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...I just got my bottles of liquid platinum, and liquid gold. Can these be used in a rapidograph? If so, what nib sizes would work best?

Skin_Mechanic wrote:...I just got my bottles of liquid platinum, and liquid gold. Can these be used in a rapidograph? If so, what nib sizes would work best?

Don't know. They're usually applied with a Kemper pen. Brock

too viscous, i think.
and evaporates too quickly.
sounds like a cleaning nightmare.
the kemper pens come in fine and medium.

i bet it would work though. rapidographs are built the same way only different. they deliver the ink via a little to tiny tube. the thickest ones would be what you might like to try. the solvents in liq metal products/thinners/cleaners might eat up the pen though. the brass kemper pens are really cool form follows function tools. rosanna

Hmmmmmmmm, I didn't consider the solvents in that equation Being clumsy and stupid, a kemper pen in my hands could be disasterous I'm wondering if a medium point fountain pen w/steel barrel and internals would do the trick. I think I'll send an e-mail to Levenger about that, they'll probably have a pen that can handle the solvent. Thanks guys

Joseph,

Take a gander here:

http://www.nationalartcraft.com/subcate ... 0&scid=628

These are what I use. You need to get yourself gold essence or a couple of jars of it too. One for each metal you are using and if you can afford it, I'd get a pen for each color too. Get yourself some droppers like you use to give medicine to kids. Load the pens either with tooth picks or I just use the eyedropper. Again, use only one eyedropper per color. I mark the bottles of essence and eyedroppers so I don't mix them up. Load the pen with the color, use it and then I take the dropper and put it in the bowl of the pen, put the pen over the gold jar or platinum jar, etc. and push on the eyedropper. It will force air into the bowl and push out any remaining gold back into the gold jar. Now take the dropper and fill it with the essence and hold the pen over the essence jar. Force essence (it's just a thinner) into the pen and into the essense jar. If you mark and don't mix your essense jar's, after a time, you can use the essense as "gold" since it will have enough dissolved into it to allow you to use it. Do this a couple of times. After that I go to the tap and using the same dropper, I force water through the pen until the stream looks clean. If you have compressed air it's not a bad idea to give the bowl a shot of air to dry it and clear anything else out. The pens come with a needle to clean them out. This is the last thing I use to clean them out before I put them away and the first thing I use to check that they are clear before I use them the next time.

Hope this helps,

Phil

PS - I am paranoid about accidently spilling the gold and the essence jars so I open them, use it and immediately close them so if I accidently hit them, which I've done, so I don't spill them.

those pens in the picture are the ones i have. for what i was doing, the wide one was too wide ... the stuff seemed to widen when fired, so the thinner line seemed preferable for what i was drawing.

i am stubbornly sticking to my assertion that putting this stuff inside a conventional pen is not a good idea. you use a droplet of it at a time, and i dont think it will flow down the channel correctly. it's a lot different in thickness than ink.

my experience with the essence is the same as phil's, including putting the cap on the lustre right away. both lustre and essence are volatile.

i found the platinum fired up dull and unattractive ... more gunmetal gray than silvery. i ended up using gold only.

The gold and copper fire beautifully, but like Kitty said, the platinum is a poor excuse for silver.

I think it would work in a rapidograph pen. And it shouldn't dry out very fast if it's capped. A similar solution is used in the Ferro Gold ceramic pens (also found on National ArtCraft's website), but that is more of a paint pen mechanism where you push down on the tip to open the valve and let the fluid saturate the felt pen tip. The line definition isn't as good with the Ferro pen... not my liking at all. I use a couple of the Kemper pens. The fine works really well... and it only takes a couple or three of drops transferred with the end of a toothpick to get you into business. The essence is mandatory to clean the pen, but then I use a glue syringe to push some of the essence thru the nib followed by air.

Tony

Tony Smith wrote:The gold and copper fire beautifully, but like Kitty said, the platinum is a poor excuse for silver.

I think it would work in a rapidograph pen. And it shouldn't dry out very fast if it's capped. A similar solution is used in the Ferro Gold ceramic pens (also found on National ArtCraft's website), but that is more of a paint pen mechanism where you push down on the tip to open the valve and let the fluid saturate the felt pen tip. The line definition isn't as good with the Ferro pen... not my liking at all. I use a couple of the Kemper pens. The fine works really well... and it only takes a couple or three of drops transferred with the end of a toothpick to get you into business. The essence is mandatory to clean the pen, but then I use a glue syringe to push some of the essence thru the nib followed by air.

Tony

i've used the silver and the copper. the silver will come out really shiny if you don't overfire it. i think i used 1050, certainly less than 1100, as a top temp for it.

the copper i used came out looking like bronze, but i fired it too hot (1300) and haven't tried again. i've also heard that firing it too hot will make it dull.

i use acetone to clean the pens, and store them with the needle inserted into it. that works well and keeps them clean.

I can verify that the thinner is evil stuff - I once decanted some into a plastic container, and the next morning all I had was a puddle of goo on my glass worktop.

Peg