Pelikans Factory Italic Nibs Any Good?

[MGLX]

Hello everyone.

 

I can rarely find a lot of information about factory italic Pelikan nibs, except them being seemingly quite rare.

Are they good or do/did you have good experiences with them?

 

I’m especially interested in those for the M400 or M200, since I stumbled over some offers and have a M200, which I could theoretically equip them with.

 

I only have Lamy an Kaweco Callihraphy nibs and some stubs so far. I know I could order a regrind from Fnibs if I wanted to, but I’m curious nonetheless.

 

 

I’m looking forward to hearing your experiences J

Edited May 5, 2020 by MGLX

[N1003U]

  On 5/5/2020 at 10:01 AM, MGLX said:

Hello everyone.

 

I can rarely find a lot of information about factory italic Pelikan nibs, except them being seemingly quite rare.

Are they good or do/did you have good experiences with them?

 

I’m especially interested in those for the M400 or M200, since I stumbled over some offers and have a M200, which I could theoretically equip them with.

 

I only have Lamy an Kaweco Callihraphy nibs and some stubs so far. I know I could order a regrind from Fnibs if I wanted to, but I’m curious nonetheless.

 

 

I’m looking forward to hearing your experiences J

 

I have an M215 from the mid-2000s with a factory steel italic nib. It is lovely. Crisp enough to be functional, yet not terribly unforgiving to slight variations in writing angle. For me a nice balance of writing properties.

[Uncial]

It's good but very, very broad

[Karmachanic]

Get one ground to your preference by one of the following:

 

http://www.opuscineris.com/about/nibwork/

https://fpnibs.com/collections/pelikan-m200-nibs

https://www.thewritingdesk.co.uk/brands/pelikan-pens/pelikan-custom-nibs/

https://www.fritz-schimpf.de/en/Brands/Pelikan/

Edited May 5, 2020 by Karmachanic

[Carrau]

  On 5/5/2020 at 11:21 AM, Karmachanic said:

Get one ground to your preference by one of the following:

 

http://www.opuscineris.com/about/nibwork/

https://fpnibs.com/collections/pelikan-m200-nibs

https://www.thewritingdesk.co.uk/brands/pelikan-pens/pelikan-custom-nibs/

https://www.fritz-schimpf.de/en/Brands/Pelikan/

+1 for this-Appleboom’s will also grind the nib to your preference-I have a BB M805 stub from them which turned out very well.

[LuckyKate]

I had the 800 italic broad and found it unuseable. It was just way too broad, and since it wasn't at all crisp, there was no way to get a thin line by rotating the nib. I eventually sold that nib and got a broad nib ground to a.9 CI by a nib technician. It suits me much better for everyday writing.

[MGLX]

Thanks for all the answers.

 

What I’m reading out of these answers so far is that those factory italics don’t seem to be worth the pursuit or price tag in that regard that they are probably inferior to third-party grinds.

 

That’s unfortunate, but on the other hand it’s good to hear that those solutions seem to be easier and cheaper to get and better than factory italics that may even need adjustments to be good nonetheless.

 

 

  On 5/5/2020 at 10:39 AM, N1003U said:

 

I have an M215 from the mid-2000s with a factory steel italic nib. It is lovely. Crisp enough to be functional, yet not terribly unforgiving to slight variations in writing angle. For me a nice balance of writing properties.

 

Thanks for sharing a ray of light. That nib seems to be lovely.

Edited May 6, 2020 by MGLX

[N1003U]

  On 5/6/2020 at 7:07 AM, MGLX said:

Thanks for sharing a ray of light. That nib seems to be lovely.

 

It's a good nib. A solid performer.

 

My experience in general is that Pelikan nibs out of the box are rarely all that exciting, but they work. There are always outliers, but Pelikan's QC is, in my sampling, and that of other Pelikan collectors I know personally (so maybe in total N = 100 pens or so), fairly good.

 

Pelikan, IME, doesn't let many bad nibs get out of the factory (my worst complaint is maybe that the broad nibs are once in a while a bit over-polished). What happens after they leave the factory is a bit harder to control.

 

Maybe I am just not as picky as most, but every out-of-the-box Pelikan nib I have ever had, even if I didn't like it, was at least functional.

Edited May 6, 2020 by N1003U

[dms525]

I have modern gold IB (Italic Broad) Pelikan nibs for both the M400 and the M800. They are 1.5mm - very broad indeed - and rather stubbish. I have no experience with the vintage steel nibs.

 

If you want a stub to use for cursive writing, I would say get a stock nib of the width you like and have it custom-ground to your preference. If you want to have a crisper nib for italic or gothic calligraphy, the IB nibs are a good starting point for a custom grind. But so is a BB or 3B nib, if you can find one(!).

