So strange , my ECOS write beautifully and have never cracked ; my Lamy AL extrafine writes perfectly, it is a little bouncy and it digests, works with every ink, unlike more expensive pens.

The Shaeffer bottle has a what they all well

I'm a sucker for my Kakunos. I love how quirky-looking and light they feel in my hand. 🥰

It suddenly feels like I've dodged a bullet by going with the Kakuno over the Explorer... 😬 The Kaweco Sport came as a surprise, ngl. I've had a friend swearing by it. I still want to get a Lamy Safari EF though. They seem quite popular among urban sketchers.

i just bought a pen at the supermarket brand new for 1 euro. it has a rubbery grip section and a (naturally untipped) stub nib. it works just fine. my perception of value in fountain pens has gone right out the window

My fave for couple of years now is Leuchttrum1917 they have loke 100 of colors, different calendar options cause i use calendar for work daily task and # for daily nores, work related etc, as well as others for my language classes for the grammar rules, etc. Paper is good for me, it holds regular highlighter it doesn't bleed through and the brightest doesn't show much on other side. I also love the color of the paper not white but not too yellow. I even got special bronze edition and they even etch your name on it in some shops or on book fairs where they have stands I also love how pages in notebooks are numbered

I love my many Kaweco sports, and they write well every time. I get that there are lousy ones out there, but it has not been my experience. I wonder if nib size is a factor? I have nothing smaller than a medium. Also, I’ve never cracked a TWSBI and I use them a lot (but I’m not a tinkerer). Safaris for me are OK, but not as smooth as I prefer. I had one Preppy crack, and it was a nasty mess! But I think I tempted fate by having it in a pocket while sitting down. Oops.

Twsbi eco was my first fountain pen and I still write with it. Such a comfortable writer.

The two colors in one pen is really funny. It reminds me of my time in school. I am from Germany and almost everyone had a Lamy Safari, but in many different colors So it was very common the change the colored parts with your friends.

Diamine 30 mL bottle mouth SUCH a pain that could be so easily solved with a wider mouth! Switched away from Writer's Blood because of all the steps needed to fill my 823 (vac filler).

I would remove lami safari's extra fine nib from the list . I have it an its one of the best purchases i have had . The tactile feedback is amazing

I kind of don't like the Tuzu. I have already commented on it under the Figboot review in a bit of a controversial take, but I just don't see how the nib adjustment is useful here. If the barrel was not triangular, there would be no need to adjust the nib itself, whatsoever, because you can just rotate the round grip in your hand freely. Since then, though, I thought about it and arrived at the conclusion that the Tuzu is more of a local competitor to the Safari in Japan. I'm thinking that it has better regional price (Lamys are probably imported, therefore having a natural price bump), while also having finer nib choices that appeal to the Japanese audience more than the awful QC of the Safari EF nibs. The nib adjustment is like a bonus feature to appeal to a wider audience of abnormal grips against the Safari, too. Wicked marketing practices, honestly. Here in the EU though, Safari are a very good offer.

I love Leuchterm , the thin, 8x11 size.

Pointless video

Now I want more pens!

I love LAMY, but cannot get past the Fugly Clip on Safaris (looks like a giant broken paper clip! ACK!) I like Pilot Explorers and Platinum Plaisirs, but I get annoyed when entry-level pens have proprietary converters/cartridges because it just confuses newbies and makes them frustrating to refill, which for me is a key draw for using a fountain pen! When I Penable a friend or family member that I can spend more time "Shelaborating," I will go with Japanese pens, but when I am Penabling a newbie, I only go with pens that accept standard international cartridges and converters. Faber Castell Grips and Kaweco Perkeos are my Faves for using at work and gifting,

Have you tried the Cognitive Surplus notebooks? They have absolutely beautiful science-themed pocket-sized notebooks like these, sewn very well

Thank you for the recommendations! I’m on the lookout for a new notebook at the moment. I had one Moleskine ages ago that I disliked, but after that I’ve stuck with Leuchtturm1917. They are lovely, but I would love to try something a bit different.

I had a couple Sheaffer Targa fountain pens in the 80's that I wouldn't buy again. There were two problems. First they were cartridge pens and the cartridges were expensive, small, and then usually only half full. They had a rubber bladder adapter, but it was a pain to use and held almost no ink. The other problem was the nibs. The nicer ones with the gold nibs were fine. But the ones with the stainless nibs just did not write well. I'm sure they were fine for someone with a different style, but not for me. I will respectfully disagree with you on the Safari though. I like an extra fine nib and the Safari has worked well for me. Maybe I got the one good nib ;) Now the Lamy 2000 I've had trouble with, I had one that just did not want to feed ink properly. It was always dry. I finally sent it back to them and they rebuilt it. That was in the mid 80's and it's been fine ever since. That's a pen I certainly would buy again.

I've been around the fountain pens, and I hate bad paper. Moleskin paper is garbage, it is just crispy toilet paper. I am not a fan of Lunchstorm. The paper is a step better than Moleskin, but just a little. It still feathers and bleeds if you use anything other than fine dry pens. If you have to have that style of a notebook, I'd go for the Rhodia. (Clairfontaine makes fantastic paper - and Rhodia, Quo Vadis, Exacompta are all Clairfontaine brands.) I like Midori and Letts of London for paper with a bit of texture. Tomoe has been a benchmark but can be hard to get in notebooks. If you're hard up for cash, and want decent paper, find cheap $1 composition notebooks made in Vietnam or India. The paper is surprisingly good with fountain pens.

I agree with you on the Lamy extra fine. I like them but they are just a bit too scratchy.

