Some Ink Tests

[USG]

14 minutes ago, Penguincollector said:

  

 

  I don’t know how wise trying to keep up is, I go pretty hard on hobby shopping.

Daolin paper is pretty good and rather inexpensive, but it’s no Cosmo or TR.  I got it in Sanrio licensed stationery for the Chinese market. It’s not as coated as the Japanese made Sanrio paper. 

 

Hahaha, I'm pretty bad too, I want everything I see,  but I can't keep up with you...  😀👍

 

[Mechanical]

22 hours ago, USG said:

Here's A Question:  How do you guys hold your average pen.  It seems I have my index finger on in the middle of the section and my thumb on the area between the threads and the step down (or step up) or on the threads like with a Wing Sung 630, with the pen resting between the tip and the knuckle of my middle finger, (closer to the knuckle).

 

Same here.  For me, it also depends a bit on the pen.  For example, a Lamy Safari has that triangular grip which seems to gather my middle knuckle, thumb, and pointer all directly across from each other.  On a Lamy 2000, my thumb plants itself atop one of those little metal ears...

[USG]

12 hours ago, Mechanical said:

 

Same here.  For me, it also depends a bit on the pen.  For example, a Lamy Safari has that triangular grip which seems to gather my middle knuckle, thumb, and pointer all directly across from each other.  On a Lamy 2000, my thumb plants itself atop one of those little metal ears...

Haha, exactly like you with my Omas  360 triangular pen and on those little metal projections with a 2K.  👍😀

[Penguincollector]

On 1/19/2025 at 9:39 AM, USG said:

 

Hahaha, I'm pretty bad too, I want everything I see,  but I can't keep up with you...  😀👍

 

  I used to wait for my mom by the pen display counter and daydream about buying all the Parkers and Sheaffers while she shopped at the drugstore. Now I don’t have to daydream. 

[USG]

12 hours ago, Penguincollector said:

  I used to wait for my mom by the pen display counter and daydream about buying all the Parkers and Sheaffers while she shopped at the drugstore. Now I don’t have to daydream. 

 

Happiness is a stationary store.....😀👍

[Penguincollector]

23 minutes ago, USG said:

Happiness is a stationary store.....😀👍

  I concur (and am choosing to ignore the typo). 

[USG]

 

 

9 minutes ago, Penguincollector said:

  I concur (and am choosing to ignore the typo). 

 LOL, Picky, picky, picky.....

 

Meanwhile the Platinum ink arrived...

(I know the cap on the vintage ink is on crooked)

 

Platinum BB shading

 

Some other writing:

 

Platinum BB sheening

 

Kon-Peki showing sheen

 

Kon_Peki showing shading

 

 

 

[Mechanical]

Holy smokes!  I would have said that Platinum BB was simply a very saturated, well lubricated dark blue ink.  But @USG, your writing samples just amaze me. Shading and even sheen... I just would not have guessed it.

[USG]

7 hours ago, Mechanical said:

Holy smokes!  I would have said that Platinum BB was simply a very saturated, well lubricated dark blue ink.  But @USG, your writing samples just amaze me. Shading and even sheen... I just would not have guessed it.

It’s the paper. 👍😀

[USG]

Ink Variety- Close Ups to follow

 

[USG]

So I was counting the days waiting for the super expensive Yu-Sari paper to arrive. It was delivered today, all 30 sheets.  At $0.57 per A5 sheet, save your money, it's unimpressive with colors and it feathers with commonly used inks.  Although not for everybody, Cosmo Snow and Iroful blow it away at $0.105 and $0.14 per sheet respectively.  Tomoe River-S comes in at $0.085 per sheet and Kokuyo KB is $0.02 per sheet.                         

- YMMV -

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 For comparison, same pen, same ink on Cosmo Snow paper, and I think I see some feathering on the Yu-Sari paper.  Caveat Emptor.

[Mechanical]

14 hours ago, USG said:

So I was counting the days waiting for the super expensive Yu-Sari paper to arrive. It was delivered today, all 30 sheets.  At $0.57 per A5 sheet, save your money, it's unimpressive with colors and it feathers with commonly used inks.  Although not for everybody, Cosmo Snow and Iroful blow it away at $0.105 and $0.14 per sheet respectively.  Tomoe River-S comes in at $0.085 per sheet and Kokuyo KB is $0.02 per sheet.                         

