Ink Review: Sailor Jentle Grenade

O drops of me! trickle, slow drops,
candid, from me falling — drip, bleeding drops,

~ From "Trickle, Drops" by Walt Whitman

One of the joys from using fountain pens is the wide choice of ink colors for everyone to choose from. When I switched to full fountain pen use, I realized that there wasn't just one red or blue ink that I could use—there are a lot! In the last four years, I have built a collection of fountain pen inks including 13 red-based ink colors, and I'm still craving for more!

When Scribe Writing Essentials launched the arrival of Sailor products in the Philippines last September, I knew I had to test their ink offerings, and what better color to start the Sailor ink taste test—I chose red! Scribe sent me a bottle of Sailor Jentle Grenade to review, and I tested it on two different pens with regular and italic nibs, and on different paper types. Grenade did not disappoint, it gave me a blast!

My bottle of Grenade holds 50ml (1.7oz) of water-based ink and costs Php695 from Scribe Writing Essentials (for Philippine readers of this blog), while Goulet Pens (for international readers) sells it for US$12.50. This ink is a bit expensive, but it's worth the price.

Each bottle of Sailor Jentle inks comes with a plastic tube that serves as an internal reservoir to make filling pens easier. When the plastic tube is empty, just turn the bottle upside down and then right up again to let the ink into the plastic tube. Just make sure that the bottle's cap is tight and secure before flipping it to avoid spilling ink. The plastic tube is helpful especially when the ink level in the bottle is very low.

Grenade is a deep, dark red/purple/burgundy ink that is highly saturated, but has good lubrication and flows very well. It is smooth on all the paper samples I tried, and the shading is just amazing! While wet, it appears as dark red, but becomes dark purplish red when it dries. It is not difficult to read and looks beautiful either on white or non-white paper samples (ecru, beige, etc.)

For a saturated ink, Grenade dries fast (8mins) on the 90gsm Canson sketchpad and Kokuyo paper, but a little slower (12mins) on Rhodia paper from the Reverse Notebook I used in the written review above.

I did not have feathering and bleed through issues in the three paper types I mentioned, but Grenade bled heavily when I tried it on 70gsm copy paper.

Grenade shows unique shading when written from a wide-nibbed pen. The sample above shows Grenade (upper swatch) with J. Herbin's Rouge Hematite (lower swatch), or 1670 Anniversary ink, the only ink that I can compare Grenade to, for obvious reasons. Grenade has dark green shading, in a similar way to the 1670's gold flecks. The green shading is the reason I chose Grenade over Epinard.

Well, my red ink collection is growing, and though Grenade is only the first Sailor ink I reviewed, it is my 14th red ink. It will surely be on my top five favorite red inks because of its deep, dark purplish red color and amazing shading. Grenade is an excellent ink and I will get more of it when I finish the bottle.

Sailor Jentle ink is available in nine colors: black, blue, blue-black, ultra marine, sky high, epinard, grenade, apricot, and pêche. Sailor also offers two pigment inks, Kiwaguro (black) and Seiboku (blue-black), both  quick drying and water proof inks.

The bottle of Sailor Jentle Grenade used in this review is courtesy of Scribe Writing Essentials, the leading contributor of high-end reading and writing accesories in the Philippines. The red Lamy Safari and Rhodia notebook are from my personal collection.

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The Joy of My 2nd Pen Meet

Earlier last month, I attended my second pen meet at Cravings, Shangri La Mall in Ortigas. Incidentally, my first pen meet was also at Shangri La in late December last year, only that was held at The Dome. Like my first pen meet, I was very excited that I couldn't sleep the night before. In place of sleep, I re-inked my empty pens, especially the new ones, and arranged them neatly and properly in their slots inside my blue flannel pen wrap. I also thought of bringing my fountain pen-friendly notebook finds so I brought along the Paperchase notebook I got from Booksale and the new Eagle notebook I found at Office Warehouse.

There was a very heavy downpour as I was about to leave the house and I got delayed for almost half an hour. Then I was caught in a traffic jam somewhere along Sucat, so I was already more than an hour late, so I sent Sir Butch D. a message to let them know I'll be joining them shortly. When I got there, it was lunchtime and most of the FPN-P people have arrived.

