Your First Fountain Pen

A nice bunch :)

Since you're reading this, I assume that you are already flirting with the thought of buying a fountain pen, but you're not sure where to start. I know the feeling. In fact fountain pens are of the most various shapes, materials, nibs and filling systems, so many that one can be easily lost and end up buying something that is expensive but does not do the job he intended in the first place, or something cheap and flimsy that drives him nuts.

In this article I will focus on what your first fountain pen should be like, and I'll explain why, so that you're introduced to the fun world of the fountain pens without the "side effects", most importantly, avoiding getting a pen that its cost will not match the pleasure of using it.

For the expert fountain pen users, this article could be a fun read also, and of course your comments and thoughts are more than welcome :)

I will cover the following:

• How much should I spend?
• What characteristics should my pen have? (nib size and type, filling mechanism, materials)
• What kind of ink should I use?
• What brands and models combine all these characteristics?

How much should I spend?

Your first fountain pen, should not cost much money. Why? Until you become familiar with operating, writing with, filling, maintaining and cleaning your pen, it is best for you to have a pen that writes well, but allows you to "play with it", even damaging it without risking a heart attack.

There are fountain pens of the most various prices but I'd say that a pen that would write well would cost no less than 15.25€ (with today's prices), and no more than what you are very comfortable with. I understand that for some people 457.39€ are nothing, but for most of us destroying a pen of that cost could give us a stroke :) So let's keep the cost as low as we can.

Pen, ink, converter and spare nibs (yes you'll get some of these too) should not cost over 38.12€ Of course, you could spend much less, but I can't guarantee that this will work for you, at least not as an introduction to fountain pens.

What characteristics should my pen have?

The most important things your pen should have are the following:

• Good materials
• Smooth, reliable nib/feed
• It should work fine with most inks
• Avoid fancy filling systems. A cartridge/converter is fine.
• Versatile

The material of your fountain pen, should be durable and its size and design should feel comfortable in your hand. That is of course a subjective matter, but I would advise you to avoid pens that are very heavy, or too small or enormously big. I would suggest a pen made of plastic or aluminium, both durable and light materials that allow you to have long writing sessions without getting cramps.

I would al suggest a steel nib instead of a gold one for your first fountain pen for the simple reason that gold nibs are expensive. At this price you will not find gold nibs, and if anyone suggest that his 15.25€  pen has a gold nib, is suspicious at best. Furthermore, the steel nibs are generally more durable, and if you damage them, you can easily replace them without having to pay hundreds of dollars.

Nib size: I would start with a medium. Even though there is no standardised nib size (a medium for a brand can write like a fine of another or like a broad of the next brand), the medium is generally the size that most people are comfortable with. Of course, we'll get some spare nibs too, so that you can change them and try them, without having to buy more pens in order to test what's best for you.

The pen should have a feed, the part that adjusts the ink flow to the nib, and a nib, that works fine with most inks. Some pens are quite selective with their inks, and can clog easily with an ink, or burp ink all over your documents if the ink has a low viscosity. We'll get back to that later.

The part of the fountain pen that draws the ink inside it is called the filling mechanism. There are all kinds of filling systems, lever fillers, piston fillers, eyedroppers, vacuum fillers etc. It is best that you use something that does the job and it is easy to clean. The most popular system is the cartridge/converter. This means that you can either use cartridges, which are capsules already filled with ink that you simply put inside your pen and you're ready to go, or a converter, which is a tube, provided with a piston that sucks the ink from a bottle into your pen. The downside is that they usually contain less ink  than other filling systems, but again, at this price, you will not find the "fancier" fillers easily and if you do I doubt if they will give a satisfying experience.

Finally, your pen should be versatile. Your first fountain pen will be a pen on which you'll be testing nib sizes and inks, so you don't want a pen that you can't take apart easily or that has a fixed nib size. By that I mean that the fountain pen ideally, should allow you to change your nib with another size or type without having to buy a whole new pen instead. There are models that allow you to do that easily and they're the best for the job we need them to do.

What kind of ink should I use?

The two most important things of a fountain pen are of course its nib, and the ink you're using. That combination will give you the result you want.

There are all kinds of inks and everyone has its own characteristics. An ink has some properties. Viscosity, shading, drying time, water resistance are some of these. You don't have to become an expert, you just want an ink that works well with most pens and scores at least average on most characteristics at a logical cost. I would recommend Quink by Parker, or Waterman inks as a start. Noodler's has great inks too, but given their amazing variety it's trickier choosing one for your first ink. I would also leave the fancy, expensive inks for later, once you're confident, and addicted :-)

So, what is the pen that combines all these characteristics? 

 From top to bottom: Lamy vista , Lamy safari and Lamy AL-star

My first choice would be Lamy. Every fountain pen lover I know of has at least one of the cheaper series of this brand, and that's for a good reason. They are reliable, they're well made with nice materials and they also offer the option to easily change nibs whenever you like just by pulling the one on the pen and inserting a new one. 

The models I recommend are: Lamy Safari, Lamy Al-Star, Lamy Vista. All these pens are made by plastic (or aluminium, the Al-Star), they all have cartridge/converter filling systems and they all have steel nibs that you can buy separately. I am using these pens daily along with my more exclusive ones.

Lamy spare nibs

Parker IM

Another excellent choice for our purpose is the Parker IM. Instead of purchasing one Lamy Safari plus a nib, for the same price you can buy two Parker IMs with different nib sizes. They also have a more classic look that some prefer to the more particular design of the Lamy. I would only say that generally the Parker pens have broader nibs, so a Parker medium could be close to a Lamy broad. But getting a fine and a medium should cover most people's needs.

The same goes for the other Parker cheaper models, you can  check them out, they will offer more or less the same writing experience, so it's more of a matter of taste for their design than their nib quality. Just remember to keep the cost low :)

Pilot Metropolitan

Another pen worth mentioning is the Pilot Metropolitan. For less than 15.25€ you  get a decent fountain pen that is a nice introduction to the fountain pen world, it looks nice and it is reliable. Remember that this is an Asian pen, and they tend to have finer nibs than western pens. That means that the Pilot medium would write close to a fine nib of a western pen like Lamy or Parker.

Pilot Varsity

Finally, if  you just want to try what a fountain pen feels like, you can do so with 2.29€ Yes, there is the Pilot Varsity. These are disposable fountain pens, which means that once the pen is empty, you just throw it away. Of course there are ways to re-fill the pen, but I won't explain that here, but you can easily find the info online. 

The nibs of these very cheap fountain pens are quite nice for the money, and you can get a set of 7 for about $20, or get them separately for 2.29€ each. 

Of course, don't expect the quality of the previously mentioned fountain pens, but you can try them or even buy one along with your first Parker or Lamy etc.

I hope that this article was helpful, and of course I'm waiting for your impressions after using your first fountain pen!

All fountain pens images obtained by Google Images search.