Great video, Vincenzo! I have some experience with the Lemon nibs (have 4 of them): every one had tight tines out of the box, and the results were similar to what you see. After adjustment, they write wonderfully - but then again, I print (block letters) and supposedly that's what the architect grind & variations excel at. I love them, but cursive writers may not. As to the new feed: Hongdian started equipping pens with that feed earlier this year. A couple of my D5 came with the old feed, but the last ones (and an A6) all came with the new feeds. The old Hongdian feed had problems keeping up with wetter nibs, which may be one reason they never made Medium or Broad nibs. The new feed has SIGNIFICANTLY better ink flow and easily handles the broadest, wettest nibs I've thrown at them. In addition, Hongdian's flow issues with dry inks seem also to have been solved with the new feed. I've now switched all of my Hongdian pens that use that nib unit to the new style feed. It's a big improvement and gives Hongdian a lot more leeway in terms of what they can do nib-wise. (Oh, BTW: that particular Majohn ink is called "Yusheng"! I have a bottle of it around somewhere...)
I agree that the new feed is a great improvement. but I believe that it was already available in some of their offerings of last year. It’s only in the very old bottles that you find the older feed and I was surprised to find it in this A7.
How did you made the switch to the new feed design, by purchasing the pens again with the new version or by getting only the nib assemblies? I can confirm the new feed works great.
I got a pen from temu for $3 with a long knife nib and was blown away at how smooth it wrote and the line variation depending on the angle. Similar to the kakimori dip nib the vertical lines got thicker the closer the angle of the barrel to the paper.
I have several Architect/long knife nibs from Hongdian which I quite enjoy. 28 grams isn’t hefty. I’m using a Diplomat Nexus currently weighs in at 63 grams. I’m a sucker for a green pen. Very good video. Thank you 🙏
Greetings from Australia. Great production. Note: It depends on whether you get a Hong dian or Lemon nib. I have about 5 Hong dian long knife nibs, and they are fantastic. It is the Lemon that is failing. Haha. I'm writing as I'm watching, and you just confirmed this. Now I'm a bit concerned because today I'm having a Lemon Beasts Fountain pen with a Naganita medium nib delivered to my home. Great video, as always. The subject pen is not available on Australian Ebay
It is interesting to hear how you are experiencing the nibs! I to find the hongdian architect styled nibs are much better than the lemon nibs. I also love the standard lemon nibs.
It is a pity that it is out of stock. There is only one listing I have found and none to be had. I like the stabilized wood body. I hope it returns and they offer that soft nib I have iny D1 model.
Hi Vincenzo! Hongdian presents its A7 fountain pen with a nib that it defines as fourth generation, oriented to a greater performance, for this a new power supply. The Lemon nib could require a suitable power supply: making manual adjustments as users on this nib is a contradiction. My Hongdian A7 has a fixing defect between the two parts of the nib group holder section. Beautiful review! Thanks!
@fountainpentherapy Exactly, there is a problem of adhesion between the stabilized wood section and the internal metal part. Vincenzo I will tell you the solution that I adopted in compliance with the construction engineering of the fountain pen. The nib holder, that is the black cylinder that houses the nib and the feeder, has a very thin o-ring. Remove this o-ring and replace it with a thicker o-ring, at least double. Restart the nib group in the metal section and the new friction will fix everything as it should. I solved it like this with my HongDian A7, extraordinary. I believe that these fountain pens are prototypes to test the market, already sold out in Europe.
That was an interesting review Vincenzo!! It is without a doubt a beautiful pen, but what gives me pause is the fact it's made from Stabilized wood. I'm not really a fan of wood pens to begin with, and not knowing what process that the pen blanks go through to make them "stabilized" doesn't help. From what I understand, the process is that pen blanks are placed in a container of resin (what kind?), then placed in a vacuum chamber, and the air is then drawn out. That is supposed to allow the resin to thoroughly penetrate the wood. Another question would be, for how long do they stay in the vacuum? For me, I think it will be a long while before I consider getting a pen made from this material.
I have to say that I am a fan of architect nibs. The issue, in my opinion, is due to the shape of the letter of each one. I do not have cursive handwriting, but rather flattened and similar to "Arabic characters"... so an architect nib is very suitable to highlight the letter. I have a Lemon M2 with a nib "hand-sharpened by architect" that works well for me but with a lot of feedback..., As always, an excellent video. Thanks.
