Art & Craft

Beginner’s guide to the fountain pen nib

Fountain pen nib
04 Dec
1. Introduction
2. The anatomy of a fountain pen
3. Detailed insights into the fountain pen nib
4. Summing up

Introduction

An ink pen is fairly responsible for the way you transition from a kid to a grown-up. In schools and academic institutions across India, the transition from pencils to fountain pens is like putting the seal of responsibility on your shoulders. You have to handle these delicate instruments and use them to progress your writing style and speed.Read More

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According to late comedian George Carlin, losing millions of ballpoint pens in his lifetime did not only point to him being a meticulous creator who took cues from the life around but also that ballpoint pens are ‘uniform, disposable, dirt-cheap’ writing materials. Although a typical ballpoint pen is mess-free, it can never be a quality writing instrument like fountain pens or calligraphy pens that work with multiple nibs and enhance your writing quality.

You might always be amazed by the precision and neat craft that goes into designing a fountain ink pen. If you want to take your interest a little forward, you can dive into the detailed structure of fountain ink pens and understand the intricate details of these mighty instruments!

The anatomy of a fountain pen

Buying notebooks online and rendering them with the best calligraphy and arts you have mastered over the years will become futile if you don’t possess the ideal instruments for the craft. Hence, owning the best-in-class calligraphy fountain pen is of the essence if you are devoted to your craft. Read More

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However, having a calligraphy fountain pen itself won’t help create the magic if the conduit rein and tame the magic is absent! Yes, we are talking about the best notebooks!

In this regard, you can always look up the Ayush Paper online store. Ayush Paper offers you the best quality notebooks with incredible shading and shimmering effect without any bleed-through or see-through, adequate dry time on wet inks, and fantastic exposure to moisture effects! Grab the best quality notebooks at the lowest prices in the market!

Well, coming back, a fountain ink pen has the following structural components.

  • The barrel
  • The ink reservoir
  • The grip and
  • The nib.

For every nib pen, these are the fundamental structural components. Although they are equally important and have individual purposes, the nib can be considered one of the most important from a writer’s or an artist’s perspective. It touches the paper and is responsible for the overall writing experience.

Since there is a lot of confusion surrounding the various characteristics of a fountain pen nib, we will dissect it in the following section to give you a clear idea.

Detailed insights into the fountain pen nib

Fountain pens are called so because of the cascading nature in which the ink flows and leaves a mark on the paper. However, this cascading nature would have turned into an outright mess had there been no structure to control the ink flow and create the desired effect on paper.

Thus, the nib was designed with sophistication, and its constituent parts testify to the fact. An ink pen has a nib that is essentially composed of the following elements.Read More

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The nib tip:

It is the part of the fountain pen that touches the paper and is responsible for the cascading ink flow from the feed onto the paper.

The nib slit:

The fine divide starts at the breather holes and ends at the nib tip. It ensures that the ink flows from the feed into the tip through capillary action.

The nib breather holes:

The breather holes have dual functions. First, by laws of physics, it replaces the ink that has traveled into the tip with air and ensures constant flow without vacuum creation that might have led the nib to burst open. On the other hand, it ends the slit and prevents the nib from breaking in two while it is in use.

The nib tines:

The tines represent the nib parts that are separated by the slit. Flexible nibs have longer and thinner tines, whereas stiff nibs have shorter and thicker tines.

The nib shoulder:

The nib shoulders offer rigidity and strength to the tines to ensure appropriate function.

Now that we have an idea about the structural components of the fountain pen nib, let us dive into their multiple characteristics.

The material of the fountain pen nib:

The most common nib materials for ink pens are stainless steel. The stainless steel nib is often coated in gold or silver to visually impact the user. It also creates a sense of aristocracy since gold nibs are also quite standard.

It is also customary to have a stainless steel nib with a gold nib tip.

A gold nib is also quite common for a fountain ink pen, albeit more expensive!

The tip size of the fountain pen nib:

If you intend to create the best calligraphy with your favorite fountain pen, then you should be wary of this detail. The size of the nib tip essentially determines the result that the fountain pens have on the paper.

The fountain pen nib tip size points out to the tip width, and the tip width varies depending on the kind of effect you want to produce on paper. For example, if you’re going to write in bold blocks, the preferred tip width will be different from the one used to create long and narrow italics.

Broader nib tips ensure a more significant surface area for the ink to flow and remain well-lubricated. On the other hand, a finer nib tip has a limited surface area and tends to dry and create a scratchy effect on paper.

The normal variants of the fountain pen nib are:

  • Extra fine
  • Fine
  • Medium
  • Broad
  • Oblique
  • Stub and Italic.

However, it should be mentioned that fountain pen nib sizes are not universal, and hence they differ with manufacturers. Japanese nib pens have longer and thinner nib tips than their Western equivalents.

The shape of the fountain pen nib tip:

The common nib tip shapes are:

  • Rounded tip – to create a smooth flow of ink and mark uniform lines on paper seamlessly, and
  • Square or italic tip – to write with variation, with a direction resulting in a thick line and the opposite direction resulting in a thin line.

Summing up

Now that you have got the basic overview of the fountain ink pens and learned in detail about their nibs, we believe you are ready to make a purchase! So start your journey of fountain pen writing or create the best calligraphy after carefully analyzing the ideal fountain pen nib that suits your requirements!

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