Majohn A1 (a capless clone)

[Helen350]

Can't discuss the technical side of FPs, but I find my A1 writing experience without

issues with ink flow.  It writes like a F-nib.

[Misfit]

Here is a photo of how my A1 writes. I’ve decided I won’t spend the money to get it a Pilot VP stub nib. I’ll use that money on a FWI Jupiter pen with a stub nib. If you don’t know me from around FPN, I love stub and italic nibs. I don’t write small. 
 

[Helen350]

58 minutes ago, Misfit said:

Here is a photo of how my A1 writes. I’ve decided I won’t spend the money to get it a Pilot VP stub nib. I’ll use that money on a FWI Jupiter pen with a stub nib. If you don’t know me from around FPN, I love stub and italic nibs. I don’t write small. 
 

LOL.  You and I are both "large" writers.  Looks good and legible to me!

[Misfit]

Yes indeed. I tend to fill the size of the lines. Then I got a Rhodia graph tablet, and found I couldn’t use it for letters. I’d drift down a line or write too big for the graph lines. 

[A Smug Dill]

12 hours ago, Misfit said:

Here is a photo of how my A1 writes. I’ve decided I won’t spend the money to get it a Pilot VP stub nib. I’ll use that money on a FWI Jupiter pen with a stub nib. If you don’t know me from around FPN, I love stub and italic nibs. I don’t write small. 
 

 

"How do you all write so small to fit these lines?" With a strong desire to do so, and a tonne of practice, I suppose. Your A1's EF nib writes much like the ones I have here now, which are no help to the endeavour of writing “so small” but legibly. The lines are definitely wider than what I would expect of my Japanese F nibs and non-Japanese EF nibs.

 

Anyway, if you thought that was small handwriting, then try this on for size:

 

I wanted to confirm for myself, as well as demonstrate to my friend, that the Majohn A1 I was giving her is capable of putting down fine and crisp lines to support writing small but legibly (after I worked on it to ‘tame’ its line width) using suitably dry-flowing inks such as Pelikan 4001 Blue/Black and Brilliant Black‡, since she has expressed frustration with some Fine nibs and was unimpressed by the Pelikan M205 EF nib I showed her. I also gave her a bottle of Pelikan 4001 Blue/Black at the same time; my spare bottle of Brilliant Black has yet to arrive, but I intend to give that to her next time we catch up.

 

As for the Pilot Capless Stub nib, its line width is about as broad as I could stomach for “normal”, everyday writing purposes.

 

 

 

‡ Just not on Exacompta FAF 70g/m² paper, as it turns out. 

 

[Helen350]

8 hours ago, A Smug Dill said:

 

"How do you all write so small to fit these lines?" With a strong desire to do so, and a tonne of practice, I suppose. Your A1's EF nib writes much like the ones I have here now, which are no help to the endeavour of writing “so small” but legibly. The lines are definitely wider than what I would expect of my Japanese F nibs and non-Japanese EF nibs.

 

Anyway, if you thought that was small handwriting, then try this on for size:

 

I wanted to confirm for myself, as well as demonstrate to my friend, that the Majohn A1 I was giving her is capable of putting down fine and crisp lines to support writing small but legibly (after I worked on it to ‘tame’ its line width) using suitably dry-flowing inks such as Pelikan 4001 Blue/Black and Brilliant Black‡, since she has expressed frustration with some Fine nibs and was unimpressed by the Pelikan M205 EF nib I showed her. I also gave her a bottle of Pelikan 4001 Blue/Black at the same time; my spare bottle of Brilliant Black has yet to arrive, but I intend to give that to her next time we catch up.

 

As for the Pilot Capless Stub nib, its line width is about as broad as I could stomach for “normal”, everyday writing purposes.

 

 

8 hours ago, A Smug Dill said:

 

‡ Just not on Exacompta FAF 70g/m² paper, as it turns out. 

 

What beautiful handwriting!

