Editing The Pen Addict 441/transcript (section)

== Christmas Break Announcement ==


'''Myke Hurley:''' Brad? I just thought we should mention it. There's no show next week. We're taking a week off for Christmas.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' The timing is so weird this year.

'''Myke Hurley:''' It's wild to think that Christmas is next Friday, but it is. I've not even finished my Christmas shopping yet. I finished yesterday. So we'll be doing one more episode this year on the 30th, but there'll be no episode next week.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Thank you. It does not feel right, but it is actually correct. So there you go.

'''Myke Hurley:''' This first question comes from Tyler. I've fallen in love with my Y Studio Brassing Portable Fountain Pen, but I haven't yet taken the plunge to scuffing it with the included sandpaper. How do you feel about weathering these brass products versus letting them patina naturally?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I am so proud of what we've created at the Pen Addict that this is like the most perfect question for this show. Like this is the perfect question for what we've built here because I don't know how to answer this other than I think you will be unhappy if you take sandpaper to that pen ever.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Oh really? So this is not what I would have said.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I think natural is the way to go. So I've done it both ways. So my Brassing Fountain Pen, I've let you know, just be natural, right? However it bangs around, hits around. And the whatever the black coating they use on these pens is really strong. Like it is not, it wears, but I have way more patina and wear in the grip section where I'm using it than where I'm like banging the barrel against it, right? Like there's some dings and things like that, but there's no real wear on the faceting, which is where the sandpaper comes in, which I did for the rollerball. So with the rollerball, I took the sandpaper around the grip section and just kind of, I said, I just told myself, well, I'm going to wear the area that I think would be the most worn anyway. And I'm just not happy with the result of it. It just doesn't feel like it came natural, which it obviously didn't. And therefore I'm less happy with the result. So if it were me, I would let it go natural, understanding that it's going to take a lot of beating to get anywhere near what that sandpaper is going to put on it because that coating is so thick.

'''Myke Hurley:''' See, I would say to do a bit of both, which is to scuff it a little bit and then let it naturally patina. That would be how I would do it. I would like take some of the shine, like take some of the edges where the facets are and then let the rest of it naturally patina over time through use.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So I'd be fine with that. I just wouldn't go, I wouldn't go strong arming the sandpaper on the barrel. I would just maybe take the edge off like Myke saying, but my vote would be to let it go natural.

'''Myke Hurley:''' All right. Lelani asks, is there an easy way to tell what brand a converter is if it's been taken out of the pen that it came with, or do you just have to learn by trial and error and which end fits in which pen?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So another great question, because we all have this problem with international size converters. Now they should be universally compatible. If they're that international size connector, they should fit the other international size pens. Sometimes they don't because that's just, you know, the, the micro measurements that, you know, get varied in, in manufacturing. So most, I'm going to say larger companies, you know, your Schmitz, for example, will stamp the ring on the converter. So you can, you're able to know that, Hey, this is a Schmitz converter. It went with this pen. Most of them do not. So if it's going to be a big deal for you to keep the exact converter with the exact pen, you're going to have to mark them yourself when you get it. Um, and either with a sticker, like a little small sticker, you know that, okay, these ones with the pink dot on them fit in my Kawekos or whatever, you know what I'm saying? And, um, because there is no good way because there's so many generic converters. There's like the short international is, is meant to be a generic converter. So they don't come, you know, unless you're getting them like with your Faber-Castell, it might come with the Faber-Castell branding on it. And then you take that off and you can find that one again, but then there's 10 other ones that are just blank and they come like when you're buying, like if I'm buying an Edison pen or a Franklin Kristoff, those converters are just coming with the Yovo parts, right? They're not coming also with a converter brand of the pen brand that I bought from, if that makes sense. So yeah, there's no good way. Um, I think for me, I've kind of just

'''Myke Hurley:''' learned over time, you know, like with some of the more popular or my personal popular brands, right? Like I kind of, I know what a sailor converter looks like.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Well, yeah, those are different. Those, because those are proprietary, I'm talking about universal converters in this case. So usually the only difference you see in universal converters is clarity or, um, you know, a material change on the, the, the knob. It might not be as, as, as many ridges, it might be smooth or the converter could be cloudy as opposed to clear, but they're without the branding on there. It's hard to tell, but like sailors, platinums, pilots, um, are all proprietary and you can, you can tell those apart real, real easy. And if you need help with that, I can definitely help you with that. Um, but I'm assuming this is, uh, the, the international styles, which, uh, are prone to get mixed and matched, but that should not matter. Like I keep all mine in a, in a pile, like in a, a little box, all my international converters are together. I'll just reach in and get one. And every once in a while, I'll get one that doesn't fit in the, in the coupling, but it's pretty much.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Length can be a thing, right?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Every now and then.

