soap!!?? not a great idea in a fountain pen

"Bruce Burke" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 06 Dec 2005 00:03:31 -0800, Iain Dalton "iain [dot] dalton
[at] gmail [dot] com" wrote:

I'm a high-school student, with a $75/wk. salary, so I'm not looking
to
get an expensive pen, but I'm getting or getting myself a journal this
Christmas holiday, something I've procrastinated a long time, and I
want
it to look worthy of showing to my posterity, so I've decided to get a
fountain pen. Now, there are several issues:

1. I've never used a fountain pen before.
2. I'm left-handed, and don't want to smear as I write.
3. I know that many of them are expensive, though I am willing to
splurge a bit.

Naturally, I have some questions:
Are there any special guidelines to follow when writing with a
fountain
pen rather than a ballpoint or gel pen?

Fountain pens need to be flushed out every so often with warm water
and a touch of soap just to keep dried ink from building up inside.

Should I get a pen with an
inkwell instead of a fountain pen? How do I deal with my
left-handedness?

With a fountain pen, you might have to adjust how your hand moves
across the paper as the ink fries. However, gel rollerballs can create
the same problem.

Do I need to buy some kind of left-handed pen? And
last, what are some good budget fountain pens I can look into?

No, ya don't need a left-handed pen. As for pens types. there are
bunches and bunches, myself, I'll confess to being a Parker bigot. You
can pick up a Parker 45 Flighter on Ebay for around $25 - 30 USD, plus
shipping costs. Excellent writer, uses either a cartridge, or has a
slide converter that allows you to use bottled ink and it is a snap to
use, even one handed.

--
Iain Dalton


Check out this place, there are a BUNCH of friendly, helpful folks
there. there are also lots of pen reviews and scanned, or photographed
samples of how many pens write. Just watch out for James Pickering,
his writing will drive you mad! *wink*

http://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/

Regards,

Bruce
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