In Pencil Review

Blackwing Eraser Hack-a-Thon

Author Laura CameronPosted on 12 Comments

Review by Tina Koyama

Palomino Blackwing pencils have a huge following. We love the high-quality graphite, beautiful finishes, distinctive ferrules and often intriguing themes, and we’re willing to pay $24.95 to $27.95 for a dozen (or much more if you missed a limited edition and you’re willing to shop on eBay after they sell out). Why, then, are these otherwise premium quality pencils attached to such mediocre erasers?

We know Blackwings are made in Japan, and we know that the Japanese make most of the best standalone erasers available. It seems logical that Blackwing pencils would come with high-quality erasers. Some have speculated that only the wood and graphite parts of the pencil are made in Japan, and the other parts are outsourced elsewhere. Others have taken their frustration a step further by cutting up their favorite erasers to fit a Blackwing ferrule. Inspired by these pioneers, I decided to go on an eraser hack-a-thon.

Neither Ana nor I are strangers to epic eraser challenges; they require coffee, stamina and a very rainy afternoon. (In case you missed them, see Ana’s great eraser rub-off and my follow-up.) Memorial Day weekend delivered the necessary rainy afternoon, so I went to work. I chose 10 block erasers, most of which were new to me:

Pentel Hi-Polymer (3/$2.60)

Pentel Mark Sheet ($1.65)

Pentel Hi-Polymer Ain Black ($1.10)

Tombow Mono – Medium ($1.40)

Tombow Mono Smart ($1.89)

Sakura Sumo Grip B60 ($1.25)

Derwent Art and Derwent Soft Art (set of 2/$3.50)

Caran d’Ache Design (about $3.50)

Staedtler Rasoplast Black – size M ($1.75)

My first step was to simply compare their basic erasing performance before cutting. My intention was to eliminate any that didn’t perform better than a Blackwing eraser. I tested them on lines made with a soft (“MMX”) Blackwing, the vermillion side of a Uni Mitsubishi editing pencil, and a Uni Mitsubishi Hi-Uni 6B, and a shaded mark made with a Blackwing Pearl. None erased the colored pencil line well, as I expected, and all but one erased the graphite lines acceptably. The only eraser I was able to eliminate in this round was the Pentel Hi-Polymer Ain Black because its color left a visible smudge (the scanned image shows the results better). That left nine erasers to hack (more coffee, please).

Using a sharp Opinel knife and a standard Blackwing eraser as a template, it was relatively easy to make clean eraser slices. The difficult part was slicing precisely so that the rectangles would fit in the ferrule. At first, I wasted quite a few eraser slivers trying to get the dimensions just right, but eventually my skills improved. Hint: Err on the side of a slice that is slightly too thick rather than too thin. A too-thin eraser will not be held securely by the ferrule and will either fall out or break when used.

Sadly, most of these otherwise excellent erasers will not work as hacks because they are too soft. An earlier hack attempt with my favorite Tombow Mono worked well for a while but eventually broke, even when I wasn’t erasing vigorously. In fact, there’s the rub: In general, the softer the eraser, the better it performs. An eraser firm enough to hold up well in a ferrule tends to perform worse than soft standalone erasers. As a block, a soft eraser has enough stability to perform well, but cutting it to fit a ferrule takes away its stability. If I felt the eraser wobble and bend as it erased, even when it was well-supported by the ferrule, I knew it would eventually break. I could tell some erasers would be too soft even as I was slicing them.

After eliminating all contenders that were too soft, I was left with three finalists: the Rasoplast, the Sumo, and the Mono Smart. For the final round, I tested these erasers secured to Blackwing ferrules on lines made with the soft Blackwing and the Blackwing 602 and a shaded mark made with the Hi-Uni 6B. I also included a standard pink Blackwing eraser (attached to a Volume 811) for comparison.

Of course, all three finalists erased better than the Blackwing eraser. The Sumo is nearly ideal – sufficiently firm while still erasing completely – and I could cut the B60 to the right size with only two slices, resulting in minimal waste. However, since its width is just a hair shorter than a Blackwing eraser’s length, a larger Sumo would offer longer eraser usage but would require a third cut.

