Editing The Pen Addict 126/transcript (section)

== Some Brainers List ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' so we need to go through the brainers list in a minute let's let's do the recommendations list and then I want to hear the some brainers list because I think that's going to be closest to your preference look at me starting list gate over here

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I know way to go I know no but I know I think it's a valid point and the way I tried to put this together was people asked me what to buy and I want to be able to point them to something and what I would pick for my personal top five isn't necessarily what I would recommend for other people

'''Myke Hurley:''' yeah no I get

'''Brad Dowdy:''' it's a hard it's a hard balance and maybe I should have something like it's very very specific to me Brad's top five personal pens something like that so yeah maybe I'll think about that that's that's probably good to encompass some of those fountain pens but anyway the top five overall list I have the Sino DX and the Twisby 580 those are great pens I added in the TI2 tech liner that's the pen you see in the image Myke and that's the pen I have with me it's got this little magnet tip that keeps the the cap on the front and back into the pen ever since I got this pen I can't put it down it's really I haven't had a pen like this in a long time and I felt that it was good enough to warrant mentioned in the in the top five pens just because it's that good and everyone I've had that's used this pen has really enjoyed it other people who have purchased this pen through through the site directly or who back the Kickstarter or raving about it

'''Myke Hurley:''' I need you to tell me sorry I need you to tell me why it's so good because I look at it and it looks so I feel

'''Brad Dowdy:''' bad well here I'll save you let me save you okay with the guy that makes this pen his name is Myke Bond it's a pretty sweet name before before he yeah before he launched his Kickstarter he sent me the pictures of the pen and he said hey this is something I'm working on and something I'm gonna do for Kickstarter and I'd like to get your thoughts on it and I told him I didn't like it and I said I don't understand this pen I don't like the pen and I said I

'''Myke Hurley:''' don't know how the

'''Brad Dowdy:''' front of the pen is is kind of chopped off that's my main

'''Myke Hurley:''' thing that I don't like I really really don't like that at

'''Brad Dowdy:''' all yeah and the pen kind of sticks out there I said I don't get this at all I said I don't like it I don't think it looks good and I mean I'm telling him this via email and we kind of go back and forth and he's like he's like I understand what you're saying you know he's he's like but let me send you one and you can try it out so I was like sure whatever and I'll take a look at it and he sent it and I started to use it and I was like okay yeah I it's not bad and then I found myself reaching for it constantly I found the quality of the build on the pen to be spectacular magnets are often a gimmick in a pen not with this one they are work really really well it's a huge feature of the pen everything about this pen is almost perfect I I don't know what changed from my first impression of seeing it in pictures to saying I'm not going to like this pen and I'm not sure who is to completely reversing that has never happened to me before I'm generally kind of on point like if I see something and I can see a picture of it and I can say yeah this isn't going to be so good then I'll get it and yeah it's really not so good this one changed that perception completely this one I got it in my hands and it was unlike any other pen I've used it's it's probably my favorite Kickstarter pen that's ever been done it's one of the best pens I use period it's a pen I wouldn't hesitate to recommend to anyone that likes the refills that it uses I just happen to like the

'''Myke Hurley:''' refills can you put in

'''Brad Dowdy:''' this the Sino any uh Uni ball that fits like the Sino 207 um and it's it's it is kind of refill limited yeah but the Sino 207 goes all the way down to 0.38 millimeter so that works for me it is for

'''Myke Hurley:''' the Sino then that's like effectively that's what you so you're going to

'''Brad Dowdy:''' use it for just the just the 207 refill which has always been one of my favorite pens anyway

'''Myke Hurley:''' that is pretty limited though do you know why it's limited like that I mean usually these types of pens they try and accommodate a large line

