Pelikan Twist Fountain Pen Review

Pelikan Twist (medium nib) Apple Blue

Fountain Pen Review

Many months ago on my Fountain Pen Journey I decided that I ought to have a Pelikan fountain pen in my collection. Back then, I thought that I'd never be able to afford a Pelikan pen, so when I discovered the Pelikan Twist fountain pen, I thought that I should buy one.

The Pelikan Twist is a student pen, quite different from the higher-end Pelikan fountain pens. It's available with either a medium or a fine nib, and in a range of colour schemes - I settled for the Apple Blue colour with a medium nib, which seems to be about the most conservative colour scheme (a matt silver version is available, however, which looks quite a bit more "professional").

The pen is very plasticky. It doesn't feel particularly "cheap", but it's clearly aimed at the beginner end of the market. The blue plastic barrel and cap are slightly textured, but quite slippery.
The green section is plastic with a slightly grippier coating.

Do the Twist

This pen has a triangular cross-section and rounded ends. Following the triangular facets towards the cap, the twist becomes more pronounced towards the end of the cap, giving this pen its name.

It's an interesting design, and one which I've not seen on any other pen. It makes the pen look a lot better than if it had just been a straight, triangular design.

The Pelikan name and company logo is moulded into one of the barrel facets.

The barrel screws onto the section - It requires an extra bit of a turn to fully engage, otherwise the facets don't line up correctly, but you'll soon figure this out.

Both the barrel and the cap have vent holes to prevent children from suffocating if they swallow either the cap or the barrel, so this pen cannot be eyedroppered.

The cap pulls off and has a slight click when pushing it back on. The cap facets line up perfectly with the barrel facets due to the section also having twisted facets, which leads to a bit of an ergonomic problem: The section has the three facets which force your fingers to hold the pen in a particular way (much like the Lamy Safari et al). However, the uppermost apex of these facets is twisted which pushes against you uppermost finger, which is very uncomfortable. Writing with this pen for a long period resulted in quite a lot of strain in my forefinger, which is something I've never expereienced with any other pen.

Dimensions:

Length, capped	14cm
Length, uncapped	12.9cm
Length, posted	17.5cm
Section length	3cm
Diameter, barrel	1.5cm
Diameter, section	1.3cm
Weight, capped	21.3g
Weight, uncapped	17.7g
Cap weight	3.7g

The Pelikan Twist fountain pen takes standard international short or long cartridges (mine came with a long cartridge filled with blue ink). Standard international cartridge converters should fit into this pen without any issues.

The Nib

I ordered this pen with a medium steel nib (fine nibbed pens are also available). The nib is quite smooth and wet enough. It lays down quite a wide medium line and writes smoothly in all directions.

The nib is stiff and there is no line variation.
There is no breather hole, for what it's worth.

Reverse writing with this pen is possible... Reverse writing works very, very well. The nib does not appear to ever run dry and this pen gave me one of the best reverse writing experiences I've ever had.

However, the triangular section makes it really difficult to hold the pen in this position (every finger lands naturally on one of the apices). It's much harder to hold than the Venvstas D'art fountain pen that I recently reviewed.

Overall, I'm impressed with this cheap Pelikan fountain pen. I paid £11.25 for it from Amazon, which I think is about the right price point. This pen isn't widely available in every colour option in the UK (mine was imported from a German seller), so don't expect to see these pens in your local WH Smith.

The Pelikan Twist is definitely a pen for children or newcomers to fountain pens. It's cheap, reliable and sturdy enough and the nib is much more usable "straight out of the box" than some of the cheap Chinese fountain pens. I assume that the Pelikan brand does extend their quality control to their low end pens like these in a similar way to Lamy with their Safari fountain pen.

Would this be an EDC (Every Day Carry) pen for me? Unlikely, given the school-like design, even though this isn't unattractive.

I really like that the nib is smooth enough, even though it's unremarkable. The one downside are those twisted facets on the section - They aren't hugely uncomfortable, but they are far from well-designed. Possibly, those for whom this pen is aimed at might not struggle so much because of their smaller hands, but for me the section is a bit of a problem.

Even though I purchased this pen fairly early on in my Fountain Pen Journey, it's taken me many months to get around to using it. Maybe if I had have used this pen sooner, I wouldn't have bought quite so many cheap Chinese fountain pens, because this pen is pretty good for the price and puts some of those Chinese pens to shame.