[Lomi]

in my experience with the pen i would say it's solid F, probably close to M with good flowing ink and right paper. Actually I haven't tried enough inks in it to conclude anything, only two inks for now, but the first day when i got this pen I inked it with my usual favorite Diamine Syrah with which i have the most experience because i have tried it in every pen i own, and oh god was it a surprise to see EF labeled nib produce such line and flow, it was really really wet and quite wide for EF nib😮 at that moment i thought that it's probably closer to my F nibs or even M, though this first test was done on cheap notebook paper that makes letters a little bit bolder, i usually use it to write fast notes because it's works well with any nib up to M. But when i tried A1 in Rhodia Cahier and in Stalogy - it was definitely closer to my pocket Platinum pens with F and SF nibs, also on par with my Moonman m100 with schmidt F nib, Platinum M which i also have in pocket pen is a different story though, it beats Majohn A1 in line width on both of this papers but they produce quite a similar line width in my cheap notebook. The second ink i tried was Diamine Sepia and oh god was it a bad choice for that pen imo, idk if that ink is considered dry but it's better be because on every paper i tried it with this pen it writes dry and skinnier than Syrah, will probably never use it in it after cartridge ends.
Just for fun talking about "writing small but legibly" - for reference my usual letter height is not higher than 2mm and around 4-5mm for capital letters, sometimes unintentionally i can go down to around 1mm height to fit letters on every line of 5mm grid and this size of writing works well even with Syrah. Smallest i can write is probably - doing consistent 0.8-1mm with A1, so i done some writing with Diamine Sepia on Rhodia which in my experience doesn't allow ink to spread at all, it's like eating it making me think that everything bellow M is a waste of paper 😐 - all of this to just say that with right ink and paper it is possible to write small and legibly with this pen, you can go even smaller with reverse writing, though i dunno who needs to write that small, so it probably was extreme example on my end. (all writing was done in Cyrillic btw, but i doubt it matters much in which script you write)
 

Wasn't really trying to debate on other users experience, just sharing mine 🙂

[Misfit]

2 hours ago, Helen350 said:

 

What beautiful handwriting!

I agree. Smug has very, very nice penmanship.  With that stub, beautiful is right.

 

Maybe I could write that small if I printed. Or really trying, with lot of practice, in cursive. 

 

@A Smug Dill How are you liking the no clip red version?

[A Smug Dill]

Thank you, @Helen350 and @Misfit.

 

3 hours ago, Misfit said:

How are you liking the no clip red version?

 

The colour is nice, and fits the description of azuki (bean) red. I find there's a subtle but noticeable difference in weight balance between the clipless and ‘classic’ (i.e. with a clip, the way Pilot Capless ‘Vanishing Point’ models do) variants, and I prefer the way the metal clip shifts the weight balance towards the nib end. That said, even though the clip generally does not interfere with my grip or otherwise bother me, I don't find cold, hard and slick metal so agreeable kinaesthetically. So, on the whole, how I feel about the ’classic’ orange A1 and the clipless red A1 is much of a muchness; whereas I definitely prefer the ‘classic’ matt black A1 (on which the clip, not being glossy, intrudes on the hand-feel less) to the clipless matt black A1. Especially when trying to write small using the finest motor control I can muster, that little bit of a shift in the weight toward the knock-button end can make the endeavour a little harder.

[A Smug Dill]

Thanks to @amberleadavis for reminding me that the 9H9V (approximately 9 parallel, distinct and untouching, horizontal lines, and 9 vertical lines, inside a 5mm square space) line width performance I get from the Majohn A1's steel EF nib is roughly the same as what I got from my Platinum #3776 14K gold Medium nib.

 

 

Loosely, testing with Rhodia DotPad paper I'd regard 13H or better as Extra Fine (with most Western EF nibs barely affording me 13 horizontal lines), 11H or 12H as Fine, 9H or 10H as Medium, and less than 9H as Unusable. Fine-Medium or Medium-Fine, as they seem to only be available width grades with Japanese (and, specifically, Pilot and Sailor) nibs in current production, tend to perform in the 11H-to-12H range, but I suppose 10H could be a Western Fine-Medium.

