Posts filed under Sailor

Sailor Profit Realo Tenku-Gensou Special Edition with Music Nib: A Review

(Susan M. Pigott is a fountain pen collector, pen and paperholic, photographer, and professor. You can find more from Susan on her blog Scribalishess.)

I own several Sailor fountain pens, but I’ve always been interested in their Realo model. I never bought one because I don’t like the colors offered by American companies (black, maroon, and nibs.com has a special edition in yellow). Luckily, I stumbled upon a Japanese-only edition Realo in the Sale forum on Fountain Pen Geeks. This special Realo is called “Tenku Gensou” which I believe means something like “sky illusions” (someone who speaks Japanese please correct me if I’m wrong).

This pen is absolutely stunning. It is a dark, translucent blue acrylic with subtle sparkles.

It has rose gold accents and a rose gold 21k music nib. Just look at that gorgeous fat nib tip.

The Sailor Profit Realo is exactly the same size as the large 1911 model.

But, the Realo differs from the 1911 in several ways. First, the cap band is much wider (about 1/2 inch). It is engraved with “Sailor Japan Founded 1911.”

Second, the Realo has an ink window, beautifully accented with two gold rings.

Third, the Realo is a piston filler, unlike most Sailor pens which are cartridge/converters. The Realo only holds 1ml of ink, so it isn’t a large-capacity piston filler. Sailor cartridges hold 1.2ml and their converters hold 0.7ml. Even though the pen doesn’t hold as much ink as a Pelikan M800 (1.5ml), it’s still nice to have a piston filler on a Sailor pen, especially one with a juicy music nib.

The music nib is absolutely fantastic. Unlike most music nibs which have three tines, Sailor music nibs only have two.

The nib provides a juicy broad line on down strokes and thin lines on horizontal strokes.

I inked my Realo with Iroshizuku Asa Gao, and the music nib shows off this ink’s shading properties well.

Sailor’s Realo fountain pens are more expensive due to the piston mechanism. A regular 1911 cartridge/converter costs around $250+ (depending on the color and style). A Realo costs $328. And, if you want a Japanese-only Realo, expect to pay even more. My Tenku-Gensou is currently $353.57 plus shipping on Rakuten (at current exchange rates).

I’m really happy with my special Tenku-Gensou Realo. The color is spectacular, I love how it sparkles in sunlight, and the rose gold accents are gorgeous. I’m very happy with the music nib—it’s smooth and wet.

Pros

This special edition Sailor Profit Realo Tenku-Gensou is stunning— deep translucent blue with sparkles and rose gold accents. It is one of the prettiest blue pens I own (and I own a lot of blue pens).
A Sailor with a piston mechanism is wonderful. Even though the pen doesn’t hold copious amounts of ink, it holds more than a converter, and the ink window adds another beautiful design element to the pen.
Sailor nibs are gorgeous and well made. The music nib on this pen writes perfectly.

Cons

Sailor Realos are more expensive than Sailor’s other pens.
If you buy a Realo from an American retailer, you’re stuck with two color choices: black or maroon (unless you want to pay $520 for Classic Fountain Pens 22nd Anniversary yellow Pro Gear Realo).
If you want this glittery blue special Realo, you’ll need to purchase it from a Japanese retailer and pay the shipping costs. I was lucky to find a used one.

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Posted on March 9, 2018 by Susan Pigott and filed under Sailor, Fountain Pens, Pen Reviews.

Sailor Shikiori Tsukuyo-no-Minamo Fountain Pen, Shimoyo (Frosty Night) 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.)

I was in public when I first saw the new Sailor Shikiori pens hit the JetPens site. Worse than public, I was at work, where I do my best to appear as a perfectly normal human who doesn't make noises like that when they see a picture of a pen. I lost some serious cred that day--but I gained an excellent pen. So, overall, I came out ahead.

The pen build is the same as their Procolor 500 series, and very similar to the 1911 Standard—almost identical, until they are held side-by-side and examined closely. The plastic of the Shikiori feels a bit softer and the edges are a little less crisp than the Standard model. The weight is about the same. The nib on the Shikiori is gold finished steel, rather than the 14k gold of the Standard nib. I had to double check this, because the nib is so smooth and pleasant, I wasn't convinced it wasn't gold. There is a small amount of feedback with the fine nib, but in a good way. The steel nib of the Shikiori is more slender than the Standard. It looks a bit small in the pen, but it still has the beautiful Sailor branding stamped into the metal. It's the same size and shape as the Procolor 500 series, but with the added gold finish.

