I got new nibs

So I finally broke down and picked up a couple of Richard Binder’s specialty nibs for the Pelikan M200. One of my M200’s had a bad nib, apparently through faulty manufacture (the slit isn’t centered so the tines are uneven) and through carelessness had one tweaked tine and broken the iridium off of the other. It was very scratchy and uneven, and it needed to be replaced.

I bought an ItaliFine nib and a 15-degree left-foot oblique cursive italic (.7mm) nib. Having used only the Pelikan’s fine and medium nibs, these are a real change. The ItaliFine nib is pretty cool. It’s a .9mm cursive italic nib when held normally, and a fine nib when flipped upside down. The fine side is comparable to the Pelikan fine, although somewhat smoother in feel, and perhaps a bit wetter. It’s also rather sensitive to rotation of the pen. If you rotate too much, the edge of the nib hits the paper and all of a sudden you’ve got relatively broad strokes. The italic side writes smoothly, although I find it a bit broad for my taste. It’s also somewhat wetter than I’m used to.

The left-foot oblique cursive italic nib is nice. While the stroke is broader than I’m used to, it’s not TOO broad. It’s very smooth to write with, and the oblique angle fits perfectly with how I hold the pen. And it makes my handwriting look so much better, almost artistic.

One thing that I’m finding a bit difficult to get used to is the requirement to write larger. I have a relatively small hand, and the broader strokes of both these nibs make my normal writing illegible. I’m not sure this is completely a bad thing, as I’m getting older and my eyes are having to work a little harder on to read. But I also use the smaller Moleskine notebooks, and larger writing means less per line, less per page. Maybe I just need to get a smaller italic nib. Hey, Richard, can you help me out…?