- YMMV -

 

Thanks, @USG, it really doesn't do so well, does it?  

 

I will say, all these examples with Teranishi Lady Emerald ink are making me a fan. :-)

[USG]

On 1/18/2025 at 9:55 PM, Penguincollector said:

 

  It’s weird, but it works for me. The usual grip hurts.

 

I was watching Neon Highway on Netflix and I saw someone writing with your pen grip. 😁👍

 

[USG]

Some more on Yu-Sari Paper.  I am not sold on this paper at all.

 

 

 

 

[RedPie]

7 hours ago, USG said:

Some more on Yu-Sari Paper.  I am not sold on this paper at all.

...but it is a lot less feathering than with your first tests. LOL

[USG]

On 1/24/2025 at 9:40 AM, RedPie said:

...but it is a lot less feathering than with your first tests. LOL

Different inks.  I retested the pen/ink combos that feathered, and they still feathered.
I found the Colors and Nuances to be muted compared to Iroful and Cosmo Snow and the paper is a yellowish color, which has an effect on some ink colors.

 

Another thing I noticed was that the weird feathering by the KOP/Noi Sumire combo did not occur on the retest which leads me to believe that there are areas on the paper that weren’t processed properly.

 

I like testing inks and paper but the bottom line is that Yu-Sari paper is not going to work for me.  I’d place the color and nuance performance on the same level as LIFE yellow paper, so for people who use LIFE notebooks it’s probably going to be OK (except for the price).

 

EDIT: OK, So it's not really as yellow as LIFE paper, but it's not white either...  This over priced paper has given me a bad attitude.  Sorry.

[USG]

Nuances:

Many inks have color and sheen nuances that are only displayed on the highest quality paper. 

 

Sailor Manyo Konagi is an example of one of them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Lithium466]

On 1/18/2025 at 4:03 PM, USG said:

 

I'm having some difficulty understanding Matte inks vs. Shiny.  What would be an example of an ink that dries shiny in a way that's not a sheen?

 

My comment on Horizon Blue is that Horizon blue is a wet version of Waterman Blue.

 

What was wrong with the Sailor #743 you told me about?  It's a nice medium blue. 

 

IIRC, Waterman Blue, Asa-Gao, Edelstein Sapphire, Aurora Blue and many others, all look the same after being in the pen for a few days.

 

A Blue ink in that didn't seem to darken as much  as the others was Diamine Sapphire Blue, if you can stand the moldy smell.

 

 

I couldn't get a satisfying answer. Ran many tests with some black inks, as some dry "matte" vs "shiny", but I think what I define as shiny is just what would be sheen with any other colour than black. Like pre-sheen maybe? For ex Sailor black fresh from the bottle dries rather matte (EF/dryish nibs). Wait a week for it to be more concentrated and it's on the shiny side. Wait one more week and use a wet pen and it's almost sheening.

 

On the medium blue side, Herbin EdS is on the "matte" (no sheen) side. Let some evaporate in a sample tube left open for a week and it's almost sheening. Same goes for Monteverde Confidence blue. So back to square one, pen/ink dependent and proper pairing needs to be found.

 

Sailor #743 is a touch too dark, and #443 is way too boring for what it costs. I need to revisit Horizon blue and maybe Capri blue, but I'm out of these and added them to my list. Diamine Sapphire is interesting - this one and Sargasso sea are favorites of mine, I don't mind the smell (less than the KWZ vanilla smell surprisingly). There's also Diamine Royal blue that could have some potential, can't get an idea with the various tests I saw so far. Is it a methyl/methylene blue? Hard to say without getting some first.

 

On 1/18/2025 at 4:03 PM, USG said:

 

IIRC, Waterman Blue, Asa-Gao, Edelstein Sapphire, Aurora Blue and many others, all look the same after being in the pen for a few days.

 

Blasphemy! Ok, maybe. But they won't feel the same in the pens, and Waterman and Aurora blue will fade on the proper paper if you let them. Maybe I should revisit Asa-Gao.

