The Worst Fountain Pen I Have Ever Reviewed
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 15 окт 2022
- An unfortunate review of the Acriv Blender.
Here is a link to the company site if you are interested in learning more about this pen. Please be kind and do not leave comments on their site unless you have purchased this pen for yourself and can speak to your first-hand experiences.
dvadaria.com/shop-acriv-1/ols...
#acrivblender #figboot #fountainpens
figbootonpens@gmail.com
Instagram - @figboot11
Figboot on Pens
P.O. Box 12430
Durham, NC 27709 
Хобби
Now this is what the internet is supposed to be about, watching someone go into insane detail about their niche hobby and explain it. God I love it.
It's like watching Adam Savage spend an hour in his shop talking about sorting screws.
@@moseszero3281 ever watched his video where he makes hammering aluminum foil into a ball entertaining? Glorious.
It amazes me how many levels of skill are present for any given interest.
I have to agree. I’ve just spent a few hours watching someone reviewing warm air hand driers in various toilets he’s visited.
@@annoyingbstard9407 that actually sounds interesting, what's the channel?
Today I learned:
Pen RUclips exists.
Putting the cap on the back of the pen is called posting.
Neat!
Thanks for watching!
And that's me now, 12 days later! Also neat!
Was this on your YT frontpage as well? I've do like writing by hand and have a few pens, but I wasn't my yt account had any info about this. I have no idea how this video showed up, but I was willing to commit to it and wasn't disappointed. :)
@@elkati3162 It was! I knew penmanship was a hobby, and thanks to some of my Animal Crossing villager rambles I know pens can get pretty darn fancy, but this is the first time youtube has shown me an actual video for it. I'm always watching random niche stuff tho, so I was interested enough to click!
*Fountain pen RUclips. Ballpoint pens are for normies
“I just wish I had a fountain pen with 3 ink chambers so I can automatically create a brown ink in my pen.”, said nobody, ever.
You would need to use diluted Ink or special mixing inks (which are basically diluted) to avoid that, and even then i think you might end up with brown more often than not xD
You need to use 3primary colours. Cyan Magenta Yellow and you will get all the possible colours there
I feel judged for choosing to put brown ink in my pens now...
@@the_snobot I love brown ink (& brown pens) but I prefer mine pre-mixed 🙂
I feel like it would be unique for getting a very specific color, like mixing 3 different shades of red/pink or blue/green. But more of a novelty than a useful ink-mixing tool
Fair review of a terrible pen. I’m amazed these people had the gall to turn up to a pen show and ask money for something that is a piece of junk.
The arrogance is not trying to sell a pen. The arrogance is not using their own product. Because if they had tested it more it would have been obvious the problems.
@@metatechnologist it starts with the provided needles...
how can you look at that and not stop to think that those do not look right?
It is so apparent that they genuinely didn't even try to test it. They could have plugged their design into Autocad and used their fluid dynamics library to check if the thing even worked, but I think the most offensive part Is that they had the balls to come up with excuses about it when they clearly didn't even try. Makes me wonder if it's some kind of scheme to store concentrations of different drugs and to use the medical syringes to suck up the mix for injection.
I'm amazed there's people that go to "pen shows".
Lol when they cut the end of the needle off and sent it back
Wow, these are worse than rookie missteps for this company. It’s bordering on risky and sketchy. You did the right thing to review this the way you did.
No sketchy if you can't even write with it.
the medical syringes are certainly risky and sketchy lmao
@@heyguysits-nicole For sure!
@@heyguysits-nicole They probably went with medical syringes because they were cheaper. For what it's worth, it can be legal to ship medical syringes, but you have to jump through some hoops that I'm sure the company didn't do.
Just overall a bad impression for a company to make.
I thought it was a rotating pen like the multi-colour ball points. That apparently wasn't the case. It was a no colour pen, which, to be fair, is fairly innovative.
Invisible ink
That would have been brilliant.
Would be fun
Innovative, of course, doesn't mean good.
I'm the 900th like
Me, stumbling upon this and having no interest in owning an actual fountain pen in my life, though I think they're really cool regardless: Yeah, you tell 'em!!!
Thanks for watching. RUclips can be odd like that. There are channels which produce interesting content on subjects that I'm not necessarily interested in...but I still watch anyways.
Same!!!
Thought the same, fountain pens are sick but would never own one. Then I bought a simple one for around $30 and now I literally cannot write with anything else!
@@FigbootonPens It seemed to pain you to publish something so negative. So it sucks that this video was the one chosen by the capricious youtube spirits.
I didn't think I wanted one until a few days ago!