'''Myke Hurley:''' A bit of a factor.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' So if you do have a particular one, make sure you mark it. If you're not going to leave it in the pen after you clean it, I tend not to, not to leave mine in the pens. I tend to take them out of it so they can air dry a little bit better.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Are there any other companies other than Sater that use a proprietary format? Yeah. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Pilot and, uh, Platinum. Right. So all the Japanese brands, um, all the, the big three Japanese brands. Trying to think of any European brands.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' No, I think everything else is international or piston filler. I'm trying to think. Yeah. I think it's just the main. Oh yeah. Uh, like Schaefer. Lamy. Yeah. And Parker. Yeah. So that actually, there is more than that now that I'm thinking about it.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Um, so yeah, all those are different Schaefer's different. Parker and Lamy. So yeah, you gotta, um, watch out for some of those. Keep them together if you want to be sure you're using the right one.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Uh, Jorvik Dave asks, any updates on your plans, Brad, to restart production on the fodder stack product. Yeah. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I hope so. Um, had a call with the manufacturer yesterday, just to get an update on the Kickstarter, by the way. Um, we're going in production like the first or second week of January. I'd have to look at the date. So coming up soon. So those should only take a few weeks, um, after they start production. So once that gets rolled out, then we're open up to having the fodder stacks and the lookouts go into the queue, which those two items will be the first to roll out after the Kickstarter campaign cases. Those are going first. Uh, so like spring, maybe we can see some of that. So something like that.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Ben 304 asks, I love the line variation I can get with my stub and oblique nibs. And I've been curious about architect nibs and few day nibs for the opposite sort of effect. Are these similar in function and other specific reasons to choose one over the other?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' They are not. They are not at all.

'''Myke Hurley:''' And a few day nib. Now this is the one where it's kind of bent, right? That is a very specific type of pen that you cannot use every day.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. Like that's the way I was going to put it is if you have normal handwriting, normal grip, standard writing styles, where you're enjoying the stub and obliques that that's a good fit for your hand. You're now telling your hand, hey, we're going to do exactly the opposite. And you're going to enjoy it all the time. And you're just not like, it's good to have those nibs to play with and to write some things with. I think in general, my advice for people looking for architect or food aid nibs is to not put them on the pen you want to use all the time. The 24 seven, three 65 pen. Those are your special usage pens that you can, you know, pick up and write a letter, you know, for 20 or 30 minutes with your architect nib or journal with your food aid nib. But like if you're going to have like a work pen or something like that, I would never get an architect or food aid nib just because you have, there's a little more overhead in using those types of pens compared to your, your more standard nibs. So as much as I love them, as much as I want to have them, as much as I want to use them, they are not in my workhorse pens. So if you think about it that way and you still have room to add an architect and a food aid nib into your collection, go for it. You're going to love them. Yeah. But to think that you're going to be able to use them all day, you'll be misleading yourself.

'''Myke Hurley:''' See, because the thing is that you've got to think about is like, I understand what you're saying, right? You've taken like two types of pen. They're very different from each other. But the next two types of pen, you are going to the very extreme opposites. There's like, there's stuff in the middle, right? Like that is more interesting. There's even things like, you know, maybe you've only used a 1.1 stub and the 1.5 stub would be more interesting to you. You've got music nibs that you could still go to. Zoom nibs that you could still go to. Yeah, I'd be looking at a Zoom nib. Yeah. Zoom is definitely still usable daily. Music starts to get on the edges and a few days, like you're off now. Like you're basically painting. It's like, it's like a totally different experience. So it's, it's, I would say, Ben, explore things like, explore a Zoom nib next. That would be my recommendation. I adore Zoom nibs. They're fantastic. Yeah. Yeah.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And I adore architect nibs. I just can't use it all day. No. It's too specific. It's special use. Mm-hmm.

'''Myke Hurley:''' All right. If you want to send in a question for the show, you can send out a tweet with the hashtag AskTPA or use the command question mark AskTPA in the RelayFM members discord. You can send them in if they're longer form to hello at penaddict.com. If you want to find Brad online, you can go to penaddict.com, not.co. You can go to spokedesign.com. Did I get all of them?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I think so. And twitch.tv. We're back. Oh, I hadn't gotten there yet. We streamed yesterday.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Twitch.tv slash penaddict. 10 a.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays. Eastern time. Myke.live. Myke.live. I'm going to be streaming again on Friday at 11 a.m. Eastern. Not quite sure what I'm going to do yet, but I have some little projects. I'm not building anything, but I have some little projects that I want to take care of. And I have Brad today just fired up a custom alert, which I like because when people subscribe, I've been working with my wonderful designer, David, on some custom alerts for Twitch. Yeah. And they're looking real cool. We've just got the subscribe one first because it's quite complicated to get them to work properly. Yeah. So we're just starting with one and then if they work, we're going to go across the rest of them. But I am having a very, very, very fun time kind of like learning how all this stuff works. It's there's a lot going on. It's complicated. It's like a whole different world and it's very complicated. And like there's so many things to learn because it's quite interesting that Twitch is its own little ecosystem. And as monetization has expanded through the platform, all these little things have popped up and you can see that they've been building on stuff over time, but never got rid of any of the old stuff. So there's just so many little things to think about, but it's kind of fascinating to learn.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yep. Yep. It's very cool.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Thank you to Squarespace and Pen Chalet for the support of the show. And thank you for listening. If you're celebrating, have a very Merry Christmas. Have a very happy holidays. Yeah. Happy holidays. Until next time. Say goodbye, Brad. Goodbye, Brad.

[[Category:Podcast Transcripts]]
[[Category:The Pen Addict Podcast Transcript]]