Help with choosing a fude/bent nib pen

[LobsterRoll]

I'd like to try a bent nib pen. I don't need one, but I've gotten it into my head that it would be fun and I could use it in multiple ways:

• Drawing: Not that I've done much lately, but I could.
• Character practice: I'm casually learning Chinese and Korean. Calligraphy is unlikely, but the nib would make writing practice that I don't do more interesting.
• Using up ink: I like trying different ink colors. Being able to write with varying line thicknesses, and especially broad strokes, is appealing.

 

I don't want to spend too much (ideally <$35) since it's for fun and experimenting. After a quick search, I'm considering these options:

1. Duke calligraphy pen. I saw two models that have a nib with an overfeed, which seems the most "fun." However, the pens seem heavy and I prefer lightweight pens.
2. Wing Sung 601 + bent nibs. I've been curious about the 601 for a while so this might be enough impetus to purchase one. The filling system doesn't seem favorable for changing ink colors frequently, though.

 

Which one should I get (or try first)? Is there another option that would be better? Are there factors I'm leaving out that are important to consider? And what are some good resources for using a fude nib?

 

Thank you!

[AmandaW]

Another option is a Jinhao 51a which comes with a bent nib (often listed as an Art nib). Less expensive than the 601 IIR and way less prone to drying out than the Duke.

 

Another is the cheap Sailor Fude which comes in a bunch of colours - green, dark blue, brown etc. I have a couple and love them.

[A Smug Dill]

I second @AmandaW's suggestion of a Jinhao 51A. Great pen, considering its cheap-as-chips price.

 

HongDian offers some good <US$10 options with bent nibs as well.

 

I find both the Jinhao and the HongDian to be better than the Sailor (steel) Fude de Mannen nibs (and feeds).

[LobsterRoll]

@AmandaW Thank you, the 51a seems like it makes a lot of sense if I don't want to spend too much. And not drying out is a good thing. It comes in attractive colors, too.

 

@A Smug Dill HongDian pens look nice, that's definitely a style I like. Now I'm very tempted to get one of those.

[dipper]

I have three fude nib pens.

They all work well, but they have all needed some fiddling around to reach that result.

 

 

1) Sailor Fude DeMannen 55 degree bend.

2) Sailor Fude DeMannen 40 degree bend.

3) Noodler's Dixie#10 piston-filler ebonite pen with Jinhao "Bent Nib" fitted by myself. About a 28 degree bend.

 

Things to consider:

 

Angle of nib bend.

All three pens above can produce a similar range of line widths and other marks, but each pen needs to be held at a different angle to the paper. The 55 deg bend nib needs the pen to be held at various angles near to perpendicular to the paper.

At the other extreme the 28 deg Jinhao makes all the same marks but with the pen held at a very shallow angle to the paper.

Some advisers I have read in the past have said you need to measure your natural pen holding angle, then choose a bent nib (and this also applies to "architect" grind nibs also) to suit, and then alter your hand posture to tilt the fude pen more or less to adjust line widths during use.

But I don't do any of that! .... I maintain just one natural relaxed hand posture all the time, and alter only the point on the pen where my fingers hold the pen body. Fingers almost touching the nib itself, the pen stands up nearly vertical. Fingers way back behind the cap screw threads, the pen lays down close to the paper.

I have honestly forgotten how my fingers move up and down the pen body! It has become so automatic. Watching my fingers now to see what they do....

Ahahh... It is a sort of Thumb vs. Index&Middle-finger-together rapid shuffle.

Your personal natural pen holding style may be very different though.

 

Ink flow

A good fude nib, well adjusted, with suitable ink and paper, can lay down huge volumes of ink, and be a joy to use.

If the ink delivery cannot keep up the the whole thing becomes frustrating.

In the past I had many problems of limited ink flow with the Sailor pens. Eventually tracked down the problem: Trapped air bubbles in the Sailor converter. ( Fitted inside the pen body like an ink cartridge, but has a screw end for filling the pen from bottled ink.) Now I stick to using Sailor ink cartridges. Different wall material, maybe slightly different ink formulation? Whatever the reason, no more problems with trapped bubbles.

Ink flow problems can affect any type of fountain pen, but fude nibs (and others such as flex nibs and music nibs) place greater demands on the ink delivery system than a standard type of nib.

 

Details of the shape of the bent part of the nib

The Sailor nibs have a sharp bend, and then a nearly flat area that touches the paper.

