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Jinhao pens

man am I glad to see someone using a Jinhao!! how do you like them? after seeing many favorable youtube reviews I decided to order a few just this morning. I havn't seen anyone around here say anything about them at all.
Honestly, I like them just as well as my Lamy Al star and safari pens. They write very well even though I dont prefer medium nibs but they are growing on me after a couple weeks use. They are a nice looking pen, have good weight and balance to them imo. The cap does not slide and lock onto the back of the pen all that well, at least it doesnt feel secure like my Lamys do, but theyve never fell off while writing either. I will be ordering some Fine nibs for them shortly and try them out. I have no complaints with them.
 
Honestly, I like them just as well as my Lamy Al star and safari pens. They write very well even though I dont prefer medium nibs but they are growing on me after a couple weeks use. They are a nice looking pen, have good weight and balance to them imo. The cap does not slide and lock onto the back of the pen all that well, at least it doesnt feel secure like my Lamys do, but theyve never fell off while writing either. I will be ordering some Fine nibs for them shortly and try them out. I have no complaints with them.

that's good to hear. I ordered a 750, 159 (Mont Blanc 149 clone) and a safari clone this morning. looking forward to trying them out. aside from a couple disposable FP's these will be the first I will have ever used. I'm pretty excited, and good prices to boot!
 
that's good to hear. I ordered a 750, 159 (Mont Blanc 149 clone) and a safari clone this morning. looking forward to trying them out. aside from a couple disposable FP's these will be the first I will have ever used. I'm pretty excited, and good prices to boot!
I also just recently got back into fountain pens, I used them in middle school because I thought they were cool but now I use them because of the way they write. My first one I bought was a Lamy Al star and still use it regularly while I'm in the office. But im pleased with these and for the price you cant go wrong. They arent a pelikan of course but they look good and I get compliments from clients all the time and they always want to use them but I still dont even though they are cheap lol
 
they always want to use them but I still dont even though they are cheap lol

I understand, even though they are inexpensive doesn't mean you want someone to mess it up by not knowing what they're dealing with. and worse yet, you either have to fix it, get a new nib etc. or buy a whole new one and then wait an eternity for it to ship from mars.

my boss asked me for a pen the other day and I handed him a pilot varsity. he looked at it and scoffed. to make it worse, he is a fairly impatient guy and the pen had a slow start :facep: then he just handed it back and told me to write it down lol

its the impatient people that I think will be some of the biggest gripers for me. hand them a pen and it takes 2.5 seconds to start writing and the FREAK OUT and reach for another pen! lol thus is the world of instant gratification that we live in.

I don't know about everyone else, but I'm ready to go back to basics.
 
I understand, even though they are inexpensive doesn't mean you want someone to mess it up by not knowing what they're dealing with. and worse yet, you either have to fix it, get a new nib etc. or buy a whole new one and then wait an eternity for it to ship from mars.

my boss asked me for a pen the other day and I handed him a pilot varsity. he looked at it and scoffed. to make it worse, he is a fairly impatient guy and the pen had a slow start :facep: then he just handed it back and told me to write it down lol

its the impatient people that I think will be some of the biggest gripers for me. hand them a pen and it takes 2.5 seconds to start writing and the FREAK OUT and reach for another pen! lol thus is the world of instant gratification that we live in.

I don't know about everyone else, but I'm ready to go back to basics.

I've learned to keep a BP on hand to let someone use when they ask for a pen. If I don't have one, I just say "it's a fountain pen," and generally then they don't want to use it. :tongue_sm

I'm not a total purist. If someone that uses FPs and knows what they're doing wants to write with one of my pens, I let them. I wouldn't let them copy the Declaration of Independence, but I find it scientifically dubious that they are going to significantly alter the geometry of the nib by writing one sentence. :001_smile
 
that's good to hear. I ordered a 750, 159 (Mont Blanc 149 clone) and a safari clone this morning. looking forward to trying them out. aside from a couple disposable FP's these will be the first I will have ever used. I'm pretty excited, and good prices to boot!

