Zebra Pen V-301 Fountain Pen, Stainless-Steel Barrel, Fine Point, 0.7mm, Black Ink, 1-Pack with Refill

Love this pen! Writes very smoothly and makes me want to keep writing ! I also use it for drawing and the lines always come out great.

It writes smoothly ,but as the ink runs out you have to flick it a few times.It is very light.Overall nice pen for the price tag.

I want to like this pen, but I just can't. Zebra's disposable fountain pens are such nice writers that I thought this would be a step up. I was wrong. There are features of this pen I like. The stainless construction is very nice. The cap posts securely. The pen balances well. Unfortunately, the pen doesn't write well, and sometimes doesn't write at all. When it does write it writes well, with a nice fine line. Unfortunately, it's hard to start, and getting it started often involve shaking it to loosen up the ink, and banging it on its cap on the desktop to wet the feed. Even then it often skips, and seems to take a bit of pressure to keep writing. This feed is a colossal engineering blunder on the part of Zebra. All they had to do was wrap a nice pen around the nib and feed from the Zenwriter disposables and they would have had a winner. They blew it. To contribute further to the blunder they made a proprietary cartridge design, and don't offer converters.Don't waste your money. Better pens for around the same price point are the Jinhao 992, or several of the other Jinhao pens for just a little more, and the Platinum Preppy, all of which are better writers. The Jinhao pens have the advantage of taking standard nibs and International Standard cartridges, and they usually come with converters, so the writer can use bottled ink.You could also spend a little more money on a MUCH nicer pen, such as a Pilot Explorer or Metropolitan.Perhaps if Zebra put a little effort into designing a feed for the V-301 that actually worked reliably then they would have a winning pen.Update: After flushing the pen with ammonia based pen flush, and persisting with it through three cartridges of ink I've finally gotten it to write consistently. If Zebra had gotten it to write this well out of the package then my review would have been much better. While it can be made into a good writer, it takes work, and it is not appropriate for a novice fountain pen user. For someone who enjoys tinkering with fountain pens as much as writing with them then it's a nice toy.Update 2: If you like the form of this pen, but you want a pen that actually writes, then look up the Muji fountain pen. It's a bit more expensive, but you get what you pay for.

I don't know if the product I received is just very old, but I have had these V301 pens over the years and they always worked well. This refill just does not work, and now both of my pens are useless. I cannot recommend purchasing this item through Amazon UNLESS there is a freshness or production date visible prior to ordering.PH

I may have written a review about the pen before. I have had several for a long time. Like some of the other reviewers have said, it does take a moment or two to get the ink to flowing, but once that happens it is a good pen to write with on most types of paper. I personally have not had an issue....and, I do use different types of paper, notebook, pads, etc. You can even put the pen aside for awhile and it does not dry out like some, more expensive pens, will do. I have a good selection of pens hat I love writing with, but this one I ot only like writing with, but I am never afraid if someone walk off with, or I lose it (has happened). I usually purchase in a local Walgreen for about $4.00 with two bonus refills.I would love to give this pen 5-stars, but here is my issue. Purchasing refills is very difficult. So far, I have not found a international, or generic cartridge that will fit this pen. You can find the refills on Amazon, but two refills cost more than the original pen. That seems a little out of line to me. For me it is cheaper to just purchase another package (pen with refils).My suggestions: (1) make refills available in the stores, and for the sake of customers, especially students, do not over price them. (2) make both the pen and refills available in more stores, and on Amazon. (3) I know there is blue ink cartridges (with pen) available....I purchased on a few months back (on Amazon)....so make them available so that people have a choice.I have purchased the pen to given to kids, and teens who have all fallen in love with it....and then the heart break when can't find cartridges...... shame, shame, shame on Zebra. You have a product that is perfect for the budgets of kids and teens, and anyone for that matter, but you are not doing well for them by not making the cartridges available.....and are overpricing them.I have a rather large collect of pens....some of them I purchased on Amazon. Most of them either have a removal/refillable cartridge....or will/can use a generic/international throwaway cartridge.. I have pens of several different price ranges, and none of them is as hard to find ink/ink cartridges as the ZSebra V-301. Again I say.....shame on Zebra.I do hope Amazon will take note of this and help in any way you can to make this a better deal. Thank you.

Bonito diseño, pero la. Tinta se bota

Nice old school writing style