If you dig through my social media profiles you’ll quickly see that one of my favorite colors is blue. Other colors I clearly tend to prefer are black, gray or silver, and purple. I try to branch out, but the appeal is quickly lost when I’m looking at colors I don’t prefer. Also, working in a professional environment, I need to keep things looking professional and not cheesy.
These considerations are especially poignant when I’m considering buying inks. I want to have an ink that I can use at work on applications or other government documents. I also want my writing to look professional and not like a third-grader chose my ink. Otherwise, I simply won’t use it as much and it makes it hard to review an ink that I’m only using in a journal or on the few documents I can at work. Given my preference and my limitations at work, I find myself especially drawn to black and blue inks. I especially love a good blue ink and often buy the blue or black ink form a particular line. As such, this week my review is the Pelikan 4001 Konigsblau Royal Blue. For an interesting short read on the history of King’s Blue and its relation to King George III, check out this article by Internet-Ink
Pelikan has been manufacturing this line of ink for over a hundred years. In this time, it’s become one of the most trusted, consistent, and well-known inks in the fountain pen community. With this much time to perfect the ink, Pelikan guarantees that the ink will be bright and shining, flow well in your pen, and provide expressional writing. Yes, that’s expressional not exceptional. In my opinion, and as I hope to make clear below, I think Pelikan lives up to these claims while providing an economically priced ink.
In my apparent never-ending search for a great blue ink, I came Pelikan’s Royal Blue ink multiple times claiming it was not only a vivid blue ink but a great ink for fountain pens. Pelikan claims that their ink is optimized for their brand of pens in that it will keep them functioning optimally. These features are not lost on other brands, so other pens can benefit from the premium ink in terms of optimal flow. After hearing time and time again about the quality of this ink I decided I had to give it a shot. I received it around the time that I got my TWSBI Eco fountain pen with blue accents. Naturally, you have to put blue ink in a blue fountain pen! Not really, I’m just a weirdo that likes to do that.
The ink complemented the blue highlights of the TWSBI perfectly! And on paper, the ink is vivid, consistent, and doesn’t seem to feather even on cheaper papers. It’s possible that the lack of feathering is due to the extra fine nib as it doesn’t put a lot of Ink on paper. However, I found many inks still feather with an extra-fine nib depending on the type of paper. Getting back to its color, the ink is a brilliant and dark blue. On the color swab, you can even see a hint of purple giving it an added depth that you don’t see in a lot of blue inks. You don’t get colors like that in a disposable pen you find laying around in offices across the world. Your writing will truly stand out with this ink.
Pelikan claims that the color ink you choose is an expression of your personality. I don’t know if I buy claims that ink expresses personality or feeling unless intentionally chosen by the writer, but I definitely think an ink can help you be noticeable or stand out from the crowd.
The writing experience with this ink is exceptional across the board. I tested it on papers ranging from cheap printer paper to Rhodia, Tomoe River, and Clairefontaine and it did well on all of them. There was no feathering at all and only light ghosting. Bleedthrough was essentially non-existent. Cheaper paper didn’t really show its hint of purple and this only really came out with a thicker application of Ink on nicer paper. As I already stated this is really apparent on the Rhodia DotPad I used for the color swab. I only hope my camera will do it justice.
Drive time was fairly reasonable at 10 to 12 seconds. According to Goulet pens, this is on the quicker side of ink drying times, but only slightly so. Flow has always been consistent and reliable with little to no hard starts or skipping. As another add a teacher, the ink does not seem to stain the body of your pen and washes off easily. An ink that washes off easily, though, does mean it is not waterproof as is evident in my swab of this ink.
Overall, this is high-quality ink that functions well across the board and for a variety of uses. Even in everyday use, it performs well on cheap paper all the way to premium quality paper. So it’s safe for use in the office, school, and almost any other application. Its deep blue makes it one of my favorite inks overall, up there with Pilot Iroshizuku Kon Peki. It tends to run between $11-$15 depending on color and site for 2oz or 62.5ml giving you exceptional quality ink at a low cost.
Published by gentlemanreviewer
Just an average guy who reviews a variety of products such as fountain pens, tea, coffee, hairstyle products, writing, bags, everyday-carry, knives and whatever else I can find!View all posts by gentlemanreviewer