 

On 1/21/2025 at 1:45 AM, USG said:

 

Happiness is a stationary store.....😀👍

 

❤️

 

On 1/22/2025 at 10:58 PM, USG said:

So I was counting the days waiting for the super expensive Yu-Sari paper to arrive. It was delivered today, all 30 sheets.  At $0.57 per A5 sheet, save your money, it's unimpressive with colors and it feathers with commonly used inks.  Although not for everybody, Cosmo Snow and Iroful blow it away at $0.105 and $0.14 per sheet respectively.  Tomoe River-S comes in at $0.085 per sheet and Kokuyo KB is $0.02 per sheet.                         

- YMMV -

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 For comparison, same pen, same ink on Cosmo Snow paper, and I think I see some feathering on the Yu-Sari paper.  Caveat Emptor.

 

Yuck. How come? On both sides of the page? Is it a smooth paper?

I'm still suffering and huffing and puffing with Oxford Optik+. I'm finishing that notebook and will be done with Optik+

[USG]

16 hours ago, Lithium466 said:

I couldn't get a satisfying answer. Ran many tests with some black inks, as some dry "matte" vs "shiny", but I think what I define as shiny is just what would be sheen with any other colour than black. Like pre-sheen maybe? For ex Sailor black fresh from the bottle dries rather matte (EF/dryish nibs). Wait a week for it to be more concentrated and it's on the shiny side. Wait one more week and use a wet pen and it's almost sheening.

 

Fresh from the bottle only counts with dip pens.  In the real world of office pens, the color of the ink is the color after it settles in.  Sure, after a refill, you might get the lighter, out of the bottle color, until the fresh ink in the feed is used up, or it sits over night,  then it's back to the darker color you've become used to.

 

16 hours ago, Lithium466 said:

Sailor #743 is a touch too dark, and #443 is way too boring for what it costs. I need to revisit Horizon blue and maybe Capri blue, but I'm out of these and added them to my list. Diamine Sapphire is interesting - this one and Sargasso sea are favorites of mine, I don't mind the smell (less than the KWZ vanilla smell surprisingly). There's also Diamine Royal blue that could have some potential, can't get an idea with the various tests I saw so far. Is it a methyl/methylene blue? Hard to say without getting some first.

 

Sailor #743 is a touch too dark?  Horizon Blue and Sargasso Sea are darker.  Diamine Sapphire is a different color.

Talking about smell, check out Noodler's Liberty's Elysium.  I don't know what's going on with that ink.

 

16 hours ago, Lithium466 said:

Blasphemy! Ok, maybe. But they won't feel the same in the pens, and Waterman and Aurora blue will fade on the proper paper if you let them. Maybe I should revisit Asa-Gao.

 

After these inks settle in the only way you'll be able to tell them apart is to use Cosmo Snow or Iroful paper and even then it's hard to tell them apart.

 

I never experienced Waterman Blue or Aurora Blue fading.  How did you get them to fade?

 

The other thing is, who constantly cleans out their work pen?  After a number of refills, I found the feeds in work pens developed a reservoir of dye that would tend to keep the ink color dark.  Do you think anyone was busy washing out their Parker 51s back in the day or just refilling and refilling and refilling?

 

I could be wrong but I think Asa-Gao is darker than #743 after a day.

16 hours ago, Lithium466 said:

Yuck. How come? On both sides of the page? Is it a smooth paper?

I'm still suffering and huffing and puffing with Oxford Optik+. I'm finishing that notebook and will be done with Optik+

 

I haven't tried the other side of the page.  Why bother if the first side feathers?  Smooth?  I think you could say it was like OPTIK with tooth but definitely not white like OPTIK.

 

I can't tell you how many notebooks I have with only a few pages used.  I'm on page 19 in the 70 page Red 'n Black OPTIK notebook.

 

I only used a few pages in these notebooks because they Feather.

L to R

Sugar Cane, LIFE, Kokuyo, APICA thin, Stalogy, Nemosine... not shown Maruman brown cover, Kokuyo white cover and others.

 

[RedPie]

On 1/24/2025 at 11:12 AM, USG said:

EDIT: OK, So it's not really as yellow as LIFE paper, but it's not white either...  This over priced paper has given me a bad attitude.  Sorry.

LOL.