 

Other nibs (that I have not tried) have a more gentle curve.

 

My Jinhao "bent nib" was purchased in a Moonman pen. It did not fit the pen feed properly, and it had a large ball of "tipping" material at the tips of the nib tines. Result was erratic ink flow, and very little line varation.

I have ground off the tipping blob, and found that the Jinhao size 6 nib is a perfect fit in the Noodler's pen (it did not even need heat-setting to the ebonite feed). This one is now my favourite everyday carry pen because it just works so reliably and holds a large volume of ink.

 

Subtleties of fude nib curves are a matter of personal preference though. Below are video links that can help... I have found these reviews by Teoh Yi Chie to be confirmed by my own experiences.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[gerigo]

Unfortunately cheap fude nibs don't approximate the feel of those that the higher end pens have. For the more expensive pens, their angle of bend is carefully considered. The best fude, in my humble opinion, is still the one that Sailor makes for their high end pens. I use them primarily for Chinese calligraphy as I am on a journey to write Chinese really beautifully.

Bad news for you, casually using this to write anything is a losing value proposition if you don't have the skills. I learned from experience myself. I somehow thought that buying a fude nib will some how improve my handwriting. What a silly notion. In fact these super broad nibs will make regular handwriting ugly.

[mouse2cat]

I had a duke 209 and it was a more flimsy feeling pen than my sailor fude. 

 

Honestly the sailor fude is really great. It's cheap as anything and has been very reliable. The main differences to consider is the different writing angles of your fude. 

The 55 degree pens feel very fluid. You will move between large and small marks almost accidentally. The 55 degree pens seem to be preferred by most artists. 

 

The 40 degree fude is bent so you have to change the angle of the pen more to see the resulting angle change your line weight. This is better for when you want fine lines and then thick lines and decisively choosing between the two. 

 

If you want more fluid transitions get a 55 degree pen.

[A Smug Dill]

14 hours ago, LobsterRoll said:

I don't need one, but I've gotten it into my head that it would be fun and I could use it in multiple ways:

• Drawing: Not that I've done much lately, but I could.
• Character practice: I'm casually learning Chinese and Korean. Calligraphy is unlikely, but the nib would make writing practice that I don't do more interesting.
• Using up ink: I like trying different ink colors. Being able to write with varying line thicknesses, and especially broad strokes, is appealing.

 

You might also want to consider what is the range of line widths you want for your applications.

 

The two nibs, of which writing samples are shown below, both have impressive range of line widths:

 

The Kaigelu nib cannot write put down quite as thick a line, but it can write much finer and more crisply than the Jinhao nib; and so I find it far more useful to me, and enjoy it a whole lot more.

 

The Jinhao pen, on account of its wooden barrel, cost me a little under US$5, but you can get one with that nib and a plastic barrel for less than US$2. I have not seen any Kaigelu pens being offered factory-fitted (or otherwise pre-fitted) with the Togi-style nib, and so I have to put it together myself; the pen and the nib cost me maybe US$30 all up.

[LobsterRoll]

(Hope it's not confusing to put all the replies together like this.)

 

@dipper Wow, thank you for the wealth of information. Is that drawing done with a fude nib pen? It's very appropriate, and very helpful to see different techniques using the tool.

 

I did think a little bit about the bend angle but wasn't able to imagine what it would feel like in my hand. Your description of your hand posture is helping; I tried it holding a pen and I get what you mean about a thumb and finger shuffle. I guess I will just need experience to understand more about angle and curve preferences.

 

Oh, right, ink flow! I was looking at some eyedroppered Moonmans with bent nibs. I'm a little concerned now though about your experience with a Jinhao nib not fitting in the Moonman feed well. I'm guessing I would end up with the same items and possibly the same issue. I'll also keep in mind what you noticed about converters vs. cartridges.

 

Thank you for the video links as well. I had watched the first one (and found it useful) but haven't seen the others.

 

 

11 hours ago, gerigo said:

Unfortunately cheap fude nibs don't approximate the feel of those that the higher end pens have. For the more expensive pens, their angle of bend is carefully considered. The best fude, in my humble opinion, is still the one that Sailor makes for their high end pens. I use them primarily for Chinese calligraphy as I am on a journey to write Chinese really beautifully.

Bad news for you, casually using this to write anything is a losing value proposition if you don't have the skills. I learned from experience myself. I somehow thought that buying a fude nib will some how improve my handwriting. What a silly notion. In fact these super broad nibs will make regular handwriting ugly.