Holy cow. The fact you remained so polite and professional and with a genuine desire for the end result to even be somewhat good is admirable. It seems like every possible way to mess this up, they did. I cannot believe they sent MEDICAL SHARPS. I don't know about USPS but there are definitely many countries where sharps are entirely prohibited in mail unless they are explicitly marked for medical use.
I used to do medical injections and there were numerous occasions I fumbled a sharp and jabbed my finger in just the right place that caused excess bleeding. The fact they just casually sent those without warning is just a massive marker of an incredibly inept company.
Yes, I would think this is legally dubious, or at least wildly inappropriate
Is this an American thing?
Just curious here, I'm in Germany and I order sharps of various sizes for my cat's medicine directly on amazon without any hassle. I mean, when i can order sewing needles, knives, hatchets or even swords per mail, why should medical needles be left out...?
@@disnonn Because those would be appropriately marked as medical sharps or, for the rest of the list, you'd expect those to be sharp and handle them with care. Medical needles need to be delivered as a necessity for many people, but they SHOULDN'T be unexpected, unmarked, or provided for non-medical uses. All sharps have a risk of injury no matter their size, and medical needles are designed to be very sharp so they can piece tissue without excess force so they can very easily pierce skin. If you're not expecting to have medical sharps in the house, you're also very likely to dispose of them in ways that will risk the H&S of sanitation workers, especially if you accidentally injure yourself with one and the needle is thus contaminated.
@@disnonn - Along with the more relevant issues mentioned by others, you also have to be mindful that american legislators have a raging hate-boner for anything with even the most tangential relation to recreational drugs. Easy access to medical-grade syringes is seen by some dingbats as "enabling" drug addicts, so some areas have restrictions on how easily someone can buy them. Even though addicts would be the ones most willing to dangerously re-use syringes if clean ones aren't available.
@@CheshireCad Ok, this is very much cultural then, I see. On a side node, in my city we have at certain spots vending machines selling sharps, special spoons and lighters for drug users. The logic behind is that whilst drug users do unfortunately exist, we don't need them to needlessly contract HIV or Hepatitis by sharing their gear. Of course, this was met with some controversy too.
I'm so impressed with how badly a single pen could be messed up
literally a thin acrylic tube filled with ink and a nib thrown on would've performed better lmao
I received 5 of their pens for review from the D.C. show last year. 1 out of the 5 worked. They all had folded nibs, not tipped which immediately raised some concerns. Of the 4 that didn't work: 3 had splayed or misaligned nibs and the remaining nib was so scratchy it barely wrote without tearing the page. I received a solid titanium pocket pen that was still filled with the metal shavings inside the body and the cap was cut off center. Another one had a clip ring that was way too small for the cap so there was a huge gap in the cap. All had finishing issues where material was left over or not polished properly. I provided feedback to the company with suggestions on correcting these issues prior to bringing them to market and have never heard back. Needless to say, I never did the review.
Good. Serves them right. They don't deserve any credit. I am Indian and it disappoints me that they are such lousy manufacturers.
144p-th 👍
I’m curious, how was the only one that worked?
@@quinn799 tons of feedback. It was a small pocket pen like the schon design. The cartridge was hard to get in, but once in held nicely. The nib was folded like the others but I was able to smooth it a bit. Kinda like a more rough sailor now but doesn't tear paper at least.
are they manufacturing their pens in a garden shed or something lol
They failed you, Figboot. You didn’t fail them. But it makes you wonder why they were eager for a review. They knew how many corners they were cutting.
Off chance to get noticed in the USA. Fairly big market. Bad publicity better then no publicity. Sucker born every minute. Just my 2 cents as to why they did it. Too bad they were unable to give him one decent working pen…
Perhaps because they knew he would try to point out the good things he found...
I know you didn't mean for this to be a laugh riot or anything, but I found it VERY funny. The snipped-off medical syringe, with the resulting deformed opening, just did me in. 😆
Same here! 😂
🤣🤣
Me too!!!!! I lost it at the same point!
That part got me, too.!!
Yeah I was pretty floored by that myself.
I couldn't believe the syringes included with the pen... Then they sent you more, just snipped! Unbelievable
Oh no! A sharp syringe! Like you've never bought a button down shirt with pins in it. What's the difference? If you can't deal with a sharp syringe, you should probably not need with fountain pens either.
@@littlejackalo5326 Who pissed in your cereal? Sharp needles are safety hazards, and in some places are completely illegal to sell in this form. These aren't even remotely similar to a shirt with pins, as this can legitimately injure someone. Needles are the cause of 385,000 injuries nationwide according to the CDC.
@@littlejackalo5326 calm down methany
@@littlejackalo5326 isn't a syringe much sharper than a button pin?
The problem became obvious as soon as I saw the chambers. Anyone with a basic understanding of how pens work would not make this kind of mistake.
