ArtBistro

I used to HATE cleaning these pens. But the ink is great. A nice solid, even black. I even bought some to use with my brushes and crow quill pens. ;)

These pens are fantastic for tiny line work, or large areas. The only issue I have with these pens is when it comes to cleaning them. While reassembling them, you have to make sure that you put the nib back in carefully, or your screwed. You bend the nib, and you have buy another one. They aren't cheap, so be careful!

Excellent for pen and ink drawing on Bristol Smooth; one recommendation to all: after rinsing out the head, complete the cleaning using one of these ultrasonic cleaner, it will make your life easier!

I concur! Great pen, a real pain to clean. Over the years I have gotten fed up and thrown out atleast 3 sets of these after I have moved... not gotten to pens in awhile... you know how that is. You always mean to get to them and then... oh @#$! If you are an organized creative great, but not for me anymore. More variety of line to crow quill pens or fountain pens anyway, these are really meant for technical illustrations and drafting and they work great for that, most of those folks tend to be a bit more disciplined in their habits anyway so.... I bet they can keep their pens clean. :)

I have used both Koh-I-Noor, and Staedtler pens, I'm not too found Koh-I-Nor I prefer the Staedtler and found it to be an all around better pen and is easy to maintain. They give the same line and control, but allot less maintenance and you don't have to worry about losing the wrench since it's on the back the pen. It is a smarter design. They followed the simple "KISS" rule.. "Keep it simple Simon" Staedtler is my main stable when it comes to my art supplies. The fact that I did over 1,700 hours of art work for my book "ABUSSUS Within Passages of Thought" should say something about the Staedtler Pens. With the Koh I Noor, I believe it would have been pure torture.

Scaramouche... in Twilight's Shadow... a Dream...

I have bought twice these rapidographs. The first time i had problems with the thinnest one. I was extra careful to clean them every time after use but still, ink was not flowing well. their own ink! Same problem the second time.
The rest of them are a pleasure to work with for architectural rendering and illustrations. Not to make expressive lines really but for designing logos and similar work they are very nice indeed as long as you use the right kind of paper. Extra bright heavy smooth surfaces are best.

Smooth consistent flow at all line weights. beats the pants off of those crappy microns I used to use .

Consistency, in a word. Koh-I-Noor has been around since I was in high school 35 years ago, it was the standard in my art school, and remains so today. Unparalleled excellence.

They might be hard to clean, but they are a great set of pens.

These pens are good but a real pain to keep up.

I agree with all said. They are a real pain when they get clogged! Used them for years. Trying to re-thread that wire is no walk in the park either. Glad they started making the other version.

They are hard to clean and maintain, but they produce the best line quality of ANY writing utensil. Plus, they dont skip!

I bought a set some time ago and have used them on and off. They can be a pain to maintain. I usually prefer dip pens for flexibility of line. Use them for borders of cartoons and comic book panels, and for a mechanical look in some drawing like architecture.

Koh-I-Noor Rapidograph pens are the first and the best. The quality has always been good, and even the steel-tipped pens hold up well.

Technical pens can be a tempramental mistress. They are fairly high-maintenance. But if you learn the care vibe for them then Rapidographs will repay your maintenance investment time and again. And for technical pen performance, no other brand have ever come close.

When cared-for, they are utterly dependable and will not let you down.

i had a set of these in college ... they were mainly used for design presentations ... they were a handy tool to use and i did prefer them over the dip pens to use, but they were terrible to clean ... if they are not maintained properly or used constantly, the tips tend to clog up making them useless

Great Pens, I think they are worth the price. They are a little hard to maintain though. I have messed up a few, because I forgot to clean them. They are definitely timeless.

I have been using these pens for over twenty years they are the best.

I won't waste time denying that these pens, clog easily and are a pain to clean. But if you want to learn a quick nib saving technique, don't try to force the metal filament, hold the pen, gently slide the filament in place, and give it an even gentler shake and the filament pops right into place. A fellow artist shared this trick and I have never had to buy another replacement again.

Koh-I-Noor has one of the best ink consistencies I have found after trying out many types of ink pens. You get a smooth line every time.

I had use this pen a lot in graphic design ,but now I'm using it for illustration on gesso... It's a real smooth line and you can choose color or put liquid watercolor ink into it... IT's a great pen.

Might seem a bit pricey but worth every penny. I've had one of these refillable pens since the first time I was in college over 30 years ago and it still performs perfectly. I've since added other sizes to my collection. They are beyond compare for any fine line or fine detail work and are easy to use and maintain. Also being refillable you can use colored inks.

i agree with most on here. i love the clear sharp lines you can get with these pens, and the ink being permament makes these pretty awesome to use, but when i did use them i hated cleaning them and you had to do it a lot! one time you forget or didn't clean it good enuff and it was pretty much done, which isn't cool with as expensive as these go. but great pens anyways!