The Mono Smart, while tying with the Sumo in erasing performance, is very slender by design (to enable small, precise erasures) and narrower than the Blackwing ferrule, so it had to be cut in the long direction. It would not yield as many hacked erasers from the block, and there would be more waste. Although it looks similar to a standard Tombow Mono, the material is firmer (perhaps to accommodate its slimmer profile). In fact, it’s the firmest of all erasers tested.

The Rasoplast didn’t erase my shaded marks as cleanly as the other two did, but otherwise it offers an acceptable combination of firmness and erasing performance.

Final Impressions

If I had to pick only one, the Mono Smart would be my first choice. It’s the firmest of the three and is the most likely to hold up well for the longest use. If it ever became available in a standard block size, it would be a Blackwing eraser hacker’s dream. But all three are excellent choices for improving on the Blackwing’s only weakness.

Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.

 

In Link Love

Link Love: Trollin’ with my Homies

Author AnaPosted on

I feel better knowing Brad posted his review of the 22 Design Concrete Pen a couple years ago. Now, I don’t have to review it. And if you read his weekly Refill newsletter a few weeks ago (#173), you’ll appreciate we continue to razz each other.

Pens:

Ink:

Pencils:

Notebooks & Paper:

Art & Creativity:

Other Interesting Things:

In Paper Review

Notepad Review: Original Crown Mill Keyboard Pad

Author Laura CameronPosted on

Review by Laura Cameron

When I went on my Vanness Pen Shop spree at the Arkansas Pen Show, one of the things I brought home was a few different kinds of paper. Today I’m going to talk about the Original Crown Mill Color Vellum Keyboard Pad ($10.00).

I work from home and I’m constantly jotting down notes from phone calls, things I need to remember to do, and just bits and pieces of information. So when I saw the keyboard pad, I knew I wanted to try one!

The pad is approximately 3.5″ (9 cm) x 16.5″ (42 cm) and is the perfect length to lay against my keyboard, ready and waiting. The paper is white, 120gsm and just a little bit toothy.

I tried my fountain pens, gel pens, fine lingers and ball points and the paper handled all of them pretty well. There was a bit of feathering with my largest nibs/most saturated inks (I’m looking at you Retro 51 M nib and De Atramentis Deepwater Obsession Black Red), but for a scratch pad, I thought it was pretty good.

There was also a bit of bleedthrough to the back of the page by the same offender, but I don’t see myself using both sides of the keyboard pad, so I’m still ok with the performance.

Overall, this may not be the ideal pad for you, but if you’re someone who has a million thoughts fall out of your brain when you’re at the computer, and needs a place to capture them, give this keyboard pad a try!

DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided to us free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

In Pen Review

Pen Review: Monteverde Engage One-Touch Rainbow Ink-Ball

Author AnaPosted on 7 Comments
Pen Review: Monteverde Engage One-Touch Rainbow Ink-Ball

Guest Post by Bob Atkins, husband, Col-o-ring creator, letterpress printer, pen cleaner, tea maker.

Monteverde Engage One-Touch

I love my Karas EDKs and Retro 51 Tornados rollerballs. I have a few fountain pens, but prefer the no-nonsense of the rollerballs and gel pens. Most likely because I write like a monkey, and am super hard on my writing tools. I’m barely quality to hold an inked tree branch. I do love the variety of inks I could use in my fountain pens, but I find the rollerballs and gel pens much more daily-use pens. (Full disclosure, I use Sharpies all day in my print shop.) I do have a nice Hinze fountain pen I uses when I’m feeling fancy.

Ana suggested that I try out the retractable Engage, as this pen has a converter that’d allow me to choose from her armada of inks and enjoy colors aside from my rollerball’s blacks and blues. And I have to say I enjoyed it.