@gerigo Actually, this interest in fude nibs came about because I was idly considering a first Sailor pen and looking at different nib options. Is the best one the Fude de Mannen on their higher end models? Maybe I shouldn't ask because I'm not going to make a big pen purchase right now 😄.

 

Ah, you dashed my dreams about magically gaining better handwriting from the nib. My characters are already quite bad, so now I'm curious how truly ugly they will look when I first try writing with a fude nib 😂. Chinese calligraphy is beautiful and I have a lot of admiration for anyone who is able and willing to hone that skill.

 

 

11 hours ago, mouse2cat said:

I had a duke 209 and it was a more flimsy feeling pen than my sailor fude. 

 

Honestly the sailor fude is really great. It's cheap as anything and has been very reliable. The main differences to consider is the different writing angles of your fude. 

The 55 degree pens feel very fluid. You will move between large and small marks almost accidentally. The 55 degree pens seem to be preferred by most artists. 

 

The 40 degree fude is bent so you have to change the angle of the pen more to see the resulting angle change your line weight. This is better for when you want fine lines and then thick lines and decisively choosing between the two. 

 

If you want more fluid transitions get a 55 degree pen.

@mouse2cat Thank you for your observation about the Duke pen. I will cross it off my list. I also spent some time reading your descriptions of the different angles and looking at some pictures comparing the nibs. I'll consider more about how I want to make the lines and marks. That the Sailor pens specify the angle (most of the bent nibs I saw from Chinese brands specified the line widths) might be more useful for choosing a pen to buy, so I'll keep the Sailor pens on the list as options.

 

 

4 hours ago, A Smug Dill said:

 

You might also want to consider what is the range of line widths you want for your applications.

 

The two nibs, of which writing samples are shown below, both have impressive range of line widths:

...

@A Smug Dill I'm strongly considering getting the Jinhao 51a, so thank you for the helpful writing comparison! (Also, your handwriting is very elegant.) If I use the pen mostly for writing, I suspect I would appreciate the crisper line, but my initial thought is that the widths for the 51a should suit me well.

[dipper]

8 hours ago, LobsterRoll said:

Is that drawing done with a fude nib pen? It's very appropriate, and very helpful to see different techniques using the tool.

Yes, the drawing is a self-portrait of myself wrestling with the 55 deg bend Sailor Fude deMannen, drawn with the 55 deg bend ... 😃😃😃.

 

As others have indicated, I also prefer the 55 deg bend for drawing and the 40 deg bend for handwriting. I agree that line width changes are more spontaneous with the larger bend angle (so drawings are more lively) and require more conscious effort with the shallower bend angles. 

That explains why I have been so happy using the very shallow 28 deg bend Jinhao nib for general handwriting and diagram sketching. Its line width is almost as uniform as that of a standard type of M or B nib, unless I intentionally reduce or elevate the pen angle.

 

With the 55 deg bend I can choose to work all over the drawing, or on one area, with some selected line width. Then change grip position slightly and do some finer lines indicating form or shading. Then change grip position and block-in solid black areas in various areas of the sketch with broad wet lines. All that is done with small occasional changes in grip position. Line widths do stay fairly constant when holding at one position for some period of time in each phase of the drawing work.

 

And, for clarity of what's going on here, "italic" nibs produce more dramatic line width chages within every single letter. But they do not make cursive western handwriting look ugly because the width variations are linked to the slopes of each part of each letter, without any special input from the user, and are consistent from letter to letter.

Fude nib width variations are all down to the user's control of pen angle, and within one letter (say an "m") I cannot change the tilt of the pen within the up and down movements that create the "m". Even if attempted, the next "m" is likely to turn out differently making the text look irregular and ugly.

 

And "flex" nibs create width variation that can be used within the forms if each individual letter, and are almost entirely controlled by the user changing pressure applied within each stroke.

My fountain-pen handwriting is generally legible but tediously boring! The only times it begins to look interesting, and maybe even attractive, is when using a flexible dip-pen.

 

It would be interesting to hear from users who write non-cursive oriental scripts about how they alter the angle or turn or pressure of a fude nib to form the separated strokes of those characters.

[A Smug Dill]

On 12/29/2021 at 3:01 PM, dipper said:

Even if attempted, the next "m" is likely to turn out differently making the text look irregular and ugly.