Absolutely. Diameter too narrow, surface too rough. They look narrow enough to compound the effect of surface tension with capillary action.
I know nothing about fountain pens, but I thought the same as soon as I saw the pen.
Surface tension, my old nemesis!
They can use a ball inside the chamber to break the tension, most cartridge pen do this. But it will be a hassle to retrieve the balls unless they make a stopper. I still doubt it will work well with chambers that small. I think they could have made it larger, but at the same time why not just premix them if the ink in the chambers are going to be cross contaminated anyway.
@@someonestolemyname I wondered that myself. I have a ton of small graded vials from ink samples which are easily repurposed for ink mixing
I'm not sure why youtube recommended this to me, but I love to watch things about more niche interests, so I thoroughly enjoyed it. Sadly the reason the algorithm is pushing it more is probably because it's a negative review. Controversy drives engagement and all that. To balance things out I'm going to go watch some of your other reviews about good pens.
Yes. The vast majority of my other videos have a much more positive tone. And the pens are significantly better. Thanks for watching.
I had thought that the worst thing a pen could do was not write well out of the box. I think this is arguably worse, which is fairly impressive in an unfortunate sort of way. I just have to ask what demand were they trying to meet with this design? If you wanted green you would just purchase a green ink, not use two random yellows and blues.
Well, as a rule of thumb, no matter how bad things might be, it can always be worse. You just need to find someone to try.
I like to mix inks... just squirt whatever ratio I want from each bottle into a vial, mix it, then transfer it to the pen. They really are solving a problem that doesn't exist and creating entire new ones in the process.
I think the idea is kinda cool. Some people like to mix their inks, and if the design had worked it would have been pretty interesting. Personally when I mix, I just put the inks into the same cartridge. I like to mix blue and black for a unique blue-black that only lasts as long as the cartridge since I don’t measure. I have since purchased a blue-black Noodlers ink and so that pretty much covers it for me… I think it’s extremely unsafe they send those syringes with this pen, and shouldn’t do business in the USA for that reason alone.
I have been an aficionado of fountain pens for several years. I am impressed by your heart-felt review and sad that you had to make such a review. I believe you are a true fan of fountain pens as I have been following you for years. I am truly sorry you had to experience this but grateful for going ahead and sharing your experience with us. Your description of the cavalier approach this company, its staff and representatives is rightly appalling. I am glad your sabbatical was of short duration. Your passion resonates loud and clear. Thank you!
right? or just mix your inks in a vial and fill it up your cartridge, there's literally no problem to fix
This is one of these channels that makes videos for a very specific niche but are actually interesting enough for people outside the community. Never thought fountain pens have a fandom!
Never in my life could I have imagined that I would be this fascinated about a pen review. But here we are. Love your passion
Thanks for watching!
I know literally nothing about fountain pens but after watching this I sort of want to know everything about them? Great video!
It's a fun hobby where you get you physically use your collection on a regular basis. Thanks for watching!
I admire your patience and diplomacy, Dave. You rarely see that nowadays. Personally, I use sharp syringes in aspirating ink from the bottle. Being a doctor, I have plenty of these. They’ve worked well thus far, gotten used to them, actually.
Being a doctor, you're also experienced in safely using and storing them, it's probably second nature to you. For us laymen, a small moment of clumsiness can turn into a dangerous health hazard with sharp, non-sterile needles. I can get sharp ones if I so need (legally), but I chose to get blunt drawing up syringes for ink.
My daughter; who is a CMA; does the same thing.
I use 18g needles and 3m syringes personally , so far so good. I have them on hand so it's easier
@@drezdogge I use 3cc syringes with drawing up (blunt) needles. Just more peace of mind
I use sharp syringes since I was about 14 years old. Funny enough I'm more afraid of blunt needles than sharp ones. With the sharp ones I need to be fully concentrated, when I use blunt needles my thoughts often wander and this can lead to accidents.
Wow. Just…wow. Appreciate your honesty about this pen. You really did give them every chance to succeed.
I couldn't help chuckling a little while you were banging the pen on the paper. The pen is a hack job at best. This isn't a bad review, but an excellent review of a really bad pen. I do like the idea of mixing ink colors, but they made zero effort at providing a quality product. Thanks for calling them out. 👍👍
It's 3:30am and I have no idea what I'm doing here, but I'm incredibly glad that someone so knowledgeable about this specific of a topic has such a passionate following! I hope in the month since this video came out, the company fixed the issues you described, or at least acknowledged them.
"what the heck, why is youtube recommending me pen review videos"
*7 minutes in*
"Jesus Christ acriv you scammers, these are rookie mistakes, god what a horrible design, get his ass Figboot"
🤣 thanks for watching!