The long table was near full, and I got seated near Sir Butch, JP Reyes, and Kurt Uy. It's an FPN-P pen meet tradition to try other people's pens and notebooks, but I have my own tradition: I try all the pens I could try but on my own Moleskine pages. I do this so I am able to try pens, write down what they are, what inks they carry, and who owns them. Neat.

Pens and inks from my first pen meet, December 2008.

Before I made the rounds of trying pens, I showed my Indian pens to Sir Butch, JP, Sir Nestor, Sir Chito, and later to Leigh. I think for most of them, it's a first to see (and try) both the Camlin and Chelpark pens.

The first set of pens I tried were those of JP's. He let me try his Pelikan M450 and two Mont Blancs. Woo-hoo!

Then I moved to the other end of the room and tried the pens of couple Vic and Cyn Icasas who are just as accommodating with their pens. I tried Cyn's Lamy ABC which is just awesome. Then I moved to Vic's pen case. *Grin.* I tried his Sheaffer No-Nonsense with a BB nib. OMG. That one is bold, broad, and wet. After that, I was able to try a pen with music nib for the first time - it's Vic's Sailor Sapporo Mini. But I did not stop there - I did not pass the chance to try the other residents of his pencase, too: Pelikan M215; a Laban pen; 2 Waterman pens: the Harley Davidson he just got from Sir Chito Limson, and a Phileas; 3 Pilots: M90, Volex, and a no-name Pilot pen; 3 Lamys: Safari (inked with Leigh's CDA Caribbean Sea), Studio, and Vista (both inked with Purple Mojo). Phew! Dami pens!

I also tried Sir Chito's pens: Danitrio, Visconti, Baoer Eight Horses, a Jinhao Sailboat Commemorative pen, and a white Parker Duofold! That last one had me drooling.

Then I tried Caloy Abad-Santos's pens: his Frankensnork from TAO, Danitrio Raw Ebonite Prototype, Platinum Longshort, Sheaffer Legacy, and a Moore Safety pen.

Dami talaga pens!

Pens and inks at my second pen meet, April 2009. This list goes on to the next page. Ganun kadami pens ang na-try ko!

After lunch and amidst the chatter, the raffle began. Yey! Raffle items included a large ruled Moleskine, a Rhodia notebook, several pens (including a Cross ATX set, a Lamy Joy Calligraphy set, a Waterman, green and orange Pilot petit), and inks. Ang daming raffle items! The raffle was done twice because there were more raffle items than the number of people to receive them. Ahem.

During the first raffle round, I got a blue M&G Joy Box pen courtesy of John Raymond Lim. I was ecstatic over that pen already, but the bomb came during the second round. As Nigs de Paula and Sir Chito raffled off the Lamy Joy Calligraphy set, I said a tiny prayer, and alas, my name was called! Huwow! I got myself my very first Lamy! Oh, boy. The set is courtesy of Johannes Sia. I didn't know what to say... Until Sir Butch joked, "hindi ka siguro makakatulog ngayong gabi nyan!" What he didn't know was that I've already lost sleep the night before. Hahaha!!!

And now, meet Joy. My very first Lamy, and it had to come as a set!

Opening the box reveals then pen, the cap with its red clip, a box of ink cartridges, a Lamy converter, and the nibs: 1.1mm, 1.5mm, and 1.9mm.

A closer look at the nibs, though this photo is way too blurry.

A closer look at the cap, clip and barrel end that also bears the LAMY logo.

And because I had a new calligraphy set (the first one is the Schneider set), I just had to learn the art now. So I got myself a Speedball Textbook pronto, and several packs of Oslo paper. I remember envying my brothers when they were learning calligraphy way back in high school and they each had their own Speedball Textbooks, inks, and Panache nibs. Now I have my own.

Below (and topmost, first photo) is a writing sample of my Lamy Joy Calligraphy set.

As Lamy says, Joy inspire creative writing. Mine isn't that creative, but I'll get there. I'm sure I will. *Wink.*

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