'''Brad Dowdy:''' don't they it's it's limited because of the way the magnets work and the way the pens designed around the magnet the the actual refill threads the tip of the refill threads through the magnet okay so it's got to be a certain so it's built it's more built around this refill than built to take a lot of refills if that makes sense so you'll have to see the pen taken apart and and understand it there's something about this pen grabbed me I it just happens sometimes um and I can't put it down it's it's and like I said in the in the post I get mad if I leave it at home and want it want to use it like I get visibly frustrated I'm like oh I left it at home I mean that's if that's not the sign of a good pen I don't know what is okay so it's it's um it's a really really impressive pen so so that's that on the on the on the tech liner and I'm sure that'll come up uh come up more I also got the um I got a kind of a fancy finish on mine through Kickstarter so I'm pretty happy without with that too it's called a gonzodized finished so you'll have to look in the links to see the pictures of the the finish it's not the pick that's not the finish that's it's the finish that's on the top five pens page not on the blog post page oh right

'''Myke Hurley:''' yeah it's like so it's

'''Brad Dowdy:''' kind of this weird gold with this goldish it's like weird it's like it

'''Myke Hurley:''' kind of looks like I don't know if you had brass and then you put something on it and then you rub that thing off and you'd start to see the brass come through again all right I mean I'm going to give it to you I don't know if I'm going to get one because I'm not that interested in that refill but I'm going to give it to you because I saw this pen on the blog and I just kind of saw the image and I kind of thought it looked ugly basically but if the if the beauty is in its utility I can totally be on board with that

'''Brad Dowdy:''' yeah and it's it's not just in its utility now that I've used it it's it's everything about the pen is uh is beautifully done so I don't want to you know I don't want this to be the the ti2 tech liner love fest

'''Myke Hurley:''' but it's it's it's one of the the new ones in the

'''Brad Dowdy:''' list so mm-hmm yeah yeah and it's one of those things it's one of those pens where I've never had that happened to me before where I really didn't think I was going to like it at all and turned out to love it and there was no there's not much middle ground right it wasn't well it's okay you know yeah it's fine yeah whatever it's it's been off the charts excellent from me thinking that I would having the exact same thoughts that you had so it's it's very strange so I I point that pen out a lot just because it's one of the weirdest experiences I've had ever had with a pen um I also put the retro 51 tornado back in

