Sheen War: Birmingham Pen Company Tesla Coil vs Krishna Moon View 2

Introduction

There are fountain pen inks that sheen, and then there are the two we are comparing today: Birmingham Pen Company’s Tesla Coil and Krishna’s Moon View 2. Both ratchet up the sheen to a beautiful display of red molten metal, delivering a fantastic metallic shimmer that few inks can match. The question we set out to answer is simple: which one is better? Honestly, it was not obvious going in, and the results surprised us.

The Two Inks

Birmingham Pen Company’s Tesla Coil comes in a charming apothecary-style bottle with a label devoid of graphics but full of character. It is a wonderfully affordable ink made in Pennsylvania, USA, and it can do some genuinely amazing things on paper.

Krishna’s Moon View 2 is the almost mystical, elusive counterpart. It is frequently sold out on the brand’s website, and for good reason. It is also an expensive ink: roughly $9 US for a tiny 20ml, model-paint-style bottle. Compared side by side, the 60ml Tesla Coil works out to around $36 versus roughly $12 for the same volume, so the price gap is substantial. One practical note: the tiny Moon View 2 bottles can be a little messy to work with.

For paper, we used Tomoe River, since we expected strong performance and wanted the sheen to reflect and look incredible. On the pen side, a TWSBI Eco with a stub nib was filled with Moon View 2, while a Magna Carta Mag 600 with a flex nib carried the Tesla Coil. We also used paint brushes to really push the sheen across the page.

How They Write

The Tesla Coil through the Magna Carta with its thirsty ebonite feed is a very wet ink, laying down a nice, wet, dark blue with a rich color. The TWSBI Eco with the stub nib is also a fairly wet writer, but Moon View 2 felt noticeably drier than the Birmingham ink, quite a bit drier in fact.

That wetness cuts both ways. A very wet ink can take a long time to dry, which can be problematic if you want to mail your letter in the next 10 or 15 minutes. But for expressive writing, it is certainly fun. With Tesla Coil, we could see incredible sheen forming almost immediately, and it only got more interesting as it dried. Moon View 2 still formed sheen, which was exciting, but the flow felt more controlled and there was a bit of resistance while writing.

If you prefer controlled, drier inks, Moon View 2 may suit you. But for the most part, wet, joyful flow won us over during the writing test.

The Painted Swatch Test

To get really bold, we brushed the ink across the page. The Tesla Coil produced a magnificent shade of blue, like a dark sapphire: rich, expressive, and beautiful. Red soon came out at the edges, a molten metallic red almost like the edge of a sunset. So much ink went onto the page that the paper wrinkled a bit, but that is the price of effect.

Moon View 2 painted another nice blue, though not quite as dark or as rich as the Birmingham offering. Even with spreading via paintbrush, it was visibly drier; the brush was almost dry by the end of the stroke, while the Tesla Coil brush, sitting even longer, was still not as dried out.

At this stage, the preference had flipped. Having arrived leaning toward Moon View 2, the wetter, more flowing Tesla Coil had taken the lead in the writing and painting tests. The real question, though, was what the sheen would look like once everything dried.

The Sheen Reveal

After waiting for everything to dry, the Moon View 2 swatches looked very metallic and very fun, with a slightly purple cast as the red played against the blue. The writing looked very nice. The Tesla Coil showed a similar purple-leaning look, and in one area produced something extraordinary: a mulberry core of magma-like, purpley-red liquid magma.

Comparing the two side by side, Moon View 2 managed a hint of that effect only in a small spot, while Tesla Coil delivered it more broadly. First glance favored Birmingham.

In the Sunlight

Moving the swatches outside settled it. As sunlight passed over the ink, both gave an incredible molten purpley-red sheen, and at certain angles everything looked like an amazing plain blue ink until it caught the light.

The differentiation came in consistency: the Birmingham Pen Company ink looked a little shinier and a little more consistently red across the letters, especially where the ink pooled.

The Verdict

The winner of this sheen war is Birmingham Pen Company’s Tesla Coil, and it is a surprise verdict, since on a previous paper it had not shown these properties and Moon View 2 was considered the ultimate sheening ink. The two are very similar, but a couple of reasons tipped the scales.

First, price. For $25 you can get a 120ml eyedropper bottle of Tesla Coil, and it ships right away. It is a great price for an ink made in the USA from quality dyes, backed by a company that even includes a fun fountain-pen-nib-shaped paper clip with orders. Second, the writing experience: Tesla Coil is very wet and flowy and simply more joyful to use, with an incredible nonstop flow feeling, while Moon View 2 felt a bit drier and had some resistance.

Moon View 2 is still loved, and it has a great story: it comes from India, it is fascinating, and it is genuinely rare, which makes owning it fun. But it is hard to get. You have to watch the website closely and buy as many bottles as you want the moment it comes back in stock, and it ships from India. If you want both, buying both is a perfectly reasonable answer. But Tesla Coil is easy to get, costs far less per milliliter, and gives you the same or better sheen with a more flowing experience.

Conclusion

For most buyers, Birmingham Pen Company’s Tesla Coil is the smarter purchase: more affordable, easier to obtain, and slightly shinier with a wetter, more enjoyable writing feel. Krishna’s Moon View 2 remains a charming rarity worth owning if you love the story and can catch it in stock. Either way, both deliver one of the most spectacular metallic red sheens in fountain pen ink today.