I’m not a completist but I do like to finish well. Around 2017/18 I’d noticed the color similarities between my sole Pilot TRUSTY HTR-1000M 0.4 and a random listing for Pilot Hi-Tec C Knock. Both had dark colored bodies and TRUSTY’s burgundy red rubber grip was dying to be matched with the deep red rose wood on a Hi-Tec C, which bore the markings “MATERIAL GRIP : WOOD”.
I wasn’t all that crazy about the TRUSTY 0.4 series but now I was intrigued. Obviously there wasn’t going to be any ‘wood’ in a shade of black or blue, but what about light brown? Coz, Pilot did make a ‘mustard’ yellow grip for the TRUSTY.
Well, search I did and so too I found: a nice maple wood grip for the Hi-Tec C Knock! Now all I needed was to circle back to one of those mustard grip TRUSTYs! Alas, the whole world had caught on to the coolness of 0.4mm and after 2020, prices just went insane.
Luckily, 5 years later, I managed to get that TRUSTY through a trade with @DarkwingDuck. And now another side quest is completed! Onward!
This is a bit outside your “perfect matchings” catalogue, but I still see it as a very tasty and classy pairing. Not wine-and-glass, but rather wine-and-cheese.
I did not know Hi-Tec C pens came in knock version; somehow I assumed the only way to keep the tips of the cartidges safe and wet was the cap on the disposable, standard Hi-Tec C.
I think Hi-tec C was/is a gel ink formulation? It’s not that surprising given the success of un-capped push-button designs like Pilot’s own G2, Pentel Energel, etc.
What I found interesting was that colon in the markings: there was something other than wood! Pilot actually made a series of ‘China’ or decorated ceramic grip designs as well. See the page retrieved from the Wayback Machine in 2006. PILOT Hi-Tec C Material Grip 2006.pdf (136.7 KB)
I have to say, my love for the Hi-Tec C dates back to a veeery long time: I switched from BIC’s to Hi-Tec C’s when I started my last year of middle school I think, and spent most of my high-school and university years using some all-metal, “Pilot Cavalier predecessor” pen with disposable cartridges. I still use the Hi-Tec C pens today, and still consider them the best all-purpose writing tools I can buy.
I should try some different solutions and brands (still in the gel ink category, probably), but why trying to break something which does not crack, no matter how hard I try?
