Monteverde Invincia Nebula with Omniflex Nib Fountain Pen Review

(Jeff Abbott is a regular contributor at The Pen Addict. You can find more from Jeff online at Draft Evolution and Twitter.)

I first wrote about the Monteverde Invincia way back in 2016 (!), and today I'm talking about the same pen. The Monteverde Invincia with Nebula finish and Omniflex nib is a recent addition to the line, and I wanted to try out a new one to see how it compares to my well-worn orange and carbon fiber variant.

What I've enjoyed about my original Invincia is the dependability and all-round good and reliable performance and easy maintenance. It's certainly not the best pen I own, and it's not even close to being my favorite. I like trying inks in lots of pens, and I definitely go through phases of favorite ink/pen combos. When it comes time to test out a new ink, I don't always want to clean out a favorite pen to try out the new ink. And that's where the Invincia has never let me down.

The Invincia is "good enough" of a writer to do a great job at testing inks. The 1.1mm stub nib shows off ink characteristics wonderfully, the ink flow is superb, and it just happens to be really easy to tear down and clean out. I've used and cleaned this pen so many times that almost half of the black coating on the nib has worn away. Some of the black coating on the grip section is also wearing away. I keep coming back to it because I know exactly how it behaves.

If you have more than a couple of fountain pens, then you're probably aware that some pens write dryer or wetter than others when using the same ink. It's the same phenomena as using the same ink and pen on different types of paper. They just feel and act differently! Using the same pen for testing affords a certain level of control to keep the testing grounds even. I stumbled into using the first Invincia as a go-to test pen by accident, but now I can't imagine testing a new ink or notebook without it being in the mix.

The Nebula variant caught my eye because of the beautiful coating. I'm a huge fan of anything with a nebula or galaxy color scheme, and this Invincia just did it for me. I love the gradient that goes from blue, black, purple, teal, and orange. That was enough to put this pen in the cart, but I had to pick a nib first. I saw the Omniflex option and realized I had no idea what that was. Touted as a steel nib with a good amount of flex, I was sold immediately.

Upon opening up the new Invincia, I was immediately 100% satisfied with the colors and finish. After inking it up and testing out the Omniflex nib, I was also pleasantly surprised with how it performed out of the box. It's an extremely smooth nib and feels similar to a car that rides on a super smooth suspension. It glides over the imperfections of the page and reacts to the various pressure levels from your hand with ease.

Being a steel nib, it doesn't have the same level of flex as a gold flex nib (like the Pilot Falcon), but it's pretty impressive considering the steel materials. It's easy to add a little flourish of line width with light pressure. When writing normally, the nib acts like a fine, and you can increase the line to a bold with enough pressure. That's a great amount of variation that means you can really affect your writing style with practice.

The Invincia comes with a cartridge converter and two international short cartridges (one black and one blue) to get you started.

The cap of the Invincia is a screw on cap, but it only takes a quarter turn to operate. It's really smooth and secure, and I've always enjoyed using it. There's a satisfying motion and click to let you know it's closed.

Posting the cap on the back of the pen extends the length quite a bit, but it's still a great overall length for writing. The pen is well-balanced without the cap, but the extra weight of the cap doesn't throw off the balance by much.

I mentioned that I'm a huge fan of the color scheme for this version of the pen, but there is a downside. This finish is a fingerprint magnet! I find myself wiping it down pretty often, and it picks up new fingerprints instantly. I guess that's the price you pay for a shiny finish with bright colors. It won't keep from using it a lot, though.

Since this is my second Invincia, I knew what to expect with this pen (aside from the new nib type), and it's delivered flawlessly. The nib is smooth and consistent, provides a lovely amount of flex and variation, and flows perfectly. It's great seeing new types of nib options outside of the standard EF-B sizing. Monteverde has excellent stub options, but flex nibs offer a different experience and are uniquely interesting. It's great seeing this diversity and change in a pen that was already well-dialed.

The Monteverde Invincia isn't the best fountain pen out there, but it's a solid contender that is worth your attention. It's a work horse that just keeps delivering a great writing experience after plenty of use and abuse. I can whole-heartedly recommend the Invincia to anyone in the market for a unique and affordable fountain pen option. And if Nebula isn't your thing, there are plenty of other color options!

At $80 for the Nebula colorway, it hits the middle price point for the line, and I think it's a fair price for the quality, materials, and aesthetics that it provides. I think the Omniflex nib is definitely worth checking out, but you can also pick from more standard nib sizes as well.

(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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Visconti Van Gogh Fountain Pen Review

(Sarah Read is an author, editor, yarn artist, and pen/paper/ink addict. You can find more about her at her website and on Twitter. And check out her latest book, Out of Water, now available where books are sold!)

Most of my experience with Visconti pens has been staring at them through the glass of a display case, thinking "no way" but feeling a little bummed about it. Because they're gorgeous, but overpriced. So having the chance to try one out at last is priceless.

