Pen review: Ensso Bolt Fountain Pen

:furiously engages the mechanism:

I admit I wasn’t too familiar with Kickstarter before I backed the Ensso Bolt project; by that I mean I knew of it, but I’d never actually backed anything before. Several months ago, as the pen was still in its earlier stages, I stumbled upon several reviews by notable pen people — the Pen Addict and Figboot, to name a few — and, having seen the pen, I naturally had to be edgy and get this pen for myself. What better way to fit in but to emulate your heroes?

I admit I fully expected not to be impressed. A thin metal pen? A nib that looks like that on a Jinhao 51a or Wing Sung 618 or several other pens in that price range? A clip you pay extra for?! Still, my envy greed curiosity got the better of me, and I ordered the pen and then the clip and I did not heed the warning that the F nib will in fact be super narrow because I do not listen to warnings.

Several months later, the pen arrived while I was at work, but since I work from home, it took me 37 seconds to retrieve it from the mailbox and to tear open the packaging.

First glance at the Ensso Bolt freshly unpackaged; the clip was in a separate plastic baggie.

Well, by packaging I mean the envelope; I don’t care about elaborate boxes and satin and all that jazz because I don’t want to litter my home more than I already do, so the lack of a pen box or whatever didn’t bother me. However, I do wish the Ensso team added the instructions — at least the QR code to the assembly videos! — but I just went back to the email, found the videos, and managed to fit the clip to the pen without too much hassle.

At first, the pen was a bit stiff; the bolt mechanism needed some loosening to start operating smoothly, and I was worried that the thinness would make my hand cramp severely. I was wrong, of course. But more about that later.

After I engaged the mechanism several times, I got a tiny bit addicted on how it felt. That’s the main thing about this pen that I absolutely adore: it’s extremely well machined, sturdy, and utilitarian. I don’t think a single bit is out of place. The matte clip is made of titanium and looks super cool as well; I would definitely recommend getting the clip as the pen will otherwise slip out of any loop in any pen case you may have (I use Galen Leather usually). And, despite the fact the pen is made of solid metal, it does not slip at all. Thin metal pens usually don’t work for me because of the combination of metal and size, but in this case, as the pen is not slippery, I have no problem using the Bolt for pages and pages of writing. Comparing this pen to the Muji Aluminum Fountain Pen would be a disservice to the Bolt, as the Muji sadly makes my hand cramp, despite them being about the same size. Go figure.

There was one aspect of this pen I had a bit of a hard time with, and that’s the slight backweightedness (that’s a word). Namely, since the bolt mechanism is obviously at the back end of the pen, when I first installed the clip, I felt like it was pulling at my wrist. However, after some taking used to it, I can safely say that unless you have an extremely small/thin hand, you should be fine using this pen.

The pen starts every time without question; however, there’s a slight caveat. The first line — after the pen is left sitting for a day or so — will be noticeably darker. See the picture below.

Same ink, same pen, different days; 7/31 vs the following Tuesday.

The bolt hides a really nifty little rubber gasket that, per the Ensso team, serves to make the nib wet and flow immediately, and that works well. I’m not sure where and how the ink oxidizes, but it does, but at least there are no hard starts, which can be an issue with capless pens. Furthermore, I have quite a few pens with caps that dry out far worse and hard start, so this is not that big of a deal for me. It does give my pen pals an inkling that I take a lot of breaks while writing letters to them, though.

The pen came with a K1 converter that works as intended; you’ll find the same one in your Benu pens.

Lastly, I do want to talk about the nib. I don’t know if it’s swappable (although most nibs are if you’re insane enough), but it absolutely looks the same as the nibs on your Jinhao 51a pens; I don’t know if it is the same nib, and from my understanding, it’s made of titanium, and I do not mean this as a flaw, but the similarity is there. I have never had an issue with these nibs, so I don’t care. My nib was a tiny bit scratchy out of the box, but I smoothed it quickly enough.

Nib zoomed in.The extended pen with clip. Zoom in on the nib.

So, to sum it up: after a while, the pen adapted to me and I adapted to the pen, and now we’re good friends. This pen is very likely one of the better quick drawing pens out there; I like it way better than the Platinum Curidas; the mechanism is more fun than most other pens out there. I also love the fact you can rotate the nib to the position of your liking by just holding the nib unit between your inky fingers.

The extended pen.

Overall, I like this pen and I am glad I got it when I did at early bird Kickstarter fundraiser. The more I use it, the more I’m in love with it. It went with me to Savannah and I wrote two letters with it, which is two letters more than the number of letters I’ve written in the last two months. I think I would have preferred the M, but the F grew on me super quickly.

How about y’all? Anyone else got it? How do you like yours? Let me know in the comments and click that banana button if you’re so inclined.