I own a couple of Acriv pens. The nibs are made from sheet titanium, and have no tipping. They are 'butterfly nibs,' meaning the tip is made from flared portions that are folded in. The Acriv nib I got that was made that way was horrible. I ended up cutting it down to a stub. That being said, their stubs are unusual, and pretty great. As for this 'blender' pen, it looked to me that it would have exactly the problems you show in this video, so I resisted the urge to pick one up.
So it`s an actual pen company..
Well, I`m not buying their stuff 🤣
@@afrog2666 isn't any company that makes pens a pen company? A ton of indian and chinese pen companies make shitty pens. Not surprised at all
Can you imagine traveling all the way from India, paying for a booth at a trade show and having a such a sub-par product? Maybe it's some kind of tax write-off company 🤷♀ .
Possibly planning on native marketing fake ones on tik tok and selling them for $40 when they cost $1 to make. A lot of cheap products are being sold for way higher that way. Idk why they'd let someone review it though
This sort of shit happens often in India. A lot of people arnt passionate about the things they do and only care about making money (im looking at you Indian cartoons)
That’s the really baffling thing…if you’re gonna go through all the trouble to table at an out-of-country trade show, then why not take ANY steps to make sure your product works, like,at ALL
@@Crobat7269Howmany American companies can I show you they literally cheated me worst than this? Don't generalize your narrow thoughts over a nation. This questions your attitude & your brought up.
@@VijayKumar01234 i was born and live in india, and ive never stepped foot outside of india but i can confidently say most of the pens are garbage
This pen looks like it could be very close to some type of proof of concept or a prototype they might have had in the lab. Because there’s so much to fix in this pen, it makes me think that they’ve just outsourced their alpha testing to you. I hope they’ll make some radical changes to the core components of this pen and come up with a beta version for you to try out. Who knows, one day they may develop a functional product out of these early stage stumbles.
Maybe… maybe he’s been taken for a ride
@@user-up7nb6id1f t,,, tally hall
Holy cow. Sounds like a nightmare. Thanks for the warning. A bad pen is one thing, a bad company is a whole different problem.
You gave them every chance to give you a better pen. Heck, they could’ve hand picked one that had the best nib out of the bunch and they failed to even take advantage of that opportunity. I suppose we should be thankful for that.
Some people can't be helped, or they are all like that.
123rd 👍
@@martinlebl631 what do you mean by "or they are all like that?"
I didn't expect this to be as entertaining and informative as it was. My mouth dropped wide open when you pulled out the needles.. That's so wild AND SKETCHY AF.
Oh my. That company didn't just shoot themselves in the foot in this instance -- they shot it, threw acid on it, hacked it up, and burned it to a crisp.
Not every product a company makes turns out well; that's to be expected. But it's how the company responds to the failure that determines if customers give second chances.
Seems they had a fun idea, but unfortunately lacked in execution. A good example of why QA is important. Thanks for the review and intro to something new.
This is not an issue in QA or even in the execution, this has basic design flaws and looks like it never had a working prototype to go back to and fix things. Just looking at it I would have easily guessed it was not fully thought out nor tested. I also fail to see the point of attempting to keep the ink unmixed until it gets to the feed (If it ever does), other than maybe as a visual gimmick, but even that could have been executed with more finesse.
I wonder about the narrow chambers there that catch in the ink, how are 3d printed chambers (like in Hexpens and Additive pens) performing? don't they stop the flow as well with their inner walls? surely they are even less smooth...
I haven’t used a Hexpen, but the Additive pens have no problem with ink flow (I have three).
@@Seefood73 I would not accuse them of not having a working prototype. It somewhat looks like if you handcraft a prototype you can get it to work with a special ink blend (not that a thinner ink blend would help with the dripping...), but... when turned to manufacturing, holesize where decreased to increase wall thickness, the nip that was hand tuned on the prototype was replaced with a mass produced piece of junk... and no one cared that the product is a pen, not just assembled pieces.
@@sarowie so no integration tests and no QC. This is not a good argument in their favor ;)
No matter what the "special blend" of ink was, it's water based, and water has surface tension, and those narrow chambers with no agitation balls are a doomed design from the start. That's just common sense. I never designed a pen, I'm not an engineer, and this design looks DOA to me before David demonstrated it. 🤷🏽♂️
David, THANK YOU for not being a shill and just giving us the facts. The unfirtunate truth is not all companies deserve to succeed. Keep up the great work.
As someone with a couple pens that have surface tension problems, I can tell you that a FAR better way to overcome surface tension in the reservoir and get ink into the feed is to hold the pen as near the nib as you can, and then wiggle the pen back and forth, so that the back end swings freely while the nib end stays relatively stationary. This makes it far less likely that ink will splatter out of the feed, and actually works better at overcoming surface tension than banging the pen on the table.