The packaging certainly makes an impression. The box is textured like a paint canvas and has the image of a Van Gogh painting on top, presumably whichever painting inspired the color scheme for your pen.

My pen is the Orchard in Blossom, with a beautiful blue-grey sky base, with pops of delicate floral colors and splashes of green grass. The pens are meant to look like the painter's oil palette as he creates his masterpieces, and they've nailed that look beautifully.

It has rose gold trim, though other versions have different trim to correspond with their respective paintings. The pen body and cap are gently faceted and taper at each end. There is a wide cap band with "Visconti Italy" on one side and "Van Gogh" on the other. The bottom finial is plain, while the top has the Visconti V logo. It has the classic Visconti Ponte del Vecchio clip, made to look like the iconic bridge in Florence, Italy. It is a hinged clip, so the whole thing lifts easily and clips securely.

The cap has a magnetic closure with a very satisfying click. It does post securely, but you risk scratching that gorgeous finish. The grip section is smooth metal with a slight ridge at the end to keep your fingers from sliding.

The pen takes cartridges or a converter, and it comes with a converter and a bottle of ink, which was a lovely surprise. The ink is a rosy purple to match the blooms in the painting. It's a great ink with lots of character that shades in different purple tones.

The nib in my pen is a rose gold-plated steel nib. It is beautifully etched. But it has some mild QC issues, which is not unheard of for Visconti. This nib is meant to be a Fine, but whoa. The slit in this nib is very wide, a canyon compared to the average nib. It's enough to affect the capillary action and made it difficult to get ink flowing at first. But once it got started, it flowed like a fire hose in a very wet, broad line. It writes with a controlled dribble. It didn't take long to write the pen empty. It's smooth and pleasant to use--I don't dislike the way it writes, but it's definitely not performing as it's supposed to.

Given the nib issues and the price ($260 for a steel nib, yikes), it's not a pen that I can fully recommend, despite its other qualities. If you're fortunate enough to be in a place where you can try one or peek at the nib, or purchasing from a vendor that does nib checks, then I'd say it's definitely worth looking into. I still really like this pen. If money was no object, there are three other colors I'd get! But it's not perfect, and at its price point, it really should be.

(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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Enjoy reading The Pen Addict? Then consider becoming a member to receive additional weekly content, giveaways, and discounts in The Pen Addict shop. Plus, you support me and the site directly, for which I am very grateful.

Membership starts at just $5/month, with a discounted annual option available. To find out more about membership click here and join us!

TWSBI PIPE - Is this really necessary?

(Kimberly (she/her) took the express train down the fountain pen/stationery rabbit hole and doesn't want to be rescued. She can be found on Instagram @allthehobbies because there really are many, many hobbies!.)

I’ve mentioned in the past that I’m a TWSBI super fan but when the TWSBI PIPE was announced, I thought to myself, “Really, TWSBI? Do we really need this?” and “Don’t all fountain pen addicts already have (at least) one blunt tip syringe?” But as a devoted fan and now, TPA writer, I had to find out for myself, for you and of course, for science!

No surprise that I had to get the new TWSBI SWIPE Salmon (don’t ask me why they all-caps the model names, lol), but I also snagged the new TWSBI PIPE. I had to see for myself whether it was worth the $10/9 EU price tag.

The TWSBI PIPE comes in a plastic sleeve with little orange nubs to protect the ends and a sheet of illustrated instructions.

Remember to remove the orange nubbins before using.

The instructions say that the PIPE is suitable for TWSBI piston filling fountain pens, their piston converter and spring loaded converter (both of which are included with the TWSBI SWIPE (check out the review for more info,) as well as “Euro spec standard converter”, aka standard international converter. The PIPE doesn’t actually work in all of their piston fillers though; TWSBI’s website says it “fits our Diamond series fountain pens”, which would be the 580 (regular/AL/ALR) and 580 mini. The picture in the instructions shows a Diamond-style barrel but that may not be obvious to most folks though. It does not fit the Eco/Eco-T because the grip section is not removable. I also tried it with the TWSBI Classic and Precision - both of which wouldn’t keep the PIPE in place. And for the heck of it, I tried it with the TWSBI GO and there’s no place it would fit, and it also doesn’t work with the Vac 700R or the Vac Mini, but I didn’t expect it to work for any of those 3 pens.

The PIPE itself is around 4”/10cm long, making anything you attach to it very long and somewhat unwieldy. I was eager to ink up the new Salmon SWIPE with J Herbin Corail des Tropiques which I only have in a 10ml bottle, so it took a lot of concentration to make sure I didn’t knock the bottle over. I can only imagine how much easier it would be to knock over a sample vial (good thing I have a LEGO contraption for that). It could come in handy for inking from an Akkerman bottle if you lost the marble or something, but otherwise, it’s excessively long in my opinion. It would’ve been neat if the PIPE fit into syringes, but again, that would make it even longer. One bonus though is that its length makes it easier to keep your hands clean because there’s so much of the PIPE that doesn’t touch any ink. Keep in mind, I was doing this one handed because I was taking pictures; it is a little easier and a bit more stable with two hands.