Another great video, Vincenzo! FWIW, in a video not too long ago Doodlebud commented at one point that the architect grind was originally developed more for printing vs cursive. Although the various similar Asian grinds such as naginata and long knife are more for writing the Japanese and Chinese characters they also are probably better used for printing western letters. I have purchased a couple of inexpensive nibs of that type on a whim, but I have yet try one in a pen so my opinion counts for little or nothing!
I agree that they seem best for printing. this is a well-known fact because architects use printing in their descriptions found in their architectural plans. However, many of us started using those nibs for every day curse of writing I may be in the minority but I simply cannot adapt my handwriting to that nib so unless I need to, demonstrate these nibs in my reviews. I will stay away from them.
Greetings from Australia. It seems that Hong dian have taken this pen off the market. I can not find it anywhere. Perhaps it will come out again closer to Christmas?
Yep, only these Lemon long xxx, hand polished blabla nibs are a disappointment, bought once, never again. The standard Lemon Nibs are great, never had any problems with them. The A7 with its mix of materials is definitely interesting, only the 2 colors that are currently offered are not to my taste. I hope HD will expand the color range in the near future so that I can take a dive as well. Vincenzo, you would do me a huge favor if your next review was dedicated to the good blue R615 Ti-Flex with polymer feed. I want to get a decent full-flex pen and hope that the R615 meets my expectations and that is why I am so curious to hear your verdict.
I agree that the standard lemon nibs are fantastic and I enjoy them tremendously. As to the R6 15 stay tuned I’ve prepared the review but I can tell you right now that I’m completely satisfied with my purchase. I purchased mine at pure pens and not at the good blue site, I also went out and purchased the titanium version of that Flex nib which surprisingly enough is not as Flexi and as fun as the steel version. If you want flex, I would recommend you stick to the cheaper steel version. I will be doing a comparison sometime soon, so stay tuned
@@fountainpentherapy Thanks a lot for reaching out and pass these valuable advance information to me. Pure Pens are offerng significantly better prices than the TGB website, only they have a very limited selection on nibs. It surprised me a lot that the Titanium nib isn't that good than the steel Flex. In any case, I'll wait for your video. I might have another option, Osprey pens, depending on the model, they offer really cheap pens (and of course the material will be) but to me most important factor right now is the large variety of Flex nib options. The big advantage of TGB nib units is they are selling Jowo compatible units but, trying to buy the single Flex nib units was already a disappointment: SOLD OUT. Immediately I became suspicious, they might not want to sell the single flex units (and they are not a bargain) as most probably they got many orders for these nibs and people disregarded the FP's and therefore perhaps and preventively simply removed them from the tray It's of course speculation, but possible. I've seen too many things like that when I was working in product marketing
Although this is a Hongdian, I had a very bad experience with the 'similar' Jinhao stabilized wood pen and it was anything but stable. Within 2 months the pen seized ( wood expansion? ) and the cap could NOT be removed without breaking the pen! I was out $ 50. The pen looked wonderful but..... I suggest caution. The attachment of the metal innards to the wood body MAY break down!
Seems to me that it is more the nib's fault this time. It seems really starved of ink for some reason. Could it be the tight tines? However, I was hoping to purchase it, alas, it is out of stock everywhere 😭
Beautiful pen, Vincenzo. I didn't order it because of the N24 cracking problem, but I may have been overly cautious Why do you think this pen has been removed from the market? They've simply disappeared
@@Shanghai_Knife_DudeSKD - Thks as always for keeping us up to date as here in the west we tend to get little or late info on what’s coming out from China! I’m also bummed regarding your insight into companies like Wing Sung, Hongdian, Asvine and Majohn are experiencing economic problems and may not survive in terms of releasing non-cheap fountain pens. I hope these brands survive.
I just wanna make a distinction between standard lemon nibs and architect lemon nibs. The standard lemon nibs have by far been very good so far, but sometimes it’s hit and miss.
Just so you know, stabilized wood is a process to "infuse" the wood with some sort or polymer so it becomes more resistant to wear and tear, it's usually not easy to tell if a wood is stabilized or not. Unfortunately, I believe this pen won't be widely available anytime soon, or ever. It's a shame. I really hope that Chinese brands don't start following the trend of releasing lots of limited/exclusive editions that very few people can have just to keep on feeding people's consumerism 😑
I have heard a lot of these brands are experiencing less demand in the Chinese market as well as economic issues which are making them release less models. I hope they survive.