It's difficult to capture the pearlescent sparkle of the material--the photos don't do this pen justice. This Shimoyo color was named for the frost that appears on ponds on a winter's night. The other colors of this series are the deep blue of the full autumn moon on the lake (Yonaga), the red of a summer night bonfire (Yodaki), and the delicate pink of evening cherry blossoms (Yozakura).

All four colors have matching inks that are just as stunning as the pens themselves. If I wasn't trying to slow the encroaching ink tide in my home, I'd have picked them up like Pokemon, but I resisted and filled mine with Akkerman #8 Diep-Duinwaterblauw. It's a good match, I think, though the ink is more greeny where the pen is a bit more grey.

If you're looking for a relatively inexpensive way to become hopelessly addicted to Sailor pens, this is a great place to start. I say relatively, because at $70, this is more of a next-level pen, rather than entry-level in terms of cost--but the experience you get for that price is an excellent value. This is definitely one of the best under-$100 pens that I own--and it's better than a few I paid over $100 for.

You may have to do a little bit of hunting for these, or keep your eyes peeled for the Jetpens restock. They aren't widely available outside of Japan. I hope Sailor does more of these models in other fun themes and colors. It would help me out a lot if I could indulge in beautiful Sailors without paying for the gold nib every time, especially when the steel nibs are as nice as this one.

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

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Posted on February 8, 2018 by Sarah Read and filed under Sailor, Fountain Pens, Pen Reviews.

Sailor 1911 Large Ballpoint Pen Review

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

Sailor are known for their high-quality, well-made fountain pens. There are several Sailors on my wishlist, but they can take some time to purchase given the high price tag. After all, well-made goods cost more than cheaper ones.

When I received the 1911 Large ballpoint to review, I was curious to see how it performed since I only associate Sailor with fountain pens and inks. The 1911 looks similar to the fountain pen version of the pen, except it uses a twist mechanism to extend and retract the refill tip.

At first glance, the top portion of the pen seems too large compared to the grip section. I've seen fountain pen versions of the 1911, and they don't have the same "out of balance" look since the body is longer and untapered at the end. That thought hasn't stopped popping up every time I look at the pen. And, it adds a bit of extra heft to the top of the pen while writing, too. This can cause some balance problems if you're not accustomed to writing with a top heavy pen.

Initial impressions weren't bad, and I was excited to see how it wrote. That's where my impressions took a big hit, and they're still struggling to recover. Yes, this is a ballpoint refill, and I was expecting something in that ballpark, but the writing experience with this refill was less than satisfactory. It's perfectly smooth (almost too smooth), but it skips and constantly looks like the refill is almost dried out due to the light black to medium gray tone it puts down. The lines are not sharp and tend to deposit artifacts outside of the main line as you write. When compared to my favorite ballpoint refill, the Schmidt EasyFlow 9000, it just doesn't compare.

Shortly after writing a few lines to try out the refill, I was optimistic that I could just swap in another refill that worked better. But, as I went through my stash of regular refills and eventually crossed them all off the "compatibility" list, I realized that this refill is proprietary to this pen and that I was just stuck with it. Bummer!

For that reason alone, I find it difficult to recommend this pen. The refill looks like a standard Parker refill that has been slightly modified to make it unique to Sailor. That doesn't feel right, and the fact that their stock refill is mediocre just hurts more.

Maybe I'm being harsh on this pen. After all, it's beautiful! This complaint is similar in nature to buying a $150 fountain pen that has significant nib issues that make the writing experience negative without some kind of nib tuning. It just shouldn't happen. With this pen, however, tuning isn't an option due to the proprietary refill.

At nearly $100, that's just unacceptable. This pen oozes executive class on the outside, and it feels great when you pick it up and operate the twist mechanism. Once you start writing, however, the experience is similar to the dollar-a-dozen Bic stashed in the office supply closet. At this price, you're not far off from the fountain pen version. My recommendation is to spend a little extra money on the fountain pens that Sailor has figured out and perfected!

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

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