Your converter plus PIPE will be around 7”/18cm, so watch where you swing that thing.

So, does it actually work? Yes … mostly. I first tried it in the spring-loaded converter that comes installed in the Salmon SWIPE and I got a pretty good fill. It wasn’t filled to capacity, but a bit more than half. If I wanted to get a complete fill with the PIPE, I had to put the tip up, very carefully press down on the converter “button” to avoid shooting ink everywhere and expel some air. Because there’s still some ink in the PIPE, I did get a little ink on my fingers. While still depressing the button, I reinserted the tip into the bottle and released the button. I got a bit more ink from doing that.

Press the button before inserting into the ink bottle (especially if your bottle is full, mine is not.)

Slowly release the button and you’ll see ink getting drawn up.

I got a bit more than half full with the first fill.

I was able to get a bit more after expelling some air and trying again.

I had essentially the same experience with the TWSBI piston converter - about half full the first time, then a few drops while expelling air and getting a little more the second time. The standard converter takes just a wee bit of effort to fully insert the PIPE as it fits very snugly onto the converter; this isn’t a bad thing, just something to note since it was much easier to fit on the TWSBI converters. I couldn’t get more ink with the standard international converter even after expelling ink. I suspect the little piston in that converter is struggling to pull up more ink with just a couple turns from a top-off.

First fill with the TWSBI piston converter.

”Topping up” as best I can.

First fill with a standard international converter. I won’t even bother you with a top-up picture because I couldn’t get more ink.

Now to try it with the models that the PIPE was designed for – the Diamond models. Would it perform any better? Nope. Both the 580 regular size and Mini got about ½ to ⅔ full from the first fill and neither was able to draw up more ink in subsequent attempts. The PIPE did not fit securely in the Purple 580 AL that I picked but it fit just fine in the Mini AL. I tried 4 different 580s ranging from long discontinued models to ones I bought last year and the PIPE just wouldn’t stay in securely. That said, if I held the pen such that the tip of the PIPE pressed against the bottom of the ink bottle, it would mostly stay in place while I twisted the piston cap and the ink got drawn up. So it does work, just don’t hold the PIPE away from the bottom of the bottle or it might fall out and possibly make a mess. I was also able to get the PIPE to work in the TWSBI Aurora (and Draco) as well though it’s difficult to tell how full the fill was. I suspect it would be about the same as filling the 580 - approximately half full.

Filling the 580 Mini AL Blue - I know, my piston isn’t as far “up” as it could be. I just hate dismantling them to make it perfect, lol.

Filling the 580.

Filling the TWSBI Aurora.

Cleaning the PIPE is pretty easy. You can put it under running water, which should clean it out pretty easily. You can also blast water through it with a bulb syringe; just be aware that you may get some backspray because it’s not a tight fit. The upper tip has a concave “lip” which can cause a little bit of spray if you squeeze that bulb syringe too hard. You may also get a little bit of ink in the lip where it connects to your converter/piston so you have to rinse that top bit too. While not difficult to clean, ironically, I found that the best tool to clean the PIPE was to use my trusty blunt-tip syringe.

Closeup of the tip that gets inserted into converters/pens.

Super easy to clean with a bulb syringe as long as you’re not doing it at your desk like I was, lol.

Cleaning the PIPE is even easier (and neater) with a blunt-tip syringe.

Pros:

• Fairly inexpensive
• Sturdy metal construction and not likely to break
• Works pretty well if you don’t already have a blunt-tip syringe
• Easy to clean

Cons:

• Length of PIPE makes it awkward to use.
• Did not consistently fit the 580s
• Doesn’t work in all pens
• Very difficult to get a full fill

After all this, would I recommend the TWSBI PIPE? Only if you really had to have one cuz you’re a TWSBI nut like me and if you didn’t already have a blunt-tip syringe. And if you don’t have one, please do yourself a favor and get one because they are (1) cheaper, (2) allows you to get as full a fill as you’d like in pretty much any pen (including ones not supported by the PIPE) and (3) have other uses like cleaning out converters/cartridges, etc. In all honesty, I would have preferred to use the syringe to fill up all of these pens/converters instead of the PIPE. So while it breaks my TWSBI-loving heart not to be able to wholeheartedly recommend it, at least it’s not a total bust. If a completely full fill isn’t a requirement and you want to have a sturdy backup for a blunt-tip syringe (maybe for traveling…hmm…), I think the TWSBI PIPE would be an acceptable purchase. But if money is tight or full capacity fills are a priority, then save the $10 and get yourself a blunt-tip syringe in a couple different sizes instead.

(I bought my TWSBI PIPE (and Salmon SWIPE) from LemurInk during the LA Pen Show.)