The offerings of Caran d’Ache continue to intrigue.
At first glance, the 351 resembles the Technograph 777. But wait – there is a ferrule and eraser attached.
And the bar code is back in black, imprinted on the pencil’s reverse side. No nice peel-off plastic as was done with the Technograph.
I tried the 351 (a 351-2 to be exact) next to an HB Technograph 777. I really had to do quite a bit of testing to try and convince myself of the Technograph’s superiority. I wasn’t completely successful. In the end I would say that these pencils are very similar – in that range where differences aren’t immediately clear.
While I don’t have any official context, the 351 would seem to be an office or school pencil – but it writes as well as the high end version. Good stuff!
I don’t usually evaluate erasers on woodcase pencils, but I tried the white vinyl eraser on the 351, and it is a surprise, being quite good on a variety of types of paper.
Another point of interest is the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) logo on the pencil. This would make it one of the first retail pencils from a major manufacturer to carry this statement.
Overall, the 351 is a very impressive pencil.
Thank you for wonderful information. I don’t agree with some manufactures’ idea that school and office pencil must be cheap and inferior. I hope for the pencil manufactures to produce pencils like 351 much more.
By the way, I really appreciate you for your kindness, I’ve got the pencils you’d sent. I’m really excited about using them. And also, I sent you some pencils a few days ago. I hope you receive them soon.
Kent, I agree with your sentiments about school and office pencils.
I’m glad the pencils arrived, and I’ll keep an eye on my postbox. ;-)
Where can the Caran d’Ache 351-2 be acquired? I would love to add it to my collection of general office/school writing pencils.
Steve, sorry, I’m not aware of any mail order/web sources, though I haven’t searched extensively.
Steve: For some strange reason it is very difficult to get Caran d’Ache pencils even in Germany which is quite close to Switzerland. I have finally bought some at Zumstein. If I remember correctly the 351 has the article number 64512743 (the picture on the product page seems to be wrong since it shows a red pencil; the text reads “gelber Schaft” = “yellow barrel”). Their website is in German only, and I don’t know if they ship outside Europe.
Thanks for that link, Gunther. (Gunther kindly supplied me with the pencil in the photo.) The Swiss franc is just about equal to the Canadian dollar right now, so the monetary conversion is easy. Or at least for me. :-)
That store has a lot of great products, especially for those who like stationery and office items in general.
However, a number of links and searches get results like this:
and their credit card checkout doesn’t use https. I am not going to place an order with them.
I keep thinking that parents and office managers don’t want to spend money on pencils because kids and employees lose them and don’t take care of them, so it seems wasteful to them. You are right, though—retailers should really give people that choice.
Hey,
sorry to ask but i’m planning to buy quite a few. Do you know where the 351-2 lies on the light/dark scale??
Charles, don’t be sorry to ask. Here is a photo, showing, left to right, the 351, the Technograph 777, the Grip 2001, and the Mars Lumograph 100, all in HB, on a Clairefontaine notepad:
I don’t really draw any conclusion. The leads are very similar.