 

My everyday hand is italic, and I very much like my many custom-ground Pelikan nibs.

 

David

[DilettanteG]

I have a factory italic IB for my M800 Brown and Black, which is superb, and several custom ground nibs from F to O3B for everything ranging from a M200 to a M1000.The great thing about the Souverans is that the ink flow keeps up from a needle point XF to a Fire house cursive italic triple broad. Plus, they're easy to clean. This hasn't always been my experience with other brands.

 

They're not nearly as pretty, but these days for a crisp, really broad italic I use my Pilot Parallel sets. Mine range from a 1mm custom grind to the stock sizes of 1.5mm all the way to 6mm. Plus they're cheap, easy to replace, and very forgiving of even the most difficult inks. Sadly, they're a bit too long to carry and do look like the $10ish pen they are..

[Fuzzy_Bear]

I have an M150 with a 1.0 nib. Excellent writer and nice live variation. It's even springy.

[amk]

Horses for courses. I have the tortoise m400 with factory IB nib, and I find it very easy to write with - I have large handwriting, use it for a little more formal work. It's a 'soft' italic, no hard edges, not horribly crisp, very forgiving, more akin to say Edison's factory stub. And it 'sings' as it writes.

 

If you want an italic for calligraphy this isn't it. If you want an italic that will skate across the page laying down large amounts of ink smoothly, you'll love it.

[TitoThePencilPimp]

I purchased a Factory Italic steel (m2xx series). I only tried it with Sailor Tokiwa-Matsu. The nib writes extremely wet, but smooth. But I do not like letters it makes. It is similar to writing with a marker. Maybe, I will try this nib using Pelikan Blue-Black. Im thinking of getting this nib grounded to an F Italic by Mike.

 

But so far, not worth purchasing the Italic steel nib.

[MGLX]

Glad to hear some more experiences.

 

That doesn’t change the mixed results though. Quite polarizing opinions, from what I read.

Those italics seem to be rather cursive italics or even stubs. That is quite interesting.

 

I wonder how those compare to vintage Broads for example.

[TitoThePencilPimp]

  On 5/14/2020 at 1:43 PM, MGLX said:

Glad to hear some more experiences.

 

That doesn’t change the mixed results though. Quite polarizing opinions, from what I read.

Those italics seem to be rather cursive italics or even stubs. That is quite interesting.

 

I wonder how those compare to vintage Broads for example.

 

Maybe it has to do with my handwriting also. I prefer xxf,xf,f nibs. Ill try tomorrow, with different ink with the italic. Im hoping it was just the Sailor Ink.

[inkstainedruth]

I have an italic M nib that came on my second (used) M200 Café Crème and it was a firehose. I had to have a pro work on it, because it was a gusher even with iron gall ink. OTOH, after the work was done I put it on a different M200, and used Pelikan 4001 Brilliant Black in the pen a year ago January for a calligraphy project, and it worked extremely well.

The only other Pelikan nib that is remotely in the same category is the OB nib on 1950s era 400, which definitely does NOT put down as wide a line as the IM nib.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[MGLX]

What can I say… Sometimes I’m just slave to my own curiosity and I had the opportunity to test a Pelikan factory italic. It’s the steel nib for the M200, which is just labeled with an “I”.

 

I’ve never seen something like this. Looking at the photos is one thing, but having it in hand and using a somehow tipped italic grind is new for me. It’s as if they just flattened a ball-tipped Broad or Double Broad with a hammer and cut the end of.

 

Writing isn’t unpleasant however, but I can confirm the experiences above. It sometimes skips at start, is very wet and lacks the crispiness of real italics. The line variation is somewhat between Medium and Broad or even Broad and double Broad.

I like the shading though and it’s fairly forgiving, as others stated as well.

 

I’m still a bit baffled and unsure what Pelikan was trying to achieve here, but I decided to keep it for its unusualness nonetheless.

[max dog]

After having owned and used a factory italic M200 nib for about 10 years, my feedback is a big thumbs up. It does require some practice maintaining proper orientation of the nib to paper given its distinct sweet spot as any proper italic nib requires. Rewards you with awesome line variation and brings out the unique qualities of the ink.

Edited May 25, 2020 by max dog

[MGLX]

It’s by no means a terrible nib to write with in my opinion. Just a bit odd.

I’ll keep it on my M200, since I’m starting to like it.

 

I just made a big mistake back then however and bought the probably most boring version of the M200: The black one.

I remember being offered the blue-marbled M205 and I refused, because I wanted to have that classy look. :’D

 

Maybe I should put the nib on my M400 Old Style. I like it more than its original Oblique Broad.