At first glance, the rainbow finish and simple design of this pen barrel reminded me of the burnt patina on missiles. The splayed plunger, rounded blunt tip, and metallic oil-stain finish give it a pretty manly aesthetic. As does the weight. It’s a bit hefty (40g).

Monteverde Engage One-Touch

Monteverde Engage One-Touch
Ed. Note: J. Herbin Rollerball in foreground for reference as the only other pen in the Well-Appointed Desk inventory that allows for filling with fountain pen ink but does not have enough room for a full-sized converter.

Loading it with ink (Monteverde Mercury Noir) was super easy, and the rollerball inked up super fast. It writes really crisply and smooth with no lag or goopy-ness that I sometimes associate with some of the medium gauge refills I usually use and like. My ham-fisted writing marks were easily forgiven by this pen.

Monteverde Engage One-Touch

My only critique of this pen is the design aesthetic. It’s much heavier, and about an inch longer than many of the pens I use on a daily basis. The barrel and grip are pretty nondescript but the clicker is super quick and precise. The finial looks a bit like a golf tee, but it somehow works with this brut pen. The clip is the most elegant part of the pen, and its simple design is a nice nod to the fine rollerball quality.

Monteverde Engage One-Touch size comparison
Pens, from left to right: Karas Pen Co EDK, Retro 51, Monteverde Engage One Touch, and Hinze Fountain Pen, uncapped for scale.

But when I used this pen, all I could focus on was its presence in my grip. My Hinze is bit wider in girth, but the grip is more sculpted and lets me ignore the size while I write.

This writes like a boss, but the size and heft are just not my cuppa tea.

Monteverde Engage Rainbow InkBall

Update: (The TL:DR version– still not a fan.)

I decided to give it a try at my shop for a week. If I’m gonna give a pen a negative review based on aesthetics, the least I can do is try it out the mechanics in real life for awhile.

I’m a printer, and walk around a print shop all day, with various writing tools in my pockets and/or apron. Usually, I’ll have a Sharpie and a rollerball of some type: Karas EKD, Fisher Space pen, or perhaps a battered Sheaffer Star Wars rollerball. All these rollerballs perform pretty well, and never seem to leak on me (Ed Note: two out of three have caps). I love Retro 51 Tornados, but I’ve had an errant one leak on me as the rollerball was exposed in my shirt pocket. So, I carry those in my pockets, point-up.

Monteverde Engage Rainbow InkBall

The Engage seemed okay at the shop. It’s large, epi-pen size seemed to work in it’s favor. Easy to find in my pockets, and a quick, brutish writing solution. I was enjoying it at the shop. I’d carry it upside down in my pocket, so I wouldn’t have any ink mishaps in the bottom of my pockets.

But carrying it upside down activated the click mechanism very easily. Ink leached into the top of my jeans pocket and I stained two pairs of pants. You’d think I’d learn after the first accident. The second time happened after I had changed into shorts one hot day at work, and even aware of the nature of this pen, put it in my pocket for only a few hours. The rollerball just activated too easily and quickly. I could try a third pair of pants, and carry this point-down, but now I’m a bit shy. And done with this pen.

Conclusion

(From the Editor) This pen is unique in that it is a fountain pen ink-compatible rollerball but the size of the pen and the push-button mechanism muddies the water about its use. It’s too large to be a pocket carry for many, and the liquid ink leaks like many Retro 51 rollerballs. The fountain pen ink compatible refill in a rollerball might be more interesting in a capped pen (eliminating leaking issues) and a slightly smaller pen (broadening audience appeal). As it stands, it has a very limited appeal.

Tools:

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided free of charge by Monteverde for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

In Fountain Pen Review

Fountain Pen Review: Zebra Zensations

Author AnaPosted on 7 Comments

Review by Tina Koyama

In general, I avoid pens (and other products) that are disposable, but I can think of two circumstances under which a disposable fountain pen makes perfect sense: One is when it might be inked and forgotten for a long time. The other is as a gift to the curious but not yet convinced. Under both circumstances, a disposable fountain pen has one job: It must behave like a gel, rollerball or ballpoint pen that requires no maintenance or thought beyond the color of ink it may dispense.

