Zen and The Art of Ink Fade Testing

by Leonardo Menderes, Guest Writer

Editor's Note: Leonardo left some intriguing results to his own pen fade testing in the comments of the Pen Freak post on my own Weblog. I felt this information was interesting enough to have Leonardo write up in detail, so his findings could receive more exposure on Journalisimo. Thanks Leonardo! — Mike Rohde

Important work notes on the wall of my cube were fading fast recently, so I decided to embark on a search for quality archival pens. All of the cheap ballpoint pens I've used in the past 5 years or so turn out to be faders, so I clearly needed to upgrade.

The first test-set was a card with black-pen writing, taped against a basement window for the South sun for a few weeks.

Set 1 (South window, 2 weeks)

The Zebra Sarasa and Jimnie pens were a lasting and deep black. However, they are a bit wide, even for the spec 0.7mm, run down fast, and take extra dry-time. The Sarasa is very hard to start after dis-use too. The capped Jimnie is better.

Fountain pen lovers might love the richness of Sarasa. If you can dip the tip in melting candle wax it will keep well.

The Rose-Art X500 is a pricier ball-point. It is not as dense as a gel, but the lines are small, and it hardly faded. Very nice! (for a ballpoint). Slight skip at work...not sure why.

The Pentel RSVP is a popular fancy ballpoint, and it was smooth and dense going on, but had almost completely faded away....oops! Not good for notes, methinks.

(Then I migrated to nicer pens for my tinier notes)

Set 2 (A card leaning against a fuorescent bulb, 10dy x 24hr)

The Pentel RSVP was faded badly... at this point, it was valuable as an indicator of how much light exposure there was. This was equivalent about a year on my cube wall.

The Sanford uni-ball Onyx is a popular gel office pen, very dense, and quick-drying. It takes some pressure to avoid skip until broken in, and bleeds slightly, but is a great deal if you want a cheap high-grade gel. Perhaps a bit thin for some. Anyway, its fade performance was good: still quite black, slight loss of a blue tossed in for noble looks.

The Pilot P-500: Nice steady lines, finer than other 0.5s! ...a slight 'pebbly feel'....this is the best for writing very small notes..long lines will blob..drying good. Fading: completely unaffected, like new.

Itoya XE-100PU "Xenon" writing: smooth, oily feel, nice! ...angle-sensitive, and needs pressure. Density good for ballpoint. Tip wobbles a little. This means despite the small line, it is only really good for larger writing. Slightly smudgy...lefties beware. Fading: density stayed good, but a little of the loss-of-blue like the uni-ball. Small skips showed up.

Set 3 (5 days, fluorescent bulb touching card)

• The benchmark RSVP pen was well-faded.
• The Pilot G2 (an 0.5) has rock-steady blackness, no fade. Nice writing too: retractable with no tip wobble!! Not quite as tiny as P-500..close though.
• Uni-ball Vision Exact (0.2) to the testing. More precise than onyx..nice. Liquid ink. Lasts super, in true Sanford style. It got juicy with 2 days of use though.. ..too bleedy for my little notes. Bummer. Good for moderate cursive, larger letters.
• The uni-ball Signo micro 207 ..a nice smooth pen, if not as super skip-free as the P-500. Feel is great. No fading (added-on later, after 7 days testing).

Overall Personal Opinions

• Cheap ballpoints are risky these days. A big exception is the uni-ball Onyx. well worth the step-up from 20 to about 50 cents each in bulk!!


• The 0.7 uniball signo 207 (non-micro) is super-smooth and crisp... that's my baby for retractable.


• The P-500 is still unbeatable for tiny block-letters (hard on almost other all pens!)


• The G2 is very nice, but it gets edged on precision by P-500 (its capped cousin) and by the signo on smoothness. If the P-500 cap gets annoying, I will shift the G2 0.5 — but not yet.

Notes: Sanford says capped pens are a bit easier to make skip-free than retractables... ink formulation. Also, larger Hallmark-type stores seem to carry nice pens.

Leonardo Menderes: Meander Around With Me