Ouch! They were definitely not ready for prime time. Thank you for saving the rest of us the hassle and fustration - you haven't steered us wrong yet.
What an interesting niche I've stumbled upon thanks to my RUclips recommended! I have no knowledge on fountain pens, but I still found your voice very soothing and your insight very interesting even for a layman! I hope this channel reaches even more success, you deserve it! There's a lot of passion very clearly put here. Cheers and best of luck!!
+
The only way I could see this concept working, properly executed, would be to fill two chambers with colors you intend to mix and the third with a white or gray ink to lighten the final result. Or you could, you know, just mix them in a cup.
as someone who did not even know fountain pens could *have* mistakes, you very wonderfully pointed out each and every flaw, which makes anyone be able to see how this would just be unusable. very good video!
Hi there!
Thanks for the review.
Living in India, I have never heard of this brand in any of the main fountain pen communities. Better to stay away from such fly-by-night operators.
To improve your experience, try Camlin or Airmail pens.
Happy writing!
Airmail has pathetic quality control issues on nibs and which pen is good from Camlin? I suggest trying Lotus, Ranga, Magna Carta if you want Indian
@@VISHNUNAIR7000 airmail nibs are definitely not great but their pen body is solid and beautiful for the price, Kanwrite makes better nibs especially I love their flex nibs
This is the 4am content i apparently needed to see. I'm loving it.
Wow, thank you for this review. I’m sure it wasn’t easy but it saved me from a purchase that, after seeing its performance (or lack thereof), I’m convinced I would regret. Your positivity is commendable, but your honesty even more so because it saves folks time and cash in finding out the hard way. Thank you!
I don’t know who you are, never seen any of your reviews before, but having this recommended to me and hearing you tear into a poor pathetic pen has been a complete and utter joy.
Your review was far more than fair, and it was a great public service. I, too, was incredulous at this pen’s dysfunction. Pens like this certainly heighten one’s appreciation of well-made fountain pens. Even a disposable Varsity fountain pen is an excellent investment vs spending any amount on a pen like this one.
Yowsers, Dave! Everything that could go wrong went wrong. This pen deserves a shelf all its own and it's not "the nice" shelf! Even the feed failed to align properly with the nib - it was set much too far from the tip of the nib leaving way too much slit without an ink supply. Not that that mattered though. Thanks for such an honest review AND for TRYING to give them many opportunities to succeed.
I have never thought about pens more than buying a pack of Bic pens for school but now I want to binge your videos
if they wannt to improve the design, they should add lateral grooves in the ink chambers to help ink flow and better allow air and ink to pass each other, and add a restrictor plate with holes spaced around it in the body right above the ink chambers, make the plate an octagon or higher order polygon and cut the spot it sits in to be a slightly larger almost polygon with one more side than the plate and the sides slightly convex so it will move and stop unpredictably, resulting in a varying blend of inks going to the feed rather than getting the same muddy blend the whole time.
Google decided I would like this video, so here I am. Pens are not a hobby of mine, but I do have Hobbies, so I can very much appreciate the passion behind the creation of this channel. Thanks for making videos about things you love.
Thanks for watching!
Another enjoyable presentation, as usual !! Keep up this great quality work ! RS. Canada
They gave you sharp syringes lol. Al seriousness thank you for the review.
Seen that a few times with new sellers of fountain pen supplies on Amazon. Git a few of those with various pens as well. Many places outside of US you can get them over the counter, so people do not realize that fountain pen syringes are different.
@@martinlebl631 you can get them over the counter in the US too… the pharmacist just might give you a pamphlet about “where to find help” with em, haha
Wow. I never thought that I would see a fountain pen that failed at being a pen. I'm wondering if they even tested it before selling it.
It was a great review though, I'm even thinking how to fix it and it doesn't sound that difficult.
Well that's just sad! I was so looking forward to the review of this pen. You gave them more than enough chances to give you a good product, but clearly they just don't have good working products. Thank you for your always honest reviews, David, very much appreciated! 🙏
Wow, Thanks for going above and beyond in fairness and taking the time to do this review. Perhaps the company will learn from this though I doubt it.
The syringe thing is seriously crazy. It's honestly funny until you realise it's not made up.
Seems like the kind of idea someone has trying to come up with an innovation within a 10 minute time limit. I feel like the inherent design issues should have been caught at some point during the design process. Like the fact you mentioned that mixing three inks together will only ever really give a dark mess. A two colour system might have been more functional, and possibly made it easier to execute a functional model (more room to have the chambers wider).
