Fountain Pens

Use mine every day, all day. Key for me is a screw top or I find they lose the seal with constant on and off.

I have a lovely Parker Duofold at the moment, the best I have owned. Platinum Century is the backup.

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My Parker pen has a nice story. It belonged to a patient of nine and we used to talk fountain pens when he saw me because he saw I always used one. Unfortunately he had a stroke affecting his writing hand but when I visited him as he recovered he asked me to have (and use) his pen, which I have done ever since.

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I have a nice little story about great customer service by a fountain pen manufacturer.

I had two Lamy 2000 pens, both quite old (10 - 15 years) and which have had hard use. One started leaking and then the other did the same. I emailed Lamy customer service asking how much it would be to get them repaired. They sent back a very apologetic email and asked me to send the pens in. No mention of cost, but I thought well it wouldn’t cost too much so I did it.

Today I got a parcel with the two pens in. They have replaced the whole of the pen body and the cap - the only thing original in each pen is the gold nib. I was very happy with this as I effectively have two brand new pens. The best bit was that it was completely free of charge!

To me this is amazing customer service. I consider the pens to be well beyond any reasonable warranty period, and to get them back in this as-new condition and at no charge is great.

For the record, I have no connection with Lamy, apart from being a user of their pens for about 30 years, and I think that they deserve a good mention for this great service. So well done Lamy!

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I have a basic Lamy, cost me about £15 I think. Use it every day and is the nicest pen I’ve ever had.

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I have a Waterman Carene. One day I’ll rediscover how to write.
I used to use it all the time, but these days I only seem to use it to sign things.

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Montblanc Broad ballpoint here. The curse of my left handed writing style. Tried but never found a real writing pen that I could make work better than ball point.

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“Somewhere in the cosmos, he said, along with all the planets inhabited by humanoids, reptiloids, fishoids, walking treeoids and superintelligent shades of the color blue, there was also a planet entirely given over to ballpoint life forms. And it was to this planet that unattended ballpoints would make their way, slipping away quietly through wormholes in space to a world where they knew they could enjoy a uniquely ballpointoid lifestyle, responding to highly ballpoint-oriented stimuli, and generally leading the ballpoint equivalent of the good life.

And as theories go this was all very fine and pleasant until Veet Voojagig suddenly claimed to have found this planet, and to have worked there for a while driving a limousine for a family of cheap green retractables, whereupon he was taken away, locked up, wrote a book and was finally sent into tax exile, which is the usual fate reserved for those who are determined to make fools of themselves in public.”

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I got a Lamy Safari (still less than £15 I think) for my birthday almost 25 years ago and I still use it daily at work - I love it.

@Skip - I’m a leftie and the Lamy really works for me.

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I was introduced to Sheaffer fountain pens 40 years ago and I developed a love of them, especially when fitted with their broad stub nib. Sadly the company no longer makes that nib, and I’ve secured a few good second hand examples through ebay, but my favourite is still the one shown in the photo, which was a gift over 20 years ago. Quite worn in places, as you can see, and not particularly expensive, but it’s great to write with. Improves my handwriting too, although it’s still pretty bad.

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Just found my Lamy … basic but wonderful feel to it. In the same wine box was a couple of refills for my slim line Mont Blanc ball point. What I really miss is the chunky pencil from David Haywood Designs in Cheltenham. Lost it at Uni a few years ago.
http://www.davidhayward.com/hexagonal/

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Haven’t used one in years. In Primary School I came third in a region competition on handwriting with one.

I bought a 5mm (ish) clutch pencil very recently. Really like using it

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Oh yes, pencils everywhere from pound shop packs to propelling, technical and clutch.
They get much more use than pens. I am a bit too heavy handed for the very thin technical ones so 3mm and 5mm types are in pockets, bags. Nothing quite as serious as a Hayward, numerous Worther Shorty.

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Well, with me everyday is a Montblanc Meisterstuck Fountain Pen & Ballpen from early 00’s. Carried in a Dual sleeve case.
I can probably find a Parker 17 used during my Undergraduate studies, and then a Parker Sonnet for Postgraduate.

I also have a Parker 17 & another vintage Parker propelling pencil, but is that a new topic?

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I adore and used to collect fountain pens, have several boxes of vintage pens from the 20s - 50s.

One of my favourites were some of the Swans, with lovely flexible nibs. My daily writer now tends to be a modern Montblanc Starwalker.

I really must go through the collection and relive the pleasure of writing with them again…and do some restorative work on some (the sacs have probably perished by now).

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In a moment of madness I ordered three Kaco Retro pens from Cult Pens, by two get another free, £19.98.
How these are made and traded at a profit I am not sure.
There is no flex in the nib because it is hooded. Medium flow smooth writing. Just fun.
Best bit is the profile. I have long slender fingers and with many pens the transition from nib unit to body falls in the wrong place to be comfortable, with the shape it just sits smoothly in my hand.

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I did that! And got 10% off too, which is nice…

What colours did you go for then…? :slightly_smiling_face:

I was rather staid in my choice, black, blue and red. The red is nearer magenta.
Doing a mix and match with inks, Diamine grey, Quink washable blue and Herbin red.
I’ve dropped big hints for the Diamine Inkvent calendar, I might need more pens.
How about you?

Oh similar, black, blue and turquoise…I thought the red/orange dot on the clip of each suited the deco styling quite well.

Boring black ink I’m afraid (has to copy easily…)

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I’ve been using the Vanishing Point for a few years now after losing Waterman’s Exception. I loved the way it wrote also felt really good in my hand. But, it, too ( mine also was Carbonesque shown in your photo) was lost so I just picked up another Vanishing Point called Stripe.


I sold most of my collection and down to three fountain pens. A serious pen collector might laugh at Parker but surprisingly this old fashioned pen writes well. ( Premiered Lacquered Black with 18K Gold Rhodium plated nib ) Another one not shown is at a repair shop ( I dropped it one too many times ) Dunhill AD2000. Its a small miracle I have not lost it!

I grew up with Pilot and Sailor. I tried a few Sailor recently, but I found them less smooth. It does not glide well. Pilot is always a good VFM. Those Namiki nibs performs well for the money.
I am not as hard core as others who mix own ink. I can’t even bother with a converter. Needs to be a cartridge for portability so colour range is very limited. I was using a beautiful deep hunter green in for a while but it always runs out of ink so forget it! back to a cartridge with boring blue/black.

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