on saleRobert Oster Rose Gilt Tynte - Ink Sample

The shimmer ink is gorgeous, but I expected my broad nib pen to handle it better. Maybe within only 200 strokes it started skipping and just locking up completely. Granted, I'm using a Twsbi Go, so it's not the highest or best quality, more so an entry level pen. I'm still a novice fountain pen enthusiast but I thought I was prepared for my first high maintenance ink from having read reviews and watching tip videos. Some people suggest using entry level pens to avoid damaging better ones anyway. Now I feel like I can't maintain an ink like this with anything but a dip pen, but it's so pretty I don't think I care about expanding my collection anyway.

Yes it writes dry and yes it can clog but some inks are worth a little extra maintenance. I have used it in pens I enjoy but don't cherish (Noodler's Ahab Flex and Pilot Metropolitan), but I've discovered that dipping a nib into the ink (which has to be continually shaken or poured so shallow that the nib can agitate it), instead of inking up the pen works quite well, especially as I don't often want to write with an entire converter's worth in this shade, just for special occasions. Rose Gilt Tynte is a lovely mid-toned, antique rose with low shading of driftwood and spruce blue-green. It looks like potpourri until I tilt the page and see the intense silver shimmers. In medium and finer nibs, I can achieve a rosy glow (reminds me of the way Diamine Enchanted Ocean writes beautifully even in an EF nib), but this color sings in a wet nib on Tomoe River (or similar) paper. 52 gsm looks best.

This is a crazy ink. A delicate, pale, antique tea rose is super amped with silver and gold shimmer. On low-absorbent paper with a wet nib, I can see traces of green-blue shading. However, you really must use Tomoe River paper (or similar) and a wet nib or you'll get little more than a shimmery pastel on the page. Unfortunately, and I find this to be the case with almost every Robert Oster ink I have sampled or purchased, the ink has a dry flow and is quick to clog. But for dip pen writing, it looks spectacular.

I used my sample in one of my BENUs, which was normally a very wet, juicy pen. At first I loved this ink - great dusty pink color with a lovely silver shimmer. But then the flow became very dry. I cleaned the nib muliple times. I ran water through the nib. I soaked it in Goulet Pen Flush overnight, twice. I scrubbed the nib with a tooth brush. I used a brass sheet. I tried to remove the nib from the feed, but could not pull it out of the housing. So I bought a new nib and my pen is back to what it was before trying this ink.

This was my first time using the Click Majestic, so the fault may lie with the pen and not the ink, but boy howdy did this ink like to halt. It took me over an hour to write the above page in Rose Gilt Tynte, because I kept having to adjust, clean the nib, force the ink through the channel, etc. in an attempt to re-start the ink flow. As a hefty shimmer, in any pen you'll need to frequently move/tilt/rotate the pen to keep the shimmer particulates spread evenly throughout the ink. Otherwise, they settle pretty quickly and can clog a pen feed.As colors go, it's pretty- a ballerina pink with tons of silver shimmer. It's definitely not the same shade of pink for me that it is in the official marketing swatches on fountain pen seller websites, for whatever reason. If the flow was better, I'd be more inclined to use this ink more often...but a frustrating flow kills my enthusiasm for any ink. I'm willing to try it with a broad nib pen to see if it works better, but for now it's in the pretty but too high maintenance category for me. In the attached photos you can see it swatched on Clairefontaine 90gsm paper, using a glass dip pen, and written on white Clairefontaine 90gsm paper, using a Click Majestic fountain pen with an Ultra Flex nib.