Liquid Graphite, The Future of Pencils?
Written: Dec 07 '07
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Product Rating:
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Pros: No Lead to Break, Retractable, Thin Line Width, Large Eraser, Erases Fresh Ink Cleanly
Cons: Ink Breaks, Lines Not Very Smooth, Pressure Causes Indentation, *Difficult To Erase After Ink Dries
The Bottom Line: If you like pens and want erasability, these are fairly decent. If you like the dynamics of wood/mechanical pencil, avoid these.
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| cw340397's Full Review: Pentech Liquaphite Liquid Graphite Mechanical Penc... |
I ordered these as a filler item on Amazon, at $3.99 for a quantity of two. I have been using them on and off for nearly a month. Initially, I thought these were standard mechanical pencils, and I read some comments about how the lead didn't break, so this exited me in particular because I hate having my lead break in a mechanical pencil.
When I received the pencils, I immediately noticed on the package that they used liquid graphite instead of lead pieces. Excited to try something new, I opened them up and put them to immediate use. It took a minute for the liquid graphite to exit the barrel through what looked like the metal point of a standard ball-point ink pen. As the "pencil ink" flowed onto the paper, I examined it closely in order to arrive at an opinion on its quality.
The lines were thin, thinner than any mechanical pencil could ever produce. Applying more pressure would get you a slightly thicker, slightly darker line. The lines were not without flaws however. There were broken sections where ink failed to flow onto the paper, and there were spots where too much ink flowed, leaving tiny dribbles of darker-than-normal spots of ink. The darkness of the line was of good quality however, slightly darker than an average pencil's strokes. But I felt that the overall quality of the lines were on an equal level of a mediocre ballpoint pen.
The eraser is longer than an average pencil's eraser when the pencil is retracted, and when the pencil is not retracted the eraser extends an average distance from the top of the barrel. Upon use, the ink/graphite cleaned up easily and cleanly, when the ink was fresh. It was also easily erased using a fingertip, and the ink could possibly smudge if it rubbed up against something. However, trying to erase something the day after it has been written, when the ink had fully dried, was a very difficult task, and it's likely that you wouldn't not get all the ink removed unless you use plenty of elbow grease. This could be good in some instances, but won't be desirable in other instances. Also, in both erasure tests, there was still a noticeable amount of indentation set into the paper where writing had existed, most likely from the use of pressure exerted in trying to get a smooth line.
As an artist who sketches frequently, I need the ability to gain additional shades of gray when applying more pressure to the paper, which both wood and mechanical pencils provide. These pencils, however, offered no such ability. Although I would prefer these pencils over the old erasable pens of the nineties, Pentech's Liquaphite pencils lack the simplicity, ease of use and sheer nostalgia of the good old-fashioned wooden pencil. The only improvement over mechanical pencils was the fact that the lead does not break, which can be resolved with the use of quality lead from Staedtler. In the end, the trade-offs for me to use these type of pencils were not worth it.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
cw340397
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Location: Northwest, OH USA
Reviews written: 7
Trusted by: 0 members
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