Wow, those are a great bargain! I hadn't heard of the brand before and just checked it out on Goulet. If they write at all, they will easily be worth every penny. Well done, and congratulations on your purchase!:thumbup1:
 
Wow, those are a great bargain! I hadn't heard of the brand before and just checked it out on Goulet. If they write at all, they will easily be worth every penny. Well done, and congratulations on your purchase!:thumbup1:

nothing against Goulet at all, but they can be had on the bay for around $5 shipped BIN. shipping will take longer I'm sure, but can almost be had for half price I think over Goulet if one wanted to save even more $$

also, check out some Youtube Vids if your interested on whether they write at all. specifically SBREBrown has some pretty extensive reviews and some head to head stuff on a handful of Jinhao pens. I think the only one he got that was a Lemon happened to be his first, and it looked like a clone of a Pelikan. fell apart on him right out of the box and the converter wouldn't even hold ink. the rest he says are WAY worth the money. although, he got them all for around $.99 a piece! I didn't get near that deal

like you said though, "if" they write, I made out like a bandit
 
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Yeah, Goulet is a specialty shop. I only have 4 pens and none of them came from them. I do buy ink and paper there often, as well as sealing wax and the stamp for it.

Don't worry about your penmanship, by the way. After years of academia and printing everything, when I got back into writing cursive with my pens, it was a little shaky to say the least. It just keeps getting better with practice. I don't have a gorgeous hand like James yet, but at least it can be read! :thumbup:
 
Don't worry about your penmanship, by the way. After years of academia and printing everything, when I got back into writing cursive with my pens, it was a little shaky to say the least. It just keeps getting better with practice. I don't have a gorgeous hand like James yet, but at least it can be read! :thumbup:

oh man, I can't even comprehend what my hand writing will look like with cursive. I'm not terribly old, and still run into old signatures of mine where I attempted it. Sheesh those are terrible. Thankfully those are from my "from boy to man" days, so hopefully I can't put a bit more effort into it lol
 
If you buy some Jinhaos, the #6 nib is removeable and replaceable with a Goulet JoWo #6 nib. A heck of a pen . . . I still have one, although the cap sits very loosely now. The dragon motif can't be beat, however!
 
When I first started playing with FPs I got a bunch of the Chinese pens. I have given away most but several have solid looks and write fantastically well for their price point. Got an X750 in my pen cup right now--very wet writer, too wet for me but fun, nice feel, nine bucks on Goulet and $3-5 on the bay if you look around.
 
nothing against Goulet at all, but they can be had on the bay for around $5 shipped BIN. shipping will take longer I'm sure, but can almost be had for half price I think over Goulet if one wanted to save even more $$

Goulet Pens provides customer service and stands behind every product they sell. They paid the shipping costs both ways on a returned/reshipped item for me.

Extremely inexpensive pens with high failure rates (Any pen with more than a 5% failure rate is a problem for resellers. They are extremely expensive to support. (A 1/2 a percentage point is a high failure rate in my book too.) Posts seem to indicate that you need to buy a few to insure getting a good one. This indicates a double digit failure rate.

Bottom line, there is no room in the profit margin on these pens to handle high failure rates. The solution - raise the price to maintain the profit margin. I'd do the same in a heartbeat.
 
Goulet Pens provides customer service and stands behind every product they sell. They paid the shipping costs both ways on a returned/reshipped item for me.

Extremely inexpensive pens with high failure rates (Any pen with more than a 5% failure rate is a problem for resellers. They are extremely expensive to support. (A 1/2 a percentage point is a high failure rate in my book too.) Posts seem to indicate that you need to buy a few to insure getting a good one. This indicates a double digit failure rate.

Bottom line, there is no room in the profit margin on these pens to handle high failure rates. The solution - raise the price to maintain the profit margin. I'd do the same in a heartbeat.
I don't quite follow.....are you suggesting that jinhao and/Goulet should raise the price for these pens in particular, or that some of us should raise our bottom line to bypass problematic pens and to include higher quality pens? I understand the concept of "you get what you pay for", but much more expensive pens than these have similar if not higher failure rates, just take a look at the Omas thread. jinhao seems to provide a better inexpensive pen than most cheap pen producers, and I'm talking about testimonials inside AND outside of B&B.

me for my part, I'm willing to take the risk so as not to invest in something I may not like and then would have to take a potential loss while trying to resell. I just spent $15 +\- a few cents one three mostly proven reproductions. If 1 writes well then I'm a winner.

as you mentioned about Goulet's service and attention to detail, I'm learning this to be true, and intend to purchase from them once I confirm my appreciation for FP's

it took me a few times of reading this, but I think I get it now. Your saying that Goulet has to sell it for double to handle to potential for returns and replacements? I would agree with that. I'm also sure that they're reselling of these pens doesn't mean that the necessarily get them for much cheaper than what eBay sellers are, so they would need to mark it up to make it worth it for them to carry it.
 