But there's also just the fundamental question of "why?" What problem does this product aim to solve? If mixing ink colours is all you want, then you might as well just do that in a tube before inking up whatever pen of choice you have. But if it's about having 2 inks on display before they intermingle in the feed to give a new combination, or possibly even a varying new combination (this could be cool, getting some sort of completely unique sheening effect with 2 different inks?), they would have had to put considerably more thought into the mechanical design of the pen.
In my opinion, the biggest failure of the pen seems to be simply the fact that it isn't actually three different chambers, but a single one that happens to split in three directions.
The nib seems an odd choice as well. It seems odd to be so focused on producing your own nibs, when they're so clearly of subpar quality. Especially when they're clearly not the focus of the product at all.
Found your channel from this! excited to see more of your videos! Ive always loved fountain pens, and wanna get back into using them for drawing!
This is my first time watching one of your reviews and I'm an instant subscriber.
At the beginning of your video, when you showed the nib, even I saw the roughness of the nib barrel and the uneveness of the nib! I admire you giving the company a few chances to give a better example of their work. Your thoroughness and delivery are excellent and "write on".
David, I loved your review. I haven’t laughed so hard I’m quite a while. Thanks for a bit of hysterical laughter. The poor chaps who are trying to make this pen and sell it have a lot to learn, but I think it will take a few knocks on the head for them to learn it
Excellent review, fair and balanced, describing a solution looking for a problem (and not a very good solution at that). If I wanted to perform ink mixing then I'd just do it with a sample vial and syringe, shake, monitor for any obvious issues such as sediment or sludge, and then put the resulting pre-mixed ink into my pen of choice using whatever filling mechanism that pen uses. In the case of your review pen, the nib looks ugly and tarnished, and the pen is reminiscent of those multi refill ballpens popular in the 70s. When you filled the reservoirs of your example, that similarity was just reinforced. It looked like a transparent pen with three ballpoint refills inside, and not very high quality ones at that.
I just found your channel and I love that you are honest and try to give points in all aspects because people look for different things in a pen. You kind of remind me of “Project Farm” channel with the honest reviewing.
First time viewer and I genuinely love your tone and feel as though I've learned a lot! Subscribed and can't wait for more!
I suspect the makers of this pen are not users of fountain pens at all. You gave them every chance to succeed. You did a commendable and fair review. Thank you.
Beginning a review with a one minute explanation and almost apology for why it is going to be a negative one is the mindset for which I love the fountain pen community. We really want to like the pens and have fun with them. However, you really treated this small company in a fair manor and maybe they can improve in the near future, which I hope.
Oh, and by the way, 12:23 was like the most physical action I have seen in one of your reviews so far. I would have liked to see you do that with the Aztecs pen of the year ;-)
I am not particularly interested in fountain pens, but this guy gives off adorable uncle vibes. Subscribed.
I’ve followed you for quite a while. I could feel your pain in posting this video. Thanks for the work you do. Honesty and kindness together.
I have never watched a pen video before, I have never desired to watch a pen video before, but if this is what pen youtube is putting out I need to start getting into it. I should look at more pen reviews considering how much I write and sketch, and even if I didn't have a personal use how could I not watch something so unexpectedly entertaining!
Quite a situation. I’m glad you did explain everything you went through.
This was a good quality video, I too have never heard the term "posting" before. Also, quick tip, you may want to shrink the size of the text document you're reading or push your monitor farther back on your desk (or just increase the margins), because I kept noticing your eyes darting back every time you started a new line of your script. Wouldn't've even noticed you were reading a script otherwise.
Thank you for your truthful, as kind as you could be, review. I love the concept and wish they could have pulled this off for those who may have needed a pen like this. I mix my inks before I ever put them into my converter so I can be at peace knowing that I don't need to buy a pen that does it for me. You were awesome!
Even looking at the close-up pictures, I could tell this was going to be an epic fail. The threads are simply not fine or precise enough to be properly airtight, and neither are they greased to ensure they are. Look at the Noodlers Charlie for example; threads with a very fine pitch with silicone grease. Pens with larger thread pitches like the Preppy need grease and o-rings to be airtight for eye-dropper conversions. The cap being so tight to screw on indicates they probably also machined the cap with a too small internal diameter.
Now let's come to the elephant in the room: the ink chambers. The ink chambers look like they're machined with a matte surface on the inside. They couldn't be bothered with actually polishing the inside of the ink chambers. The rough surface means the surface tension of the ink is never broken, and it will never flow. This is why many converters ands cartridges have the metal agitators or ball bearings inside them, as they break the surface tension in the ink to facilitate it flowing.
In this pen the ink chambers are so narrow that capillary action will prevent downwards flow. Two rough walls encapsulating a high surface tension liquid in such a narrow aperture will never let ink flow. There's simply not enough fluid that is free from adhesive force with the wall that its weight can pull it down.
