Platinum Preppy (Fine)

Without this pen I would not have ventured further into fountain pens. To be fair, my first fountain pen was a pilot varsity, but I believe I write too slowly and it was simply too wet a writer. I have read a lot of reviews on the preppy and there does seem to be a varsity/preppy divide. I was so curious as to how a fine tipped fountain pen would work for a lefty that I made it part of one of my first Jetpens order. My largest concern with this pen was whether or not it would be scratchy. As a lefty I do a lot of pushing with my pen. I do have to alter the way I hold normal nibbed pens. I simply angle the nib downwards. This puts the pen at an almost 90 degree angle with the paper and allows some of my push lines to become pulls. I still have some skipping but it is not nearly enough to make me not want to use this pen on a regular basis.

Body: It's made of plastic with a stainless steel nib. It feels much less clunky then the varsity in my hand and the matching ink and nib setup is really quite quaint. While I haven't had this pen long enough for this issue to occur but I've read that the preppy is prone to breakage around the barrel threading. It is also worth mentioning that this pen is hackable (as seen on Future; Nostalgic). Add this on to the ability to refill this pen with platinum cartridges, it seems like a landslide vs. the varsity to me.

Ink: I am not a big fan of the blue/black ink that I got with the pen. If anyone has a blue/black botteled ink that they love, please let me know 'cuz I'm looking. Back to the ink I received. It dries very light, almost a periwinkle, which is one of my favorite crayons but not ink color. Preppy does make up for the blue/gray ink color by drying very very fast. On 90g Rhodia it is very close to smear proof. On regular paper, flawless. I am not sure of the medium nibbed preppies, and to be honest, I probably will not try them, mainly due to a pelikano junior review that I'll do in a bit. Another plus is the various color offerings of the preppy. Lots of colors and colored nibs, what's not to love!?

Price: $3.00 on Jetpens. I haven't searched for them anywhere else but that is a pretty great price for a very versatile pen.
Lefty Bottom Line: The best starter fountain pen for the cost. Initial ink was lackluster yet fast drying but you can get a converter and plug in your flavor of the week (There is a business idea there, a baskin robbins for ink. Rocky Road brown/black!? Yes please!)

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