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I tried to like a 159 I was PIF'd on. I really did. Couple of things that I couldn't get past - its weight - @ 50 grams (1.76 oz) it is a very heavy pen. The flow on the one I had was horrible. I tried everything in terms of inks to try and get it to work acceptably. THe closest I came was a Waterman Intense Black cartridge and it was only so so. The person I got it from had stubbed the nib, so I don't know if it was because of that or some other reason. So I passed it on realizing that I wouldn't use it regularly.

My heaviest pen is a True Writer Silver Anniversary I got from Levenger. 30 grams (1.07 oz) seems to be about my upper end.
 
it took me a few times of reading this, but I think I get it now. Your saying that Goulet has to sell it for double to handle to potential for returns and replacements? I would agree with that. I'm also sure that they're reselling of these pens doesn't mean that the necessarily get them for much cheaper than what eBay sellers are, so they would need to mark it up to make it worth it for them to carry it.

Exactly - Assuming I am doing a good job second guessing Goulet's business plan...

Goulet knows they have customers and potential customers who want these pens. They also know from personal and anecdotal experience the quality control issues they will face. They raised the price to cover the high end support they provide along with the pen because they don't expect their customers to buy a few to get one that works to the customer's satisfaction.
 
Exactly - Assuming I am doing a good job second guessing Goulet's business plan...

Goulet knows they have customers and potential customers who want these pens. They also know from personal and anecdotal experience the quality control issues they will face. They raised the price to cover the high end support they provide along with the pen because they don't expect their customers to buy a few to get one that works to the customer's satisfaction.


Ahh.....I'm pickin up what your layin down.
 
ok gang, after using them for a while, I have my first leaky Jinhao pen.......kind of. I don't have any pictures is it happened at work and I just had to get it cleaned up, but it wasn't REALLY the pen as much as it was the converter. I have three Jinhao's and all three have a different converter. the two "good" ones I can completely take apart (remove collar, piston, screw assembly etc.) and apply grease wherever and whenever needed. this one I can't. the collar comes off, but that's it. so I can't get to the plunger/pistol to clean and lubricate. what happened is that ink got behind the piston seal and started to leak out of the back end. to make matters worse, I didn't realize this right away and screwed the piston back out a little thereby forcing the ink out of the back end. not a total loss as I believe this to still be a decent pen, it just needs another converter, or I need to figure out how to service this converter better.

FWI.. the pen in question is the 599A lamy safari clone. so far, the 159 and X750 are still running like champs.
 
ok gang, after using them for a while, I have my first leaky Jinhao pen.......kind of. I don't have any pictures is it happened at work and I just had to get it cleaned up, but it wasn't REALLY the pen as much as it was the converter. I have three Jinhao's and all three have a different converter. the two "good" ones I can completely take apart (remove collar, piston, screw assembly etc.) and apply grease wherever and whenever needed. this one I can't. the collar comes off, but that's it. so I can't get to the plunger/pistol to clean and lubricate. what happened is that ink got behind the piston seal and started to leak out of the back end. to make matters worse, I didn't realize this right away and screwed the piston back out a little thereby forcing the ink out of the back end. not a total loss as I believe this to still be a decent pen, it just needs another converter, or I need to figure out how to service this converter better.

FWI.. the pen in question is the 599A lamy safari clone. so far, the 159 and X750 are still running like champs.

If you could only have one Jinhao knowing what you know now, which one would it be?
 
159 hands down. Some talk about how big it is, but in my hands it's just right. The section is the right diameter and the length un posted is about perfect. Which is good as it doesn't really like to post. The nib is technically the same as my 750, but is quite a bit drier. That 750 is like a fire hose. And with my relatively small writing it just doesn't work. I have a suspicion that it's not the nibs but the feeds that make the difference, so I hope one day to get a couple Goulet fine nibs for the both of them which might tip the scales a little bit. Also, I tend to gravitate to black pens and the 159 fits that bill nicely. But we shall see what happens when my wing sung 590's get here :001_rolle
 
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