Good smudge resistant black ink for vintage pen

[yerach]

Hi to all

I currently primarily use Platinum Carbon Black in my pens (the pen that I'm currently using day to day, that is... you can't leave the thing in a pen all that long...)

I've got a vintage Pelikan 400nn on the way, some told me PCB is bad for vintage pen materials.

Does anyone know:

1. if that is true?

2. if so what smudge resistant alternatives are out there that are ok and do the job?

My writing is important to me, I can't have a tiny spit bubble or someones oily hands render it unreadable.

Thanks!

[A Smug Dill]

1 hour ago, yerach said:

Platinum Carbon Black …‹snip›… you can't leave the thing in a pen all that long...

 

That's not true as a blanket statement. I left a fill of Platinum Carbon Black ink in my most-prized, ¥100,000+tax Pilot ‘Hannya Shingyo’ fountain pen for over six months, and nothing untoward came of that. No clogging, no hard starts, no dreadful staining of the clear plastic tube of the Pilot CON-70 converter except for where it got behind the mechanism. If the fountain pen in question is fit for purpose, and has good cap seal effectiveness that you're prepared to put to the test in a do-or-die manner, then leaving a fill of PCB ink in it “all that long” is exactly what I'd want to do.

[AmandaW]

My Platinum Carbon Desk Pen has been filled with Platinum Carbon over a decade without cleaning. When it gets low, I top it up. No problems.

 

It does seal very well.

 

[yazeh]

If the pen is regularly used and /or has a good seal, I don't see any problem. However, pigment inks mights be difficult to clean and might clog overtime, if the pen has not a good seal or not used regularly. 

Alternatively you can go with a true IG ink,  (Essri, Diamine Registrars, Akkerman IG, etc)  which will oxidizes into black over time. That is depending the paper you use. If your paper is absorbent, the transformation to black is instantaneous.  They are waterproof, but not lightproof

[yerach]

4 hours ago, A Smug Dill said:

That's not true as a blanket statement. I left a fill of Platinum Carbon Black ink in my most-prized, ¥100,000+tax Pilot ‘Hannya Shingyo’ fountain pen for over six months, and nothing untoward came of that. No clogging, no hard starts, no dreadful staining of the clear plastic tube of the Pilot CON-70 converter except for where it got behind the mechanism. If the fountain pen in question is fit for purpose, and has good cap seal effectiveness that you're prepared to put to the test in a do-or-die manner, then leaving a fill of PCB ink in it “all that long” is exactly what I'd want to do.

I also don't find it as bad as I was warned it'd be, but in my modern pens, when it sits to long it becomes a pain to clean (not impossible, yet a pain nonetheless), now some have told me that in vintage pens (as for their material) that bit of stubborn dirt can ruin the pen, others warned me that Japanese inks of this sort are just too acidic to sit in vintage material barrels, I'm no chemist and have no experience with vintage pens, and so I shouted out to hear whether this is true or false.

[Estycollector]

I used Waterman exlusively in all vintage pens, but it does smear. I use it because it's considered a wet ink. 

[arcfide]

6 hours ago, yerach said:

Japanese inks of this sort are just too acidic to sit in vintage material barrels

 

The traditional wisdom is that many Japanese inks are alkaline, which can interfere over time with some traditional pen materials, primarily sacs. Historically speaking, most much older vintage pens were designed with acidic ink in mind, but not necessarily alkaline inks. The "safest" inks commonly used, such as washable blues and the likes of Waterman Serenity Blue are almost all acidic rather than alkaline. 

 

Of course, how much the traditional wisdom is true today is harder to pin down, especially since sacs are made differently now. 

 

When you say smudge resistant, based on the context of the rest of your post I assume that you're speaking about water resistance (which would cover a degree of oily hand resistance). In that case, for traditional pens, the traditional water resistant ink was iron gall ink, and that is what I would probably still lean towards, especially the more gentle formulations, such as Pelikan 4001 Blue Black or Platinum Blue Black. I personally would probably avoid pigmented inks simply because I might not personally be comfortable with cleaning or the cap seal on vintage pens. However, because of this, i would also probably expect to rinse iron gall out more often just in case a poor cap seal causes trouble. The problem, of course, with the iron gall inks is that you won't get the jet black look of other inks, and you're more likely to get something blue or grey. 

 

Many of the more traditional inks dry well on the page and are not subject to incidental smudging, even if they aren't fully water resistant. If you are good with that level of resistance, I can heartily recommend most of the trad black inks as good ones to give a go. That would include Waterman, Parker, Pelikan, Lamy, and Herbin Perle Noire. I don't have enough experience with modern Cross and Sheaffer black inks to be confident in those. Aurora Black and Montblanc Mystery Black seem wetter, and thus might be more susceptible to smudging. Japanese black inks are really good (I like all of PIlot, Sailor, and Platinum standard dye-based standard black inks), and since you're talking about a Pelikan 400nn, which I believe uses an internal piston instead of a sac, I suspect that those inks would work fine as well, though Sailor Black is quite wet (same problems as Aurora, IMO), and so I'd probably start with Platinum dyestuff Black if I wanted to play with those. 

 

Outside of that, if you are okay with the increased maintenance of a stronger iron gall, Diamine Registrar's can go quite dark, and might be suitably "black enough" for you. 

 

For my own choices, my favorite (not water-resistant) trad black ink is probably Waterman Black because of its cooler tone. However, I do tend to use the manufacturer's black ink in a given pen, and I've had great luck with that. 

[yerach]

Has anyone actually tried putting PCB in a vintage pen (just celluloide with no sack)?