Kuretake No. 13 Fountain Brush Pen - Black Body

Now this is a brush pen's brush pen. It's what most other brush pens wish they were. Simple elegant class all the way. It's light like a regular brush so the switch between the two is almost effortless. And when you plug a Platinum ink converter into it your ink choices are infinite. The most useful inks that I've found to use in this pen so far are Noodler's Bullet Proof Black and Platinum's Carbon Black with the Carbon Black being slightly more useful if your into heavy watercolor washes as it doesn't bleed that tiny little bit that the Noodler's BPB does. The brush itself has been the most responsive of the synthetic styles that I have used so far, at least for my style of line work, it has a crisp snap so that going from a hairline to the broadest of line and back again is as near to intuitive as I've found in a synthetic. And if you're a serious line junkie you can easily convert this puppy into an eyedropper fill pen with a 1/16" diameter (hard to find so if you don't mind a bit of a bump between the pen barrel and nib section you can use an 1/8" diameter washer found at any hardware store) 1/4" washer and some silicone grease on the threads and you have yourself a brush pen that can hold an 1/8 of a bottle of ink and it'll lay down lines for days. Just remember to keep the nib upright as it can bleed like crazy if dropped or stored nib down with that much ink in it.

Hello, and a wonderfull (whatever daytime you might be reading this...)

Interesting, for such an infamous pen with these fast de- and increasing numbers in any shops, that I am the first to write a short review here... nice.

The Kuretake DV140-13C is one of the better Bruspens I have used.
It's nylon bristles range, in flexibilitx and resiliency between the Kuretake Phys Waterbrush Pens and the Pentel FP10 GFKP Brush Pen.
The Bristles spring back to a sharp point, but sometimes it needs a short while with the pen closed, before it's tip is sharp again for working on crisp lines, especially after filling in larger areas, which stresses the bristles a lot.

After nearly two months and 8 used cartridges, the tip looks quite like new, so the possibility to buy spare/replacement tips/nibs is great and counts as a plus, but it is not necessary too often, a second plus.

The Pen closes with a wonderfull clicking sound, and you can feel the "reistance" of the pen while closing the cap, so you know it is "closed" and tight. It gives you a good feeling about the bristles not getting too much air and drying out.

The Barrel and Cap are made out of Aluminium it seems, it seems more durable in feel and more elegant in look than the Pentel GFKP. Maybe thus the price is so much higher.

The Pen is very lightweight, more lightweight than the Pentel GFKP, could be a little heavier, depending on the user, it's up to you whether this is good or bad.

The Price is very moderate for a pen of this quality.

The Ink is a very dark and saturated black, watersoluble and even after drying not waterproof. If you want to make washes or use aquarellistic colours on your paintings, do it before using the Kuretake-ink, and you will be fine.

Kuretake DV140-13C only gets four of five stars because I prefer natural sable bristles, more stable, more sharp lines, and a better control of the line, like on the Kuretake DV140-40 oder DV140-50.
Anyway, it is still one of the best brush pens I have ever had the luck to own, thanks to JetPens. ^_^

TheHOINK

I've had this pen for about a week so far and absolutely love the pen. I've been using the standard Winsor & Newton Series 7 brushes, but they are becoming hard to find without ordering, and the constant dipping was getting old (not to mention the few times I turn to dip, I knock the bottle of indian ink over)

So I thought I would try a brush pen to avoid spillage but still get the same brush feel, and it was probably the best decision I've made so far.

Ink that is supplied isn't waterproof and I found that when dried, it has a dark brown tint rather than flat black. So I ordered a few cartridges of Carbon Black and a bottle of it.

Is it truly confirmed that the No. 40 replacement tip will fit on the No. 13? If so, I would like to convert it over to the natural sable. I found that the nylon brush tip is a bit slow on flow when taking fast strokes, and maybe a natural hair tip would fix it.

May be getting a second to use exclusively with the Platinum Converter for colored inks/washes, or just for non-waterproof cartridges for sketching.

This is a wonderful drawing tool. My first brush pen was the Pentel Pocket one, and it is a lovely pen. But this Kuretake has a higher quality brush with more spring and a finer point. I am really enjoying it.

Just fyi, I use Platinum Carbon ink cartridges instead of the supplied ink, because the Platinum ink is waterproof and dries near instantly on most papers. Happily the Platinum and Kuretake cartridges are identical to each other (even down to the little metal ball), and the Platinum converter fits this pen beautifully as well. I've had absolutely no problems with inkflow.

I would like to add that I was surprised to find that this does not bleed with Copics. It does however bleed with faber castell brushpens. My guess is that it is not alcohol soluble, but is water soluble.