This is the second post in a series on the pencils of Korea.
Dong-a is Korea’s oldest pencil maker, established in 1946. The Hongdangmoo Office Pencil is a basic offering, and I am told that it is the most common office pencil in Korea. It is not clear to me if it is manufactured in Korea.
A few notes:
– It does have a slightly larger diameter than the Hankook Sharp.
– The eraser seemed exceptionally good for a pink/red eraser. In fact, it is an excellent eraser by any measure. I’m not sure how they did it.
– The wood appeared to be cedar, and the pencil easily sharpened. The top photo shows an attempt with the KUM Long Point.
– The lead is much scratchier than that of the Hankook Sharp.
Overall, I think the choice between the Hankook Sharp and the Dong-a Hongdangmoo is a tough one.
May I ask which sharpener has been used to sharpen the pencil in the first photo?
That was the “KUM Long Point”. It left an odd “shoulder bump” on the pencil.
I am sorry to hear about that bump. Although I like the KUM Long Point sharpeners some pencils – especially those with a slightly larger diameter – won’t fit properly and leave the sharpener slightly damaged.
I’ve not seen the sharpener damaged, but I have seen the shoulder bump. It occurs when I over-use the second stage, usually in an attempt to fully sharpen off the gouges in the lead made by the first stage. My first sharpener gouged too deeply, but a replacement blade helped. Essential, though, was putting a shim in to stop the pencil from going too far in the first stage. Their “stop” is too far back by almost 1 mm. I don’t need an infinitely sharp tip at the expense of 1mm of lead per sharpen. 0.3mm or so at the tip is plenty.
Even with the new blade and shim, though, I usually get either a small bit of gouge left behind the sharpened cone of lead, or, the shoulder bump.
It’s still my favorite handheld sharpener, but the design needs some tweaks. I don’t know how it got released with the problems it has, given how easily they could be fixed. Did KUM not use it? Or used it with strangely sized pencils?