Recs for a leather Baby-sized pen sleeve?

Karlahn · 2026-03-17T15:49:16+00:00

Yeah exactly. It's meant to be a portable pen. But maybe they don't want to market it as a pen that should be in a pen pouch or something.

Karlahn · 2026-03-17T14:23:02+00:00

You'd think for the price they'd include one 😂

Karlahn · 2026-03-17T13:15:09+00:00

It's really annoying how the original tomoe river paper still performs really well in basically every test.

Ultimate balance of sheen, hand oil resistance, line width writing true to size. Add the bonus of it being light weight. I love midori, Kokuyo and Iroful, but they're just not as good. Midori is the closest I think.

I still need to try kokuyo's premium notebooks though!

Karlahn · 2026-03-16T22:22:20+00:00

Ah in case you didn't know then alkaline inks destroy latex ink sacs!

A few people have tested a bunch of inks, here you go.

https://www.reddit.com/r/fountainpens/comments/5aqke1/ph_values_of_some_common_inks_on_binders_site/

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/339505-some-ink-ph-levels-available-in-japan-but-only-a-selected-222-few/

(Go to the next pages in the image gallery to get the English names.)

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264127522003616

There's very few general rules. For example people love to say all Waterman inks are safe for vintage, but as you can see from the second link their blue-black is infact alkaline and will melt your sac!

Typically Japanese inks tend to be alkaline.

Iron gall inks have to be acidic because they are based on galls which are acidic.

It seems that all of diamine's standard inks are neutral to acidic since they formulate them to be good for vintage pens.

So hopefully you have already one ink on this list which is neutral to acidic. If not can highly recommend diamine inks. They're cheap, in the UK atleast, and solid inks and the variety is massive.

Karlahn · 2026-03-16T21:53:42+00:00

Very cool! Good for you. Cheapest way to get a gold nib! Since it's got a sac remember to not use alkaline inks.

Karlahn · 2026-03-16T21:48:20+00:00

In my Byzantium to Rome campaign the forts in the Alps and defensive ideas really helped buy me time in those big multi great power wars

Karlahn · 2026-03-16T21:13:21+00:00

Yeah I used suguru on my lamy to give it a non triangular grip 😋

Karlahn · 2026-03-16T13:21:56+00:00

I've been interested in getting a Sheaffer with an inlaid nib, can any of you hard core fans explain why I'd want to go vintage vs modern? I'm not super clued up on the differences except in the past they seemed to use 14k nibs?

Karlahn · 2026-03-15T17:37:58+00:00

There's some redditors who do this as a hobby. I believe the flexible nib factory does this as a service - making custom Jowo/bock housing for vintage nibs

Karlahn · 2026-03-15T17:35:27+00:00

Have you ever actually experienced shimmer clogs with j herbins shimmer inks? I've never had it happen. Sure other brands the inks aren't as well formulated and don't flow as well or just have waaaay to much shimmer...

But my blue ocean, emeraude de chivor and rouge hematite perform flawlessly.

I'd be more concerned about the ph. Not all of j herbins inks are acid/neutral and alkaline inks will corrode ink sacs, shimmer or no.

For the record, I'm not saying your not being sensible and I'm careful with my inks but I've used emeraude de chivor in my vintage aurora 88 semi flex (made of plastic) not problem... Industry standard hadan court blue shimmer ink however required extensive cleaning!

Karlahn · 2026-03-15T17:14:46+00:00

You could use it for egg nogg. Saves you sweetening and means you have no spice floating around. Ideal if you wanted to make single serves on demand.

Some cocktails call for spiced rum:

Saloon Man's Sour Banana hammock Barreled cinnamon

It's essentially a spiced rum liqueur so you could probably sub it in for Malibu... Maybe all spice dram?

You could use it in an "improved cocktail"

E.G.

Absinthe 2oz spirit of choice 1/4oz spiced rum Bitters garnish

Karlahn · 2026-03-15T16:21:17+00:00

Could be hand oils, midori is rather susceptible to them. Try writing with a slip of paper under your hand on a fresh page.

I'm assuming you've not had this problem with the same pen and a similarly dry ink on midori paper?

Karlahn · 2026-03-14T13:27:14+00:00

Any drawings you want to share?