'''Myke Hurley:''' the top five my my darling love you mean I think I

'''Brad Dowdy:''' recommend that pen so much I actually carry one in my backpack all the time and use it all the time and it's been in the top five overall pens before and you know as things kind of change and you know I go through the years and you know pens are moving in and out that's one I'm always coming back to so that one's easy to recommend um and I know you will totally vouch for that the micro gel ink pens that's a pretty static list um the uniball sino rt1 is the newer model um that one I moved into the top five list um I moved the pentel sleechy out just because it's I've kind of gotten bored of that pen they've never really changed the barrel I really like the refill on the sleechy but the barrel is gotten to be annoying and all these other pens do the same thing and do a better job at it um the top five pens in the store list the uniball vision elite has kind of been a forgotten pen for me and until I reviewed one of the new blx ones uh recently I forgot how good of a pen that is so that's uh jumped up in the top five pens in the store list that's generally a very static list because there's nothing new that ever comes out at office supply stores by these big brands like uniball pilot zebra I mean at least nothing any good um so that's a pretty static list you know with the uniball jet stream the sino 207 the vision elite the sharpie pen the pentel inner gel um notice I don't have the pilot g2 on there I think all these pens trump that uh pretty easily um then we get into the fountain pen lists so we kind of have the the fountain pen no-brainer list which is more of your basic straightforward fountain pens fountain pens that are really good that are very easy to come by you know easy to purchase easy to find online easy to find at a pen show easy to find in a store things like that twisbee 580 still the top of that list then I put the sailor 1911 um second on that list number one because it's an awesome pen I have a model called the black luster and number two they're really starting to infiltrate the u.s market a bunch of retailers are carrying them where before I'd be a little bit hesitant to put the no-brainer tag on the sailor pens just because they were harder to get now that they've become a lot more easy to get I think the quality of a sailor pen is really really good their nibs are fantastic so that's why it cracked the list then you have the two stalwarts of this list the Lamy 2000 and the pilot vanishing point I don't really see those going anywhere anytime soon um and then um Edison Beaumont which I'd actually need to update that link there is a link to the review Jeff Abbott did a review of the Beaumont on there that's a wonderful wonderful pen by our friend Brian Gray at Edison pens that I think would appeal to a lot of people um who are either new or just kind of getting into fountain pens um it's a real real good quality pen um and then we get into the sumbrainer list this is kind of my little tweak on the list this is this is the me section Myke um out of this whole page this is uh this one's kind of for me and that's where it's hard to balance this whole list right am I doing this for me to show what I I mean I try to say what I'm using the most but you know I also try to have to balance it between what I would recommend to other people and I broke this list out originally because I didn't want to just start putting like Nakaya's on here and telling people they should go buy Nakaya's because that's not what I believe so I kind of split up these fountain pens lists and I still thank uh our our friend uh Toffer for coming up with these names the no-brainer list and the sumbrainers list I really like that so the sumbrainers list comprises pens that I love but they're going to take some thought process for you to consider purchasing um and I recommend a lot of thought process into going into these either because they're very expensive they're very hard to get or they're very specialized in what they do the Edison Menlo um it's one of those pens every time I pick it up I just kind of yeah that's it's like perfect for me the build the size the functionality of it um the feel is really really really good um now since I did my last list I've uh come into some Nakaya's will they trump that one day maybe um right now I have three pens loaded out three fountain pens the Edison Menlo I have the Nakaya Piccolo which is not on this top five list and I have a TWSBI Micarta those are the three fountain pens I'm using right now and any of those could be on this list but the Nakaya portable I think is the best Nakaya I own so far um and I may or may not have bought a fourth Nakaya

'''Myke Hurley:''' we'll see oh my word really wow may or

'''Brad Dowdy:''' may not it might not be true I might just be saying that um the third one on this Sunbrainer's list is the Pilot Murex and I wrote in my little caption is this even fair to put this on here because it's an it's a discontinued pen right so I I don't know if it's actually fair to put that on the list um but there

'''Myke Hurley:''' especially because it makes me want one

'''Brad Dowdy:''' even more I know I know it's just it's a really amazing pen and like I said all of these pens in this list give me that holy crap feeling when I pick them up and use them like this is exceptional an exceptional pen um and I I hesitated to put the Murex on there but it's true it's it's how good of a pen that is even though it's discontinued and it's kind of hard you have to go to the secondary markets to get one so I'll think about if that is allowed to stay on the list or not I wanted to get some feedback on that the Pilot Custom Heritage 912 not because of the barrel which is great I love it but the nib um the PO nib it's still one of my top users and then the Franklin Kristoff Model 40 Pocket which um is a pocketable eyedropper fountain pen with a great nib um those those five fountain pens um are are excellent my fountain pen inks kind of changed a little bit the Shinkai is still my favorite the one that came in at number three the PW Ackerman number eight which is uh it's kind of a blue black it's called I'll I won't even has I won't even pretend like I'm gonna get this right but it's deep doing water blau this is one I picked up back in the spring I use this color I use this I use this ink in every pen and it works wonderfully and the color is amazing this has this has a shot at being the number one ink this could this could be Shinkai um and Scabios is number two that's a that's a pretty awesome inked um so then the fourth one I get into the Sailor Sky High which I love and this is kind of in the Pilot Murex vein this is a discontinued ink should it be allowed to stay on the list what are you thoughts what are your thoughts on that Myke I

'''Myke Hurley:''' think all of that stuff I think it's allowed to be on there because you've been able to get hold of it so other people should be able to get hold of it maybe yeah maybe so what do you think I mean when was the last time you bought Sailor Blue Black is it still available