I love my Kakunos EF fountain pens. (14 and counting. ) I'm purchasing a clear resin kit from Amazon to try to fill the anti choke holes. This is to try to slow the evaporation rate. Potential problem: vacuum effect in a snap cap. I've learned to try to slowly lift the cap up. As a tinker person, have you experimented with syringing a CON-70? I'm not to fond of placing part of the nib section into a bottle of ink to try to fill it up. Next Project: Decorating the clear demonstraters with finger nail stickers. Lacquer will be used.

I always refill with a syringe so I only consider the colour of the ink, and sometimes the aesthetics of the bottle design. There're a few brands' bottle designs so beautiful that I definitely want to own one: Tools to Liveby, Alchemy, Ferris Wheel Press (the globe one)

Go vintage! What has already lived 50, 70, 100 years will live another whole life! Just learn how to buy and check them at the moment you find them.

Twsbi is trash. Every single one that I've had has cracked and leaked. They want to talk about "user error". Why have my Lamy pens never failed like this? Why haven't my Pilots? I'm never buying another one.

My kaweco sport M nib never had any problems writing

May I suggest an addition to your list? Faber-Castell School+ Fountain Pen is a very affordable starter pen with a smooth medium nib. It's not going to going to dazzle you, but it won't disappoint you either.

Kakuno is absolutely great for value. It's among the cheapest pens I own but the one I use the most. It's reliable, well behaved, and pretty forgiving with poorer quality paper. I just bought a second one at the pen show today

Good to see that I never wanted any of these five pens. There's one pen that I was super into but will not buy again after buying three of them, Parker Sonnet. The cap design is so flawed that the pen dries out in no time. Especially frustrating for people who don't do super long writing sessions

Low price and good looking pens that I recommend for starters include the Pelikan Twist, which comes in lots of colors and is easy to hold. The shape begs to be turned, but don't do it. Pull the cap off. Another candidate is the Jinhao x159, which some dislike for it resemblance to a high-price pen, but it's a wonderful writer. The Jinhao 9091 is really large, has several steel nib options and a generous converter, and looks impressive. A pen line called "Cutie" seems to be a white label Lamy Safari in a big range of decorated barrels and sometimes comes with rainbow-colored nibs. I have these in all sorts of designs, colors, finishes and they write like crazy. Amazon has a basic pen under its own brand that is inexpensive and decent. Wing Sung 601 (iirc) is a hooded nib, sleek, looks a lot like classic Parker 51. Classic pen models can often be had for your price range, and can often be restored inexpensively. Old Esterbrooks are not at all like the modern ones.

I have permanently retired my safaris. Terrible nibs, they dry up and they’re ugly. Waste of $$$$

Agree about the brittleness of the plastic used in Preppies. I think that's a deal breaker for school use. Same problem with the Kakuno. Conversely, no problem with the Kaweco Sports. I have two - F and EF - and they've written beautifully and without problems for several years.

Platinum's bottles look good, but the best thing about them is they come with an intr-bottle ink well, making filling your pen easy when you run low on ink. All ink bottles should have this.

Rohrer & Klingner's brown bottles probably blocks out UV light.

Thanks for the great comparison video! I was looking for something with a good stub nib on it that was still at an entry level price, and I’m not new to fountain pens, but it’s been a long time since I had one. I recently purchased a Kaweco Sport F nib and I love it. I could just get another one of them with a stub nib, but I wanted to try something different, too. I’ve never used converters, I’ve always used cartridges. I’ll use them in the future, probably, but I don’t want to force myself to have to do that, especially since I can just fill cartridges with a syringe. I really want to thank you so much for the detail you described. My first fountain pen was the Lamy Safari in the aluminum, and I wasn’t able to try any pens in person, and it was recommended and looked cool. It was wayyyy too heavy for my hands, and I despise a tripod grip. Because of it’s awful (imo) tripod grip (because my grip is anything but tripod,) it was literally painful to use for any type of writing session, and so it was my pen at work for my calendar, jotting post-its, etc. So many people seem to like the TWSBI, and I’ve only heard of the ECO and just found the Swipe…which for $27 with 2 converters and it takes standard cartridges, I thought that was amazing. You sealed my decision making with two things: the ECO being very top/back heavy similar, but not quite as bad as, the Lamy…and the ECO having any kind of notching/tripod grip in the grip section. That’s an automatic “nope!” for me, and it is hard to see that until you point it out (I hadn’t noticed it before.) So, for Pen Day, which is coming up soon, I will probably be getting the Swipe…definitely in my top 3 list (unless the Kaweco Student is really on sale, and then I’m going for that, the retro look is gorgeous. I have written with one and it feels wonderful.)

I forgot. Also Faber Castell Grip and Faber Castell Hexo. Excelent both of them.

I would recommend the Pilot 74G+ . It is lighter than the Metropolitan. The nibs are interchangeable between the two models. The Asvine P20 would also be a good choice, although I am aware that for a beginner the piston filling method might be a bit scary.

Have you considered putting in some soft foam to protect the surface of the pens?

If u buy the cheap products is consider low quality also it almost feel like disposable items but if u buy high quality products it consider to be expensive and a heavy burden and stressful to deal with it if u buy products is healthy balance like economic goods the material maybe limited but still have some good quality into it

I have forced my preppy to survive by taping the cap closed. I love them, and I'm willing to do a little work to avoid throwing them away. I hate having to throw away things, so that's just a me thing.

Akkerman has the most practical ink bottles

My EF safari gives the perfect pencil feedback, I am scared to buy a second, my luck can only go so far

the Lamy stub nibs are really good

I got the Tuzu with a Fine nib, and it has almost zero ink flow, so it is completely unusable. If anyone wants to take a chance on this one, I recommend you get a Medium nib at least.

I'll check out the kaweco fix vlog; I love that pen but it dries up after one use.

Love Leuchtturm 1917 notebooks. Their pens aren't bad either.

3:00 what a beautiful doodle!