 

So, yet another reason why I'd say the Majohn A1's steel EF nib writes more broadly out-of-the-box than a Fine nib. That applies to six out of seven Majohn A1 pens I received (with the seventh one not really writing properly until I adjusted it), and from what I can see, @Misfit's as well.

[amberleadavis]

3 hours ago, A Smug Dill said:

Thanks to @amberleadavis for reminding me that the 9H9V (approximately 9 parallel, distinct and untouching, horizontal lines, and 9 vertical lines, inside a 5mm square space) line width performance I get from the Majohn A1's steel EF nib is roughly the same as what I got from my Platinum #3776 14K gold Medium nib.

 

 

Loosely, testing with Rhodia DotPad paper I'd regard 13H or better as Extra Fine (with most Western EF nibs barely affording me 13 horizontal lines), 11H or 12H as Fine, 9H or 10H as Medium, and less than 9H as Unusable. Fine-Medium or Medium-Fine, as they seem to only be available width grades with Japanese (and, specifically, Pilot and Sailor) nibs in current production, tend to perform in the 11H-to-12H range, but I suppose 10H could be a Western Fine-Medium.

 

So, yet another reason why I'd say the Majohn A1's steel EF nib writes more broadly out-of-the-box than a Fine nib. That applies to six out of seven Majohn A1 pens I received (with the seventh one not really writing properly until I adjusted it), and from what I can see, @Misfit's as well.

Glad to have been of help. The amount of work you put into these, encourages me to share them many times. These sheets are truly helpful.

[miwishi63]

I received my orange Majohn A1 yesterday and am pleased with it. It is the first capless pen I have ever owned. It came with an empty "cartridge" installed (it is open and the top and so readily reusable), a second cartridge with a rubber plug it seal it, and a converter. It writes like a western fine. I would buy it again.

[Helen350]

My MaJohn A1-Green finally arrived.  It is a beautiful hunter's green.  It reminds me of

Diamine Sherwood Green and Erroll Flynn in Robin Hood.  I would love the A1 in a 

beautiful brown color.  The Jinhao 100 Centennial came out with a lovely brown

acrylic pen, which is not often seen in Chinese pens.  This makes my 4th A1, and

I do enjoy writing with this pen.

[MW135]

Does anyone that it likely that this will be offered with M or B nibs?

[OCArt]

21 minutes ago, MW135 said:

Does anyone that it likely that this will be offered with M or B nibs?

I just ground mine down to a stub.

[g33klibrarian]

I have a green lacquered version and the coating is starting to craze, bubble, and chip off on varying parts of the pen.

 

If I get sick of the odd texture in my hands, what material would strip the lacquer from the metal? 

[A Smug Dill]

1 hour ago, g33klibrarian said:

I have a green lacquered version and the coating is starting to craze, bubble, and chip off on varying parts of the pen.

 

Wow, that's astounding and disheartening to hear! Between my wife and I, we have two pearlised green Majohn A1 pens, and luckily it hasn't happened to either of those… yet. I don't use mine much at all, however. Have you been using and/or handling yours a lot?

[Jamerelbe]

8 minutes ago, A Smug Dill said:

 

Wow, that's astounding and disheartening to hear! Between my wife and I, we have two pearlised green Majohn A1 pens, and luckily it hasn't happened to either of those… yet. I don't use mine much at all, however. Have you been using and/or handling yours a lot?

 

Our 'combined family total' of Majohn A1s is 3 (one blue, one black, one burgundy), and so far none of ours are doing this either.  Hopefully it's just a one-off - though that doesn't make it any less disappointing!

[jchch1950]

2 hours ago, g33klibrarian said:

I have a green lacquered version and the coating is starting to craze, bubble, and chip off on varying parts of the pen.

 

If I get sick of the odd texture in my hands, what material would strip the lacquer from the metal? 

Bad news😡 even if it is a limited problem.

[PHHPHD]

I'm now up to 3 of these.  Two without clip (white and red) and one with clip (orange).  I think these are a home run.   I do hope the finish does not degrade as I think the lacquer is well done.