@@fountainpentherapy This viewer is knowledgeable regarding stabalised wood. HD experienced first batch wood failure in summer, barrels cracked after processing, otherwise this pen was initially planned in September. Stabalised wood is cheap, but plus the processing cost, it's not that cheap at all. That also explains why few pens in the market adopting stabalised wood.
Thank you, Vincenzo. Your videos are always informative and a pleasure to watch.
4 วันที่ผ่านมา
Hi Vincenzo, really nice pen review as you always did, very illustrative. I'm a big fan of Hongdian pens, hey make great pens and have and use some of them daily. Can I ask you where do you buy this A7? I saw this pen in Blue and Green on AliExpress couple weeks ago and I loved how it looks and I loved the idea of a wood and resin pen, but when I try to buy it couple hours later it wasn't available. Since these day I've been searching for them almost daily on Aliexpress and Amazon and is not available, I'm afraid of happens the same of the N10, go out of stock and never restocked. Thanks
Another informative video thank you!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Another great review, thank you
Glad you enjoyed it
Great video, Vincenzo!
I have some experience with the Lemon nibs (have 4 of them): every one had tight tines out of the box, and the results were similar to what you see. After adjustment, they write wonderfully - but then again, I print (block letters) and supposedly that's what the architect grind & variations excel at. I love them, but cursive writers may not.
As to the new feed: Hongdian started equipping pens with that feed earlier this year. A couple of my D5 came with the old feed, but the last ones (and an A6) all came with the new feeds. The old Hongdian feed had problems keeping up with wetter nibs, which may be one reason they never made Medium or Broad nibs. The new feed has SIGNIFICANTLY better ink flow and easily handles the broadest, wettest nibs I've thrown at them. In addition, Hongdian's flow issues with dry inks seem also to have been solved with the new feed. I've now switched all of my Hongdian pens that use that nib unit to the new style feed. It's a big improvement and gives Hongdian a lot more leeway in terms of what they can do nib-wise.
(Oh, BTW: that particular Majohn ink is called "Yusheng"! I have a bottle of it around somewhere...)
I agree that the new feed is a great improvement. but I believe that it was already available in some of their offerings of last year. It’s only in the very old bottles that you find the older feed and I was surprised to find it in this A7.
How did you made the switch to the new feed design, by purchasing the pens again with the new version or by getting only the nib assemblies? I can confirm the new feed works great.
Hi Vincenzo. I am always looking forward to your informative and amazing videos. Hope you are having a good day ❤
Glad you enjoyed the video, I had fun making it!
I got a pen from temu for $3 with a long knife nib and was blown away at how smooth it wrote and the line variation depending on the angle. Similar to the kakimori dip nib the vertical lines got thicker the closer the angle of the barrel to the paper.
I am glad that you were enjoying that nib model
I have several Architect/long knife nibs from Hongdian which I quite enjoy. 28 grams isn’t hefty. I’m using a Diplomat Nexus currently weighs in at 63 grams. I’m a sucker for a green pen. Very good video. Thank you 🙏
I like heavier pens too.
People love their architect nibs. I'm not a fan either, but i bet some would love the long knife. I find the hand-polished ones are very nice.
There is a lot of hit and miss in these nibs but the standard lemon nibs are really constant performers
Another great review. I love the stabilized wood material. Sadly I cant find them anywhere for sale :(
They’re supposed to be back in stock soon cross your fingers
Greetings from Australia.
Great production.
Note: It depends on whether you get a Hong dian or Lemon nib.
I have about 5 Hong dian long knife nibs, and they are fantastic. It is the Lemon that is failing.
Haha. I'm writing as I'm watching, and you just confirmed this.
Now I'm a bit concerned because today I'm having a Lemon Beasts Fountain pen with a Naganita medium nib delivered to my home.
Great video, as always.
The subject pen is not available on Australian Ebay
It is interesting to hear how you are experiencing the nibs! I to find the hongdian architect styled nibs are much better than the lemon nibs. I also love the standard lemon nibs.
It is a pity that it is out of stock. There is only one listing I have found and none to be had. I like the stabilized wood body. I hope it returns and they offer that soft nib I have iny D1 model.
One of my Chinese viewers informed me that it will be in stock soon soon
@fountainpentherapy excellent!
