Very thin erasers

Very thin erasers

Here are a couple of amazingly thin erasers.

The Tombow Mono zero is a 2.3mm diameter cyclindrical eraser, dispensed by clicking the cap. It really does seem like a mechanical pencil in both form and function.

I thought this eraser was probably a borderline novelty, but it worked quite well over a period of days. You wouldn’t use it to erase several lines of text, but it is great for smaller tasks such as changing a line fragment, digit or letter.

I like the portability as well.

Very thin erasers

The Pentel Clic Eraser Hyperaser is a rectangular metal housed eraser. It has a dispense mechanism similar to that of most stick erasers, such as the Staedtler 528 50. A clip as well!

This is an ink eraser. It seemed to work well on tests with ballpoint ink, and less well with fountain pen ink.

I wasn’t expecting much, but both seemed pretty good.

The main problem I see it that both require yet more proprietary refill types. The Mono zero in particular seems like it will require a replacement eraser soon enough.

Very thin erasers

My thanks to der Lexikaliker for the Pentel eraser.

Musgrave 90th Anniversary pencil

Musgrave 90th Anniversary pencil

We are late by two years – the Musgrave Pencil Company’s 90th anniversary was in 2006. Yet, it was still a true delight to recently receive a box of Musgrave’s 90th anniversary pencils.

Round pencils, they have gold coloured ferrules, with white erasers. All have dyed wood – red, green, or yellow, with corresponding varnish.

The pencils are marked:


Musgrave Pencil Company Inc.
90th Anniversary
1916-2006

Among the American pencil companies, I think Musgrave must be acknowledged to have an advantage in lead quality. The Musgrave HB is possibly the sole American pencil in the same league with the top pencils from the rest of the world. The situation is all very strange – by some measures, Musgrave is a “small business”, yet (and tell me if you think I am wrong!), the quality of their best pencils surpasses those of Sanford and Dixon.

Musgrave 90th Anniversary pencil

The quality of the 90th Anniversary pencil seems to be even better than that of the HB – the lead is even smoother in a side-by-side comparison. The round vs. hexagonal shape is obviously a personal preference. Musgrave has pulled out all the stops for their Anniversary pencil!

Pentel Mark Sheet Pencil

Pentel Mark Sheet Pencil

We’ve seen special pencils aimed at optical and electro-mechanical mark recognition – the vintage IBM Electrographic, and the more recent Musgrave Test Scoring Pencil.

Quite a few people seem to be interested in these pencils, so I’m pleased to be able to mention a superb modern example that I recently learned about – the Pentel Mark Sheet pencil.

This hexagonal pencil is finished in blue with silver lettering. Two grades exist – HB, which has an orange cap, and B, with a red cap.

The pencils are marked –

Side 1: Pentel Mark Sheet Pencil HB

Side 3: the best quality for OCR sheet marking CM10 Japan HB

Side 5: [bar code]

Pentel Mark Sheet Pencil

The lead is just superb – at the pinnacle of modern graphite quality. The pencils leave extremely dark, rich lines. There is often a crumbling issue when a pencil’s graphite saturation reaches this level, but these pencils have no such problem.

It would be hard to imagine a better performing pencil.

Mitsubishi 2667 EW red and blue pencil

Mitsubishi 2667 EW red and blue pencil

Yesterday, I mentioned pencils made from wood scraps.

Well, I just found another – the Mitsubishi 2667 EW red and blue pencil.

Mitsubishi 2667 EW red and blue pencil

Mitsubishi’s product page is here, and the page includes a small diagram that appears to mention the construction method.

The pencil has a very nice woodgrain finish. The text is in green, with colour markings in green, and a bar code in black. With text (both English and Japanese), barcode and associated numerals, and graphic markings, the design seems a bit “busy” to me, yet I like it very much, and it is a very unusual pencil.

Mitsubishi 2667 EW red and blue pencil

Mitsubishi 2667 EW red and blue pencil

The photo below shows the pencil on a highly textured (“toothy”) Fabriano sketchpad, but I would say that the markings are even richer and more saturated on ordinary office paper.

Mitsubishi 2667 EW red and blue pencil

It is a very good all-round red and blue pencil. The only possible issue is that the non-traditional colouring doesn’t provide as much of a visual cue about which end is which.

Fila buys Lyra

This new post at Timberlines discusses the recent acquisition of Lyra by Fila.

Here is an Italian language business article on the subject. Several more can be found online.

Given that American-made Dixon pencils seem to have disappeared under Fila’s ownership, one has to wonder if the German-made Lyra pencil has a future.