Faber Castell Mechanical Pencil, TK Fine Vario, 0.5mm (135500)

This mechanical pencil exceeded my expectations. By the price I thought it might be more than just a plastic drafting pencil, and I was right. Although the body (green part) is made of plastic, everything else is solid high quality metal and the pencil has a great balance in the hand. It is heavier at the tip of course, but it feels very comfortable to me. The shape is very elegant and anatomical although the metal body piece is perhaps too smooth for a good grip unless you have sweaty hands! It has ridges, but they are not rough enough to provide excellent grip - so grip is acceptable but not perfect. This pencil also has a mechanism where you can make the metal barrel be more forgiving to pressure (for writing) or static (for drafting) - you turn the tip of the pencil to the different lead settings and it changes how the pencil sets the metal barrel - that is not only for you to tell what lead you have inside like all other pencils I have seen. It is actually functional! So if you turn towards "hard" (and there are several settings, not only hand or soft), the pencil acts more like a drafting pencil. If you turn it towards soft, it acts like a mechanical pencil and is more friendly for writing in a notepad. The eraser in the back blew me away. Although I hardly use it (as it is usually so small and lasts a week!), it is easily 10 times longer than what you normally see in a mech pencil - you twist the back and the eraser comes out - there is over an inch of eraser! And it looks replaceable, although I have not looked for replacements yet. I have never seen this pencil for sale anywhere but at Amazon so I guess I will start there! All in all, quite a pencil for $24. My request to Faber-Castell would be perhaps a full metal body and more texture at the front for better grip - then this would be IMHO the best pencil in the market. But I am very happy as is, specially comparing with the dozens other mechanical pencils I have used.

It’s got a really cool look to it, it feels good quality, it is durable, fits in my hand well AND has a really nice quality eraser on the back. I use it for sketching with 2b lead and I’m extremely happy with it and love to use it!

I started as a draftsman and am an illustrator as well. I collect and very much enjoy writing/drawing instruments. Faber Castell has been around for a long time and makes quality products. This mechanical pencil is no exception. Even though most all mechanical pencils get the job done, they each have a unique feel and, this one also has a nice feature for reducing lead breakage. It feels like a solid instrument in the hand with good balance and a fairly smooth non-aggressive grip, which I like. The grip area can also be rotated to choose between what they refer to as "hard" or "soft". Choosing "soft" allows for a spring mechanism to cushion the lead when sufficient pressure is applied, allowing the lead to retract into the barrel when enough pressure is applied, but returning to it's normal position as pressure abates. This feature reduces lead breakage and is especially helpful for those using the pencil to write with, taking class notes, etc. Selecting "hard" puts the pencil into the standard mode of most mechanical pencils in which the lead isn't cushioned by a spring and the lead has no "give" when pressure is applied, contributing to lead breakage. One of the few pencils that doesn't cover the eraser, which I actually like. Even though I convert my pencil illustrations into digital form for doing color work, I prefer drawing by hand and use a large handheld eraser during that time so I don't use the pencil's eraser much, however when I do, not having to remove an eraser cover first is convenient, though some users may prefer it be capped. A product whose solid top-notch quality is discernible the moment you pick it up, and one produced by a an excellent company with a solid top-notch reputation. Can't go wrong here ... great product at a good price!

I could write dozens of lines on why this pencil is a fine drawing instrument. And yes, it does have a few personal flaws in my opinion, but they are only my opinion. Someone else might look past them with no issue at all. So let’s look over these issues and see why I still gave this mech a full 5 stars. Ok, I personally never use the built in eraser on mech pencils. I use a separate electronic eraser. But the eraser/clicker on this pencil extends out almost twice as far as a normal mech. Which normally wouldn’t be an issue and visually it’s still a very attractive design, but with that extra length extending out, it has a bit too much play and wiggles around side to side loosely with just a touch of a finger. Like the diameter of the eraser/clicker was made a bit too thin. Telling me that if I were to try using the eraser, the clicker would flex back and forth unpleasantly, and could eventually cause a malfunction or break. Since I don’t use erasers on my pencils, this doesn’t effect me, but could effect somebody else. The chrome grip looks great, but at first glance seems like a bad design if your hands got moist or sweaty. However, they added a slight flare to the bottom of the chrome grip that feels good and secure while holding. Which brings us to my last issue. With the design of this pencil, they added a hardness scale label selector allowing you to spin a metal cylinder with viewing window that you are able to spin to the type of lead you chose to use in the pencil. Not a bad idea in theory, but a terrible idea on placement. It’s located just above the conical tip at the exact position I place my fingers when I tend to feel the need to choke up on the tip for achieving greater detail. Yes, I can still choke up on the tip, but it definitely feels weird gripping that small spinning cylinder. Almost as though your grip feels conditional. Don’t misread me here. It seems like I’m burning this pencil to the ground, but like I said earlier, this is only my opinion on a few issues I feel got overlooked when designing this mech. Listen, I still gave this pencil 5 stars cause it’s still amazing and very attractive. Everything else about this pencil is perfect. It’s smooth, and the movement feels effortless. It has a feature to select hard or soft touch. Yes it has it share of plastic, but the plastic doesn’t feel weak. And where they did use metal, it’s very nice and strong. Plus that Crome grip (not just silver) adds style that few other mech pencils can achieve. This mech has a nice balance also. It doesn’t feel too nose heavy. This pencil feels light, but not cheap. The lead extrusion equals out to around 0.3 to 0.4 per click, which is a nice average. I would definitely tell people to give this pencil a try. Especially if you are a mech collector. This is one you will want in your collection. I’m seriously surprised it don’t cost more. I’m glad I gave it a shot before it’s discontinued and I would be stuck buying it used second hand from some collector cashing in on this rare gem.