 

Nevertheless, there are many Latin alphabet calligraphy scripts the are (designed to be) produced by brushes instead of broad-edged or pointed pens. I personally don't like all that ‘modern calligraphy’ that seem to dominate the market in hand lettering books and decorations on coffee mugs these days, but obviously some people like that irregularity in the size and positioning of letters, even when ‘writing’ in English.

 

On 12/29/2021 at 3:01 PM, dipper said:

It would be interesting to hear from users who write non-cursive oriental scripts about how they alter the angle or turn or pressure of a fude nib to form the separated strokes of those characters.

 

I can only speak for myself, and my technique was unschooled and ‘developed’, as opposed to taught either by a tutor in person or by way of instructional videos. When I write, I move my wrist as if my hand was attached by a ball socket, so the tip of the pen travel in arcs with respect to the vertical plane, to change the pressure and the amount of contact surface area between nib and paper, instead of using my whole arm to move the pen or vary the pressure. Close to a decade's training in very close range fighting techniques taught me to make lots of ‘small circle’ arc movements and and modulate the amount of force between — and within — each movement, as well as quick and abrupt changes in direction and delivery of sharp bursts of power. That's why my cursive handwriting in English exhibits lots of snap changes/reversals in direction in the nib tip's trajectory, and produces lots of acute angles with sharp points as well as long, slash-like exit strokes.

 

Where line variation within a pen stroke (when writing in English) is concerned, my mental image (or metaphor) for it is that with each stroke, it should be like slashing skin with a razor-sharp blade or scalpel, and let the incision be forced open by pressure coming from within, thus producing the gentle ‘swell’ in the line width towards the middle but the ends are still as tight and crisp as hairlines.

 

As for writing in Chinese — and, by extension, Japanese including both kanji and kana — producing the (in Japanese terminology) tome, hane and harai features involves my borrowing techniques from brush (Chinese) calligraphy I learnt (and hated) as a schoolboy, and marrying them to what I've learnt about controlling a fountain pen. In my mind, although my body may not translate it into something patently observable, I dip my forearm a whole lot more often to put pressure on the nib to produce the longer broad strokes, before flicking my wrist to bring them to almost triangular terminals.

 

Not sure if it helps to show you in a video what I actually do with my fingers and wrist when I write these characters:

 

The video plays at the actual speed at which I wrote them. (Click on the image to play.)

 

On 12/29/2021 at 5:23 AM, LobsterRoll said:

@A Smug Dill I'm strongly considering getting the Jinhao 51a, so thank you for the helpful writing comparison! (Also, your handwriting is very elegant.)

 

Thank you!

 

Edited December 30, 2021 by A Smug Dill
Added video of hanzi writing sample

[dipper]

The video is worth a thousand words. It certainly does help.

 

The nib bend is difficult to see under its "hood" disguise though. Piecing together clues from eBay and Amazon searches it seems Jinhao "bent nib" and "art nib" may be alternative names for the same thing. Is that correct?

 

(Or is the nib in the video a narrower cylindrical wrapped metal tube that encloses the feed inside the hood?)

 

For comparison here is my Jinhao "bent nib" (ex Moonman pen, now in a Noodler's piston filler pen). It looks too big to be hidden inside the Jinhao hooded grip section:

[AmandaW]

As I recall bent nibs are the ones to the right in this picture, art nibs to the left. I'm pretty sure @A Smug Dillposted it originally, but I can't find the post. Sorry. I did keep the picture.

 

[A Smug Dill]

1 hour ago, dipper said:

The video is worth a thousand words. It certainly does help.

 

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/gallery/image/7565-hand-movements-corresponding-to-writing-«詠春拳»/

 

1 hour ago, dipper said:

The nib bend is difficult to see under its "hood" disguise though. Piecing together clues from eBay and Amazon searches it seems Jinhao "bent nib" and "art nib" may be alternative names for the same thing. Is that correct?

 

Bent nib, art nib, calligraphy nib, fude nib are all terms a seller may use to describe the general class of nibs on which the tip is triangular and upturned at an angle (as opposed to arcing upwards in a rounded way), irrespective of whether the nib design is open or hooded, and whether its body is flat, convex or tubular.

 

1 hour ago, dipper said:

(Or is the nib in the video a narrower cylindrical wrapped metal tube that encloses the feed inside the hood?)

 

 

44 minutes ago, AmandaW said:

I'm pretty sure @A Smug Dillposted it originally, but I can't find the post.

 

Alas, it wasn't me.

 

 

Edited December 30, 2021 by A Smug Dill
Found the source of the image cited by @AmandaW