a parallel fountain pen

I recently bought a Pilot Parallel fountain pen along to play with. I knew the ink would not be waterproof, but I thought it might give a subtle gray wash when touched with a waterbrush. Wrong!! The ink in this pen is very wet and very intensely black! Just a light touch of a wet brush tip releases a strong black wash. Still, I was determined to see it in action with a quick sketch — I had to really work to keep areas of this Flint Hills farm scene in lighter washes.

The nib shape is similar to my Lamy Joy pen’s calligraphy nib, but the Lamy nib seems to dry and clog if not used daily. The flattened nib makes for interesting sketching lines. Packaging that this pen came in warns to not refill the empty ink cartridge with other inks — which was exactly what I had planned to do using my waterproof fountain pen inks. There is a converter sold that fits the pen but I’m curious as to why I couldn’t simply refill the cartridge with a syringe?