Hi Vincenzo! Hongdian presents its A7 fountain pen with a nib that it defines as fourth generation, oriented to a greater performance, for this a new power supply. The Lemon nib could require a suitable power supply: making manual adjustments as users on this nib is a contradiction. My Hongdian A7 has a fixing defect between the two parts of the nib group holder section. Beautiful review! Thanks!
I just noticed in my pen that the nip section appears to be spinning around
@fountainpentherapy Exactly, there is a problem of adhesion between the stabilized wood section and the internal metal part. Vincenzo I will tell you the solution that I adopted in compliance with the construction engineering of the fountain pen. The nib holder, that is the black cylinder that houses the nib and the feeder, has a very thin o-ring. Remove this o-ring and replace it with a thicker o-ring, at least double. Restart the nib group in the metal section and the new friction will fix everything as it should. I solved it like this with my HongDian A7, extraordinary. I believe that these fountain pens are prototypes to test the market, already sold out in Europe.
That was an interesting review Vincenzo!! It is without a doubt a beautiful pen, but what gives me pause is the fact it's made from Stabilized wood. I'm not really a fan of wood pens to begin with, and not knowing what process that the pen blanks go through to make them "stabilized" doesn't help. From what I understand, the process is that pen blanks are placed in a container of resin (what kind?), then placed in a vacuum chamber, and the air is then drawn out. That is supposed to allow the resin to thoroughly penetrate the wood. Another question would be, for how long do they stay in the vacuum? For me, I think it will be a long while before I consider getting a pen made from this material.
It’s true there’s a lot of mystery surrounding the process. For me, this particular pen is all about the look, and I’m willing to take a chance.
Beautiful 🎉 mind the grip, glue may be needed .
I have to say that I am a fan of architect nibs. The issue, in my opinion, is due to the shape of the letter of each one. I do not have cursive handwriting, but rather flattened and similar to "Arabic characters"... so an architect nib is very suitable to highlight the letter. I have a Lemon M2 with a nib "hand-sharpened by architect" that works well for me but with a lot of feedback..., As always, an excellent video. Thanks.
You are not the only one who likes those architect nibs I must definitely be in the minority
I had to open up the long knife nibs a little but after that they wrote great
That adjustment appears to be necessary based on other comments I received
Another great video, Vincenzo! FWIW, in a video not too long ago Doodlebud commented at one point that the architect grind was originally developed more for printing vs cursive. Although the various similar Asian grinds such as naginata and long knife are more for writing the Japanese and Chinese characters they also are probably better used for printing western letters. I have purchased a couple of inexpensive nibs of that type on a whim, but I have yet try one in a pen so my opinion counts for little or nothing!
I agree that they seem best for printing. this is a well-known fact because architects use printing in their descriptions found in their architectural plans. However, many of us started using those nibs for every day curse of writing I may be in the minority but I simply cannot adapt my handwriting to that nib so unless I need to, demonstrate these nibs in my reviews. I will stay away from them.
Greetings from Australia.
It seems that Hong dian have taken this pen off the market. I can not find it anywhere.
Perhaps it will come out again closer to Christmas?
Indeed, I read somewhere that the pen will be made available sometime in the future once again
Yep, only these Lemon long xxx, hand polished blabla nibs are a disappointment, bought once, never again. The standard Lemon Nibs are great, never had any problems with them. The A7 with its mix of materials is definitely interesting, only the 2 colors that are currently offered are not to my taste. I hope HD will expand the color range in the near future so that I can take a dive as well.
Vincenzo, you would do me a huge favor if your next review was dedicated to the good blue R615 Ti-Flex with polymer feed. I want to get a decent full-flex pen and hope that the R615 meets my expectations and that is why I am so curious to hear your verdict.
I agree that the standard lemon nibs are fantastic and I enjoy them tremendously. As to the R6 15 stay tuned I’ve prepared the review but I can tell you right now that I’m completely satisfied with my purchase. I purchased mine at pure pens and not at the good blue site, I also went out and purchased the titanium version of that Flex nib which surprisingly enough is not as Flexi and as fun as the steel version. If you want flex, I would recommend you stick to the cheaper steel version. I will be doing a comparison sometime soon, so stay tuned
@@fountainpentherapy Thanks a lot for reaching out and pass these valuable advance information to me. Pure Pens are offerng significantly better prices than the TGB website, only they have a very limited selection on nibs.