If that’s the one job, the Zebra Zensations ($3) is doing it – and very well.

Available in seven colors, it comes with a 0.6mm nib (which happens to be my ideal basic writing nib size). It has many competitors, and I pulled out a few I happen to have, including the Pilot Varsity ($3), Platinum Preppy ($4) and Pilot Petit1 ($3.80).

The Zensations has a pleasing, secure snap when the cap is engaged (unlike the Varsity, which feels mushy, and the Preppy, which takes more muscle to pull off than I ever expect). Of the four plastic pens, I prefer the Zensations body and design for looking the most fountain-pen-like. The barrel has a narrow window for checking the ink level.

As for writing quality, the Zensations’ steel nib is solid, reliable and surprisingly smooth – no skipping, blobbing or scratchiness. It started writing immediately – no initial scribbling needed.

Used only sporadically in the four months that I’ve had it, the Zensations always starts writing upon demand without priming, which is more than I can say for some much more expensive fountain pens. The purple ink I chose (which matches the body) dries quickly (no lefty smudges in my writing sample, which was done in a Leuchtturm 1917 notebook).

Frankly, considering that all four pens cost $4 or less, they all write remarkably well and – dare I say it? – behave as close to a rollerball or gel pen as any fountain pen could. Which brings me back to how I began this review. While I don’t value pens for being designed to be tossed when empty, sometimes I want and appreciate the writing feel of a fountain pen nib even when I won’t be using it much. A case in point is the little Lihit Lab pouch I take with me only on fitness walks. I could drop a Zensations into that bag, forget about it for weeks or months and still feel confident that it would work well when I needed it.

In addition, I think a Zebra Zensations would be an ideal candidate for pushing your curious-but-cautious friends over to the fountain pen side of the fence. I know that the Lamy Safari and Pilot Metropolitan are often cited as good “starter” pens for their low entry cost. But as “real” fountain pens, they still require filling and occasional flushing (and I sure wouldn’t want a newbie to leave a Safari idle for six months and then roughly prime it like a ballpoint pen when it doesn’t write! Yes, I know someone who did this). The Zensations is more of a transitional fountain pen that gives the uninitiated a chance to learn to appreciate what it feels like to write with a pleasant nib – but without the fuss.

Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

In Tools

What the heck is White Lightning?

Author AnaPosted on 4 Comments
What the heck is White Lightning?

Vanness Pen Shop has released their first ink product and it’s an additive for ink to help improve the drying time and flow of “dry inks”. Dry inks are the inks that may cause a pen to hard start or are overly pigmented. Some inks might have excessively long dry times, particularly on certain papers. The product is called White Lightning Ink Additive ($5.95 for 1oz bottle).

Good candidates for White Lightning might be the Kyo-No-Oto or Kyo-Iro inks. Some Robert Oster inks. I’m thinking Aurora Blue Black might have improved dry time with the addition of White Lightning. And that’s just a few I can name off the top of my head. There are probably many one-off ink colors that have frustrated and annoyed.

White Lightning Ink Additive

So, how do you use White Lightning? It’s easy. Take the offending ink and add 5ml to a sample vial. Add one drop of White Lightning to start. Shake up the mixture. Then fill a pen from the sample vial.

Never add White Lightning directly to a whole bottle of ink. Dispense ink into a smaller container and use a ratio of 5ml to 1 drop or 10ml to 1 drop. Be sure to label your container after you’ve dded White Lightning to the ink.

The above sample was done using Robert Oster Carolina Blue with a broad nib on a Leonardo Momento Zero (reviewed earlier this week). The ink is extremely pigmented and writes quite dry. One drop in 5ml made the ink much better behaved and improved flow dramatically.