Beautiful quality, clogging disaster if not cleaned after every use.

The pens are spectacular! Their design and ink flow control is impressive. The only downfall is that they must be cleaned and maintained after each use.

Perfect. The only Rapidographs I own! HAve usd them for over 20 years.

Takes some getting used to. However, once you've gotten comfortable with them, they really make beautifully clean lines. Just make sure you clean them and take care of them properly.

I've just obtained some old repidograph pens. I'm in the process of cleaning them, but the ones that I've finally gotten to work are brilliant. Great project for inking.

freakin' small writing possibilities - excellent on mylar, not so good on paper or any fiberous material - the pen will scoop up the fibers and clog if you're not carefull

These are wonderful. Other than having to constantly clean them I couldn't think of any reason why not to use them.

I really love these pens except for the necessity of cleaning them. I've had the same pens for about 15 years and they still work just as good as when they were new. They allow for such fine detail and terrific black lines

It is very durable and makes your work look great however as mentioned, clogging really screws up your plans. Can't fork over that much per pen if the life-span is short-lived!

I have two sets, one of 6 and another of 3, I have had them for years and I love them! Like many here, cleaning has always been an issue. I moved and packed away my pens with ink still in them. It was about a year or so before I got around to un packing them from the box and the ink had clogged in them terribly. I hated to throw them out and decided to get an ultrasonic cleaner before resorting to that. In the meantime , I was working on my car and had to clean some engine parts before replacing them. I went to ACE Hardware to Buy some GUNK, degreaser and bought SIMPLE GREEN MAX cleaner instead, because it is enviornmental friendly. As I was cleaning the engine parts, the soapy smell reminded me of something familiar. It came to me that it smelled like Koh0I-Noop pen cleaner, only stronger. I soked my dried up pens over night and then rinsed them in water until it came clear. To my surprise they dis assembled easily. I soaked the parts, nibs etc. and rinsed them again until the water was clear and they are as good as new. You can buy a gallon of Simple Green Max for less than *oz. of pen cleaner. Just a pearl that I discovered

I got a 12 pen set of these about 45 years ago when they mostly sold to cartographers and draftsmen .
They were used then, I got them for 5 dollars for the set and I used the heck out of them for many years. Of the ones that didn't "Walk away" they all still work great except the finest point 0000 because of abuse from a friend who had never used them before. I have several new ones as well and use them quite often and am still pleased with their line!
Hap

Not so much a review as a suggestion: I was reading an article about Basic H2 ( a green cleaning product plugged by Oprah ). It lists the following:
"Radiograph Pens – A few drops of Basic-H2 will clean engineering pens and keep them working smoothly". Hope that helps. I will be trying it out on my daughter's pens and will report the results.

If anyone else decides to give it a try, you can order it online (www.shaklee.com - I order through a friend who's id is WG07811 ).

I use the 12-pen set and have come to enjoy using these pens on nearly all my sketching projects. With all the different nib sizes I have the ability to effectively render all 7 pen strokes creating the tones, values and contrasts that are, at times, difficult to render in pen & ink sketching.
If I had any negative reviews of these pens is the tendency for the pens to lose ink flow. In the scheme of things this is a minor issue.

I like the different 01.03.05 widths that this comes in because it suits my drawings and flows so easily I am assured of the same width of line for the pen I have chosen.

I've had the same set for about 10 years and, yeah, cleaning them is a pain. All part of the process. They're great for even line widths for stippling, lettering, technical drawing, drawing border panels and straight line work as such, but lousy for real cartooning and illustrating work where a varied line weight is required. Much faster is using the old throwback 12th century tool, the crow-quill steel nib. Koh-I-Noor's waterproof ink is the best I've ever used.

I use to use these all the time, but it became time consuming cleaning the internal parts in an ultrasonic cleaner all the time. Sometimes a bubble of ink would form on the nib. The stainless steel nibs wore down to fast, so I started buying the jewel tipped nibs. The jewel tips last 4x as long. I got away from these because of just too time consuming for cleaning.

Love Koh-I-Noor....dam fine pens. Just be careful, nibs get jacked up easily. Heres a newbie pointer....if they clog they are not lost! Use an ultrasonic cleaner with Koh-I-Noors cleaner. BUT heres the real tip....those ultrasonic cleaners are insanely expensive so head to your local jewelry supply place and just buy a ultrasonic jewelry cleaner! SAME EXACT machine but about half the price....!!!!

Love these pens and use them sparingly due to cost. Love their flow.

I have used this on all my tecnical illustrations, Great tool.

Junky , cloggy , messy , high maintenance , etc . Will post a product review on a far better alternative . The Japanese put on the market a new type of felt- tip pen line that blows these away . Comes in most all measurements and many colors as well . Pull the cap off and go , put the cap on and walk away .