It surprised me a lot that the Titanium nib isn't that good than the steel Flex. In any case, I'll wait for your video.
I might have another option, Osprey pens, depending on the model, they offer really cheap pens (and of course the material will be) but to me most important factor right now is the large variety of Flex nib options.
The big advantage of TGB nib units is they are selling Jowo compatible units but, trying to buy the single Flex nib units was already a disappointment: SOLD OUT.
Immediately I became suspicious, they might not want to sell the single flex units (and they are not a bargain) as most probably they got many orders for these nibs and people disregarded the FP's and therefore perhaps and preventively simply removed them from the tray It's of course speculation, but possible. I've seen too many things like that when I was working in product marketing
Although this is a Hongdian, I had a very bad experience with the 'similar' Jinhao stabilized wood pen and it was anything but stable. Within 2 months the pen seized ( wood expansion? ) and the cap could NOT be removed without breaking the pen! I was out $ 50. The pen looked wonderful but..... I suggest caution. The attachment of the metal innards to the wood body MAY break down!
So far so good with my pen. The N24 was a disaster. but after three tries, I finally got a cap that is yet to crack
Seems to me that it is more the nib's fault this time. It seems really starved of ink for some reason. Could it be the tight tines?
However, I was hoping to purchase it, alas, it is out of stock everywhere 😭
One of my Chinese viewers believes it will be back in stock soon
Beautiful pen, Vincenzo. I didn't order it because of the N24 cracking problem, but I may have been overly cautious Why do you think this pen has been removed from the market? They've simply disappeared
Wood storage. Also wood processing capacity. Don't worry, more will come.
@@Shanghai_Knife_DudeSKD - Thks as always for keeping us up to date as here in the west we tend to get little or late info on what’s coming out from China! I’m also bummed regarding your insight into companies like Wing Sung, Hongdian, Asvine and Majohn are experiencing economic problems and may not survive in terms of releasing non-cheap fountain pens. I hope these brands survive.
The N24 cracking problem I believe was solved and newer ones do not crack.
I can confirm that after three tries the third cap that was sent to me as resisted any cracking.
I can confirm that after three tries the third cap that was sent to me has resisted cracking and is still intact
Jinhao 9056 or 58. It's not clear
I’m not sure what you’re referring to. Are you referring to something I mayhave misstated
It's certainly not you. My own experience is the same. Lemon nibs are indeed lemons.
I just wanna make a distinction between standard lemon nibs and architect lemon nibs. The standard lemon nibs have by far been very good so far, but sometimes it’s hit and miss.
Do not trust stabilized wood!
Just so you know, stabilized wood is a process to "infuse" the wood with some sort or polymer so it becomes more resistant to wear and tear, it's usually not easy to tell if a wood is stabilized or not.
Unfortunately, I believe this pen won't be widely available anytime soon, or ever. It's a shame. I really hope that Chinese brands don't start following the trend of releasing lots of limited/exclusive editions that very few people can have just to keep on feeding people's consumerism 😑
I have heard a lot of these brands are experiencing less demand in the Chinese market as well as economic issues which are making them release less models. I hope they survive.
Received word from a knowledgeable viewer who is tuned into the Chinese market and he believes that more of these pens will be coming out
@@fountainpentherapy This viewer is knowledgeable regarding stabalised wood. HD experienced first batch wood failure in summer, barrels cracked after processing, otherwise this pen was initially planned in September. Stabalised wood is cheap, but plus the processing cost, it's not that cheap at all. That also explains why few pens in the market adopting stabalised wood.
Thank you, Vincenzo. Your videos are always informative and a pleasure to watch.
Hi Vincenzo, really nice pen review as you always did, very illustrative. I'm a big fan of Hongdian pens, hey make great pens and have and use some of them daily. Can I ask you where do you buy this A7?
I saw this pen in Blue and Green on AliExpress couple weeks ago and I loved how it looks and I loved the idea of a wood and resin pen, but when I try to buy it couple hours later it wasn't available. Since these day I've been searching for them almost daily on Aliexpress and Amazon and is not available, I'm afraid of happens the same of the N10, go out of stock and never restocked. Thanks
One of my Chinese viewers indicated that they will be coming out with additional supplies sometime soon. Stay tuned.
@ ohhh ok thanks, I’ll be alert about the release date hehehe thanks