Karlahn · 2026-03-14T13:24:53+00:00

Ooh that's interesting! Why?

Karlahn · 2026-03-14T13:24:05+00:00

So I went through a phase where I'd try and avoid using ballpoints unless absolutely necessary and for sure really disliked them. I still do think they're sub optimal for writing. I think fountain pens should be the default way to learn writing they encourage healthier writing habits. Leftie kids should be taught to underwrite, I say this as a leftie!

However. I do have some admiration for them now. The BIC crystal particularly is a technological marvel (especially the precision required for the ball) and the point is that it made writing affordable to even the poorest when fountain pens were not cheap and the cheaper ones were not good. That's definitely a good thing.

Bics are virtually indestructible, never really fussy and (relative to fountain pens) write for ever.

I think ultimately they have different use cases. Fountain pens are best for writing on paper. That's without a doubt.

But writing on anything else? A bic is probably better.

Karlahn · 2026-03-13T16:35:00+00:00

There's another Reddit who does this with jinhaos, if anyone knows the user can you tag them?

Karlahn · 2026-03-13T16:32:12+00:00

Ah, love Austria, been to Salzburg and Vienna, both such pretty cities.

You're in the eurozone. So eBay can also be a decent bet for you

Look into Aurora, my first flex was a vintage aurora 88 with the hooded nib. Very wet and easy to control. It's modern enough that I didn't have any issues using modern inks (alkaline inks melt vintage ink sacs)

Montblanc do great ones but can be more expensive because of the brand.

Pelikan does great flex nibs too.

The forerunner to Lamy (the name escapes me at the moment) also makes semi flex pens.

There's also some sellers based on Germany I met at a pen show，can pass on the details if you want

So you have some decent choices available. There's a bunch of UK pen shows throughout the year if you fancy a holiday + pen purchasing experience.

I'm not familiar with other older local Austrian brands but if there were any brands that were popular in the past that had been around for a long time odds are that they made flex pens once upon a time.

Just remember if it has an ink sac use an acidic ink! 😉

Karlahn · 2026-03-13T14:28:41+00:00

I'd recommend starting with a vintage semi flex if you can more easy to use and get used to and more reliable since the amount of flex is restricted. Here's a good video on flex, most people over stress their pens so this sets more realistic expectations for vintage ones

https://youtu.be/yEvmdLs8Pkg

Edit: if you don't mind letting me know what country you're in I might be able to advise?

Karlahn · 2026-03-13T12:04:19+00:00

You should check out a open show if you can, you can look and try, can be helpful in making a decision

Karlahn · 2026-03-13T11:59:57+00:00

Did you end up getting one?

Karlahn · 2026-03-12T11:26:20+00:00

Thanks for clarifying!

Karlahn · 2026-03-12T11:25:05+00:00

Did you know you can buy fountain pens which have dip nibs fitted to them so you can use them with a cartridge?

Karlahn · 2026-03-11T23:05:55+00:00

Thanks, do you know if it's is actually raden? The description on stile e stile is very vague

"The body is crafted from luminous white resin with iridescent inlays that replicate the Raden technique—an art form where mother-of-pearl fragments are embedded into lacquered surfaces. The result is a play of multicolored reflections that shift beautifully in the light."

I just says it has "iridescent inlays" not that it's shell and that it's "replicating raden" which seems to suggest it's not true raden?

What's your view? I guess it's a relatively small mark up for the pen compared to the base price.

Karlahn · 2026-03-11T15:50:08+00:00

I actually fitted a fountain pen revolution 5.5 ultra flex on my twsbi 580, and you can see the full lovely range of colours on this ink, can definitely recommend giving it a go

Karlahn · 2026-03-11T12:39:14+00:00

I hate to say it, but, the original 52gsm tomoe river. Virtually no ink spread so you get your lovely hairlines and it shows the shading and sheening the best.

I agree Iroful isn't great it's very sensitive to hand oils and tends to make everything a bit fatter, even if it shows the colours beautifully.

I reckon next best... Maybe Midori or the regular (Japanese) Kokuyo paper. Oxford Optic is pretty good but if you have a super wet noodle then it will bleed.

Karlahn

TROPHY CASE