Then there's the other issue: You can't expect the pen to mix inks consistently. Each ink has a different viscosity and surface tension because each ink has different dyes, surfactants and solvents in it to get the desired colour. You will likely always end up with a situation where one ink flows in preference to the others.
You gave them more than a fair chance.
You know, the idea of a "silly straw" ink chamber kinda sounds fun now, because the aesthetic of the 3 chambers suspended in the barrel is actually kinda cool.
It probably wouldnt work for a myriad of reasons, least of all cleaning, but I can dream.
there actually exists pens like this-check out the double helix from additive pens
@@rurubyu8470 oh no...*falls down helix shaped rabbit hole*
This was a very informative video! Thank you for sharing your hobby with the world, it's fantastic!
David, I would really like to commend you on the way you review not just this pen but all pens. I've always found your reviews to be presented fairly. As you say something you may not personally like could be something another loves. You did a great job in presenting this pen warts and all. It's a warning to all that this pen can't ever write. Great review thank you.
P.s. Thank you for your honest review. It's important to ferret out people trying to take advantage. I can't imagine this could be anything else.
This was a great review of a terrible pen, but it is *also* a masterclass in how pen design works! Seeing the many ways it fails, especially with the chambering, has taught me how a few pens in the past failed me and what I'd have to think about if I wanted to make a very basic one. It's even helped me understand my dip pens a little better.
This was a very fair and honest review. I really enjoyed it. I hope the company that gave out this pen, will do better in the future.
This has just been recommended to me and I have to say: Your tone, pacing and structure is exceptional! Keep up the good work, I was very pleasantly surprised!
Thanks for watching!
I’m at a loss for words. You were as fair as you could be. Great review as always David.
Not related to the video, but I like the padres city connect hat in the background. As a giants fan I am indebted to the padres for beading the dodgers in the division series and will be rooting them on in the NLCS, haha!
Vanquishing LA was a pleasure. Now...let's see what we can do against Philly.
@@FigbootonPens guys, can we cool it with all the hockey talk and keep the focus on pens please? D:
It’s seems the algorithm is pushing this video again, great work sir! This isn’t a topic I know a lot of about but it’s extremely interesting to learn from someone with passion and knowledge of a topic :)
Very fair review, David, and I appreciate your honesty as always! Some pen reviewers seem to gloss over problems with pens for whatever reason, but that's not your style. Thanks for steering us in the right direction!
Hopefully they will learn from their mistakes. They need to hire someone with pen making expertise and a marketing expert. Obviously, they don’t have either. Thanks for a very objective and thoughtful review. 👍👍👍
And here I am reusing my dad's used insulin syringes to refill my pens after cleaning it with IPA. My office looks like a mad doctor's office with insulin syringes lined up on a stand inside a locked cupboard with various coloured liquids inside it.
🤣🤣
RUclips recommended me this video and I'm glad. You striving for the most accurate and fair review reminds me of Gamers Nexus (just watched a video by them today, too) and your style of just giving facts so each person can make their own informed decision reminds me of Paul Harrell. Two excellent RUclipsrs, too. Instant sub and like.* Great video!
I have loved pens, notebooks, stationary items since I was a child. Seeing that someone is reviewing pens is a wonderful surprise to me. Thank you for your hardwork! I subbed.
i didn't know i needed fountain pen reviews until just now. this is what im spending the rest of my day on!
Thank you for the review. I had visited the same table at the DC Pen Show and was excited by the pens on display. I was very excited by the idea of a pen with an ebonite feed and a titanium nib at that price and was tempted to purchase one of their pens. In the past I have worked with people from Mumbai many time and while I liked them as people I came to realize what they considered acceptable and what I considered acceptable were significantly different. I examined several pens displayed at the table and spend more time there than most other tables, I really wanted to buy something from them. In the end I didn’t buy anything because every pen I looked at had multiple quality problems. As much as I wanted to find something good about one of the pens to justify buying, in the end the consistently bad quality made me give up.
My bottom line about the company is: great concepts, terrible execution. I would love to buy some of their pens IF they can get their quality to an acceptable level.
Again thanks for a great review that will hopefully serve as a wake-up call for the company to improve.
I’m a fan of Indian-made pens, and have quite a collection of them. I’m really into tinkering, experimenting, and modifying pens, and they’re usually the right price level for material/fodder.
There are definite exceptions, but in general there is an undeniable quality / QC gap between these and those from other major pen-producing countries/ regions.
I’m not sure if it’s fair to chalk it up to cultural differences… but on the other hand, I know that in Japan (for example), there is a specific, self-conscious cultural aspect of taking immense pride in producing high-quality goods, and striving to always innovate and improve upon designs. So… idk :/
you are a very patient person. I had to chuckle as you told the tale of your struggle to help them onto the back of the horse, and their refusal to take the hints
Figboot: "I didn't want to make this video."
