I am not usually into stationery, but I recently discovered two pens that punch well above their weight and wanted to share them. They write well and you can easily refill them, making them last a really, really long time.

I'm not talking about one-time cartridge "refills" where you have to throw away the cartridge — I mean pens you refill with actual liquid ink which you can get in bulk.

"Bulk" for ink is 50ml of ink in a glass jar, by the way — not something that's going to take up a lot of space in your desk drawer. A single refill is maybe 1.5ml of ink (and that lasts for a long time). Even if you go with the Platinum Preppy mod I'll describe below and make the entire body of the pen refillable, it's still around 3ml per refill. So we're talking about 15-30 entire "penfuls" of ink. That's a lot of writing (or, in my case, pen plotting — which is a topic for another day).

You can get really fancy ink for $60 for 60ml, but you can also get nice ink for as little as $12.50 for 50ml.

Of course, just like with mechanical keyboards (and sneakers, and board games, and coffee, and just about anything else these days) there is an intensely passionate community online debating the merits of various pens and inks and sharing mods, ideas, and recommendations. This is its own rabbit hole. If you're already in it, please email me your recommendations. But if you're not, these two pens are a great place to start, and might be all you need.

The Platinum Preppy

Fountain pens are not scary. Your handwriting does not need to be fancy to use one, nor do you need to hold a fountain pen in a special way to get a line on the paper.

The Platinum Preppy is a solid fountain pen that costs as little as $6. It's fun to use and works well. Out of the box it comes with cartridges (which you can refill with a blunt syringe like I did for the Schneider below), but there is a simple way to mod it so that the entire body of the pen becomes a big ink reservoir.

While this isn't a how-to post, the mod is so simple I'll describe it (you can find more detailed tutorials on YouTube). You open the pen up and remove the cartridge. Then you put some lube around the threads, and pop an O-ring on for good measure. I found that the O-rings we keyboard nerds sometimes use for MX keycaps work perfectly here — just one is enough.

Once you've done that, you just fill up the entire barrel of the pen with ink, using a blunt-tipped syringe. Close it up, and tada — you've got a lovely pen which is going to last for a very long time before it needs to be refilled again.

It is important to use ink specifically labeled "fountain pen ink" — other inks (India inks etc.) can clog up the pen. You could still clean and fix it, but by using the right ink you can keep that from happening.

You can even empty the ink back into its original pot, clean out the pen, and fill it up again with a different color of ink! This is a more involved process, but it's doable. That said, if you think you're going to want to experiment with different ink colors, you're probably going to want to refill the cartridges rather than the pen itself.

I've modified two Platinum Preppy pens using this mod (one has a 0.2mm nib and the other is a little thicker at 0.3mm). Neither pen leaks. I keep them on their side.

If I don't use a pen for a few days it sometimes needs a bit of shaking to wake up again, but even when I shake them up, nothing leaks. It's a solid mod: Simple, quick, and effective.

The Schneider Ray

It turns out there are ballpoint pens that take the same cartridges fountain pens do!

The Schneider is one such pen. Its full name is the Schneider Ray Cartridge Rollerball Pen and it's currently selling for $14 CAD — so, double than the Preppy, but not exactly a luxury item.

It's got a tight-fitting cap and a rubberized ergonomic grip and just sits well in the hand.

The body of the pen contains two cartridges. Out of the box it comes with one full cartridge and one empty cartridge, inviting you to fill it up with any fountain pen ink you'd like to try.

It's so fun to write with — I get this very smooth gliding feel and it leaves a generous amount of ink behind. Yes, it can smear if you rest your hand on the ink too soon — but that's true for any pen, and is mainly dependent on the ink.

I used my blunt syringe to fill that empty cartridge with "sunset yellow" fountain pen ink.

Because I was putting the previous cartridge away for an indefinite period, I "capped" it with a dab of hot glue (without getting any into the cartridge itself — just around the top). This will hopefully keep the ink fresh until I decide to switch the pen back to blue.

I had to use a bulb syringe to flush the blue ink out of the tip of the pen, and then I had to scribble and wait to get the yellow ink to come out, but it worked. Within a few moments the pen was putting out a vivid yellow. Fun!

You could also use a "converter" which is essentially a cartridge that has a suction mechanism, making it easier to refill. I don't think I need one: Refilling a cartridge with a blunt syringe was quick and simple. I may pick up a few more empty cartridges as my ink collection grows.

The surprise

I always thought of fountain pens as "fancy" — expensive writing implements for people who can write in cursive. While there certainly are fountain pens like that, the Preppy really brings things down to a level which is very beginner-friendly.

I also wasn't aware that there are ballpoint pens that accept fountain pen ink cartridges — the Schneider was a fun discovery, and the learning curve there is even lower.

All in all, if you're tired of throwing away disposable pens, either of these options is great, and they are both easy to start with or even just try out at a minimal investment.