One bottle of White Lightning should last a lifetime. Unless you’re me.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided free of charge by Vanness Pen Shop for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

In feature

Notebook Review: Wild Pages

Author Jessica ColesPosted on 1 Comment

By Jessica Coles

The Chicago pen show was a great show in 2019 (not that it isn’t every year!) due to hard work from the organizers, fun people, and new vendors.  I always love to see new vendors at shows; they prove that the pen community is growing.  Plus they bring new stuff to check out!

One of the newest vendors at the Chicago show was Wild Pages. My table happened to be next to the Wild Pages table so I was able to see the amount of traffic that was drawn in by the brightly colored notebooks.

In order to demonstrate their paper, Wild Pages had pieces of their journal paper and various pens available.  A smart way to introduce a new type of paper to the fountain pen crowd.

Wild Pages brought four types of notebooks. I couldn’t resist grabbing both a large and a medium to take home.  It was a bit tough to choose the color – all of the colors were beautifully distracting! Prices were clearly labeled on their sign.

Finally, I did choose a large purple notebook (9.7 x 6.5 inches) and a medium (6.5 x 4.9 inches) in a light coral. The covers are made of a medium weight cardstock.

Inside, each notebook is made of two signatures (a group of pages that are folded together) of white paper for a total of 48 sheets (96 pages). Each signature is sewn into a fold in the center of the cover and includes an elastic band.

This band is looped around the folded ends of the cover, so it is easy to remove if you would prefer to go band-less.

The only mark on the entire notebook is a printed logo on the bottom of the last page.

Here’s a closeup of the logo so you don’t need to squint!

Now for the paper.  The owners of Wild Pages understandably didn’t want to give too much information about the origin of the paper in their notebooks, although we were told it is made in the US. The surface is just a bit shiny and smooth to the touch, but there is some tooth to it when writing.

First came tests of various inks and gelatos in the larger notebook. I wanted to see how the pages could stand up to various mediums.

There was no bleed through with these inks, although there is a tiny spot where I laid down quite a bit of Taccia Midori ink.  I did notice the tiniest bit of feathering with heavier inks, however, I could only see it when the page was two inches from my eyeball.  There is a good amount of ghosting (being able to see the writing on the back side of the page), but if this bothers anyone, a dark sheet of paper behind the page masks the writing.

Then it was time to throw a wide variety of pens and inks at the notebook – I love this part since I get out all of the fun pens! I also conducted this testing on the medium notebook so I could make sure the quality was the same.

If you look closely, the Sharpie did feather a bit. Oh, Sharpie. However, the Sharpie didn’t fully bleed through; there was no ink on the next page. The metallic Gelly Roll pen and the Pentel Sparkle Pop had small spots where they nearly bled through. But not nearly as much as I was expecting; these are two pens that are usually second only to a Sharpie in bleeding through paper.

So I decided to increase the challenge. I purchased a folded nib at the Chicago show that hadn’t been used yet.  It paired perfectly with a bottle of J. Herbin Rouge Hematite! Dry time on this page was faster than Tomoe River paper, slower than watercolor paper.

All that ink and no bleeding through! I was shocked.

One thing I noticed with this super sheeny ink was specifically the quality of the sheen.  I’ve included a photo of the same ink on Tomoe River 52gsm paper below to demonstrate.  The color of the sheen is the same on both papers, however, the sheen on the Wild Pages paper appears matte rather than metallic.

I love the difference between the two.

To make sure it wasn’t an effect that was confined to one ink, I also grabbed some Bungubox First Love Sapphire. Please excuse the slight smearing of the ink.  My cats decided to investigate before the ink was completely dry.  It is no fault of the paper!

Again, the color of the sheen shows as usual, but the surface is matte rather than metallic.

Still no bleed through!

I am enjoying these notebooks from Wild Pages thoroughly. The price per page ($0.15 for the medium and $0.23 for the large) does put the notebooks among the more highly priced available, but for the new type of paper, a new company and hand-sewn bindings, I believe they are worth the cost.

The last thing that should be noted: these covers are absolutely perfect for the stickers you have been saving up!

DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided free of charge for the purpose of review. Others were purchased by me. Please see the About page for more details.