The algorithm: "Everyone needs to see this."
Real bummer. I had some hopes for a test write with that nib but as you said, it would have been tragic.
To bad, it sounded like a good idea, but somehow it just didn't come together for that manufacturer, great review, thanks for your honesty.
I like watching your reviews, they are always informative and interesting for me an amateur pen enthusiast.
Thanks for the heads-up. That pen is certainly not worth anything near $40.00. Not only that, but their concept, and obvious lack of commitment to "customer service" is a very prominent concern. They are definitely not worth my money, nor any degree of trust. Thank you for a great review, and a very necessary warning. And I also feel compelled to compliment you, Dave, on your kind discretion and patience you exhibited. Best wishes all around.
My reaction too went from "oh dear" to "OH DEAR" when the price was mentioned.
I don’t know why I’m here but thank you algorithm. Your voice is really nice and I feel like I can trust you if I ever do get into fountain pens. Perfect about of honesty and information. Even I’m starting to feel passionate about how wild this pen is.
The word "scam" comes to mind. There are 1000's of ink colors out there. If I wanted a particular color, I'd simply buy it. Ink can be expensive and I wouldn't want to waste it experimenting with it. Thank you Dave for this very informative video and I would say you were more than fair, asking time and again if this was what that company wanted you to show. You finally had no choice and I'm convinced. The nib looks crappy and unfinished. The entire pen looks like something an amateur made at a country fair.
Thanks for the honest review!
Not quite sure what Acriv were going for with 3 ink chambers (with no way to proportionately control the flow from each). Basic color-science tells us; cyan + magenta + yellow (in equal proportions) = black. The only reason an inkjet printer is able to print a wide variety of colors (using only cyan, magenta, yellow, and black inks) is VERY fine control over how much of each color is applied to the paper). It's as if the folks at this company read about 3 primary colors (cyan, magenta and yellow), but didn't fully understand color science.
Well that's unfortunate. I would love a multi-color concept pen to come to the fountain pen world. I still love my bic clic stic multi-color pens from my youth even tho they write terribly. Maybe version 2.0 will be better.
OMFFFFFFFFFG thank you for your honesty. I’ve watched several videos of yours so I know you’ve never been mean to manufactures. This information is so beneficial 😊
Good job on a challenging review. Your fairness should be appreciated by the company as I'm sure it is by your viewers. One always has high hopes for new pens, and when they fail, is very disappointing.
Yeesh. The whole idea of this pen sounds like a possible nightmare waiting to happen. Not only due to the possibly bad color mixture. Different brands have different chemistry made for stabilizing that particular ink. It makes a little more sense to tell people to stick to color mixing within one brand at at time, even that’s a broad stroke. Not even warning people that the possible mixture might be shifting the chemistry enough to change the viscosity of the final product to ensure a flow issue or worse, possibly introducing bacteria, is a big disservice to the pen owner.
It’s my understanding that is why you are advised to clean your pens with a good pen cleaning solution when shifting from one brand to another. Each one has its own stabilized chemistry and the two together could gum up the system and/ or create an even bigger headache. As a mixer of inks myself, it’s advised that you mix in an immediately usable small batch and let it sit for a day for these very reasons.
This is a fascinating concept. I hope this or another company will improve on it. Maybe two larger chambers?
Bigger chambers, or coating/surface finish that breaks the surface tension. And test with many different kinds of ink. Perhaps they tested with very viscous ink, but not a good sample size. R&D can be hard, and if you cut corners the outcome might be less than optimal.
It's kinda useless. You can mix inks beforehandand just put the result into the pen.
@@DrinkWater713 I'm guessing it is a visual thing - look at these three different colors in the clear barrel.
Even if it worked better, I don't think a lot of people are ready for this pen; you have to be careful mixing inks together. If you don't use inks that are meant to be mixed together, you can really have a blowout in your pen case...
Mixing inks like this pen does it is kind of useless - but changing the design so only one chamber is connected to nib and you can select which one, so "new" ink mixes with "old" one and slowly chnges colour as you write wold be interesting.
Let's say - 2 ink chambers with thin air channels at the back (so ink can flow despite surface tension problems). One "blind" chamber to "seal" the pen.
Great review! And yes, you were very fair. I am surprised that a company would even show up at a pen show with this kind of pen. It would have been better if they had sent prototypes to an assortment of fountain pen users to "de-bug" their concept. But, alas, they probably sold quite a number to unsuspecting buyers and likely turned off some to fountain pens all together. Sad . . .
One of my favorite pass times is watching people rant about things I have no idea about. Also "I didn't want to make this video" is such a hilarious way to start a pen review