Shopping in my hometown after ages šŸ 

So today while roaming around in my hometown, I paid a visit to one of the OG local stores. I found two scribble ball-pens which were just sitting there collecting all sorts of dirt on the clips and on the body. So naturally I rescued them! The shop guy gave me a healthy discount. Then my head turned to the new upper class(for India) mechanical pencil from Pentel called the energize, which sits comfortably at a pricetag of 150inr and comes with an alloy body and retractable lead sleeve. The sleeve on mine is not retracting fully :smiling_face_with_tear: however the packaging label comes with one year quality warranty which is shocking.

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Congrats on the all-black scrib!

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Thanks man! Going to be visiting a few more shops before I leave the city.

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How is that energel pen? Looks interesting.

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Pretty cool for the price. Its a .7mm mechanical pencil. Quite tall very light.

Final haul in my hometown before leaving.

Managed to finally find a Lamy scribble .7mm mp and a low priced Scriss hex barrel mp.

Some cool looking pens from an Indian brand called Pentonic and a Staedtler bp.

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Very nice pickup there. The black accents LAMY Scribble was produced in fewer numbers than the silver accent version. Itā€™s harder to find them on the resale market, so prices are a good bit higher.

These are great pens. I see youā€™ve also got the 0.7 mm MP version. Thereā€™s also a Scribble in the 3.15 mm lead size.

I finally managed to pick up a black accent Scribble BPā€¦ for a fair price relative to the going market rate. $76 USD. Nowhere near the deal you got!


I like the Scribble with black accentsā€¦ although photos of used examples show the anodizing commonly wears off on the edges. Same for the clip. So, definitely handle it carefully.

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Iā€™ve often wondered: what if I resprayed a standard scribbleā€™s metal parts in flat black paintā€¦ ?

Anodizing would be stronger. DIY spray paint would come off rather easily, unless you had access to a heated spray booth. But, it does make me wonder if some sellers may have attempted to do just thatā€“carefully paint the silver bits and pass off as an original black Scribble on auction markets.

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So satisfying to see that blue colour bath towards the end :smile:

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And the rocket pack go-kart.

Thatā€™s super cool ā€“ thanks, Patrick. Iā€™d no idea that anodizing could be a DIY project with basic equipment. Intriguing.

Of course, this does pose a challenge with parts that canā€™t be easily separated. The connected part not to be anodized would have to be very resistant to high heat to survive the process intact.

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Never realized how valuable this model in black was since apparently itā€™s quite common here (?) over the past 3 years Iā€™ve seen multiple listings across various online marketplaces for the black scribble, most recent one was sold for ~60 USD, cheapest Iā€™ve ever seen was sold for as low as 37 USD. If anyone wants, I can try and ā€œproxyā€ a black scribble next time one shows up.

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Interesting how LAMY model availability can vary quite a bit by market region. So the Scribble is not hard to find in Brazil local used markets? Is the black version selling fairly close to the silver accent version?

The black version is pretty much non-existent on eBay USA, except for sellers from Japan looking to make a huge profit. The silver one doesnā€™t seem to have much rarity recognition as Iā€™ve seen several pop up and sell around $40~$60, at least for the 0.7 mm pencil. The ballpoint is pretty rare. And the 3.15 mm version is uncommon.

On Mercari, thereā€™s more inventory and generally cheaper pricesā€¦ plus the black version tends to pop up a lot, except theyā€™re usually going for high prices. There are trawlers constantly looking, as Iā€™ve seen them sell very quickly when the price is below market average.

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Hereā€™s a very rare sightā€¦ a black LAMY Scribble 0.7 mm pencil. Popped up on German eBay. Snagged in about 2.5 hours. Very hard to compete with such tenacious bidders. Only 49ā‚¬.

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I got one at a lower-than-average price only under two conditions: it became available on a ā€œsecondaryā€ platform for the EU (Spanish) market, namely Wallapop, and it sported a light advertisement engraving (fortunately, in the same colour as the barrel, so it is barely noticeable). Other specimens have proved so far to be pointless to chase: they are just too expensive.

On a tangential note: with the Lamy Scribble 3.15 I finally got why some people love the triangular body form factor ā€” it is indeed a rare case where my hands got pleasantly acquainted with the shape, and appreciated the feeling and above all the proportions ā€” and I finally found peace with that specific geometry. I still canā€™t stand some variations on that theme, but the Lamy Scribble in 3.15 is a different sort of beast, and Iā€™m afraid I would not think the same about a 0.7mm tip. On the other hand, a pen, perhapsā€¦

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I have on occasion gotten a pen or pencil with an engraving thatā€™s light, but painted a contrasting colorā€¦ and then Iā€™ve either been able to remove the paint to make it look muted, or if the paint is stubborn just paint over it with some enamel (matte, satin, or gloss). For a user pen, itā€™s definitely passable. The vexing thing about personalization is that sometimes what looks to be painted on is engraved, because the photos were not detailed enough or deceptive. I had one with a kind of gloss black enamel that, under the right lighting, looked like an engraving based on the reflectivity. It was a very pleasant surprise to find it was just raised paintā€¦ that was easily stripped off.

You pointed out something that I too appreciate about the Scribble 3.15 mm. That unique faceted body. I appreciate how itā€™s like a 50% treatment (as opposed to a triangular body). It was such a shame that Lamy didnā€™t repeat those facets on the 0.7 mm.

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I learned a lot about the Scribbleā€™s design from the Bleistift blog. As I understand it, the 3.15mm came out first in 1999 and is closest to the original design drawings. Hannes Wettstein has a quotation regarding the 3 facets being an ergonomic feature and also to act as a roll-stop. In handling the 3.15, I grasp it differently than for a normal MP ā€“ more like an artist would, like holding a piece of charcoal, or oil pastel ā€“ and thus I believe why it was named ā€˜Scribbleā€™. Typically, the canvas is much larger than an A4 or letter sized sheet of paper, and you would make larger arm movements for sketches, instead of exerting more precise control around the wrists.

The BP came out a bit later in 2000, and like the 0.7 MP, the way one holds a pen or MP is different from a broad tip sketch pencil. I think this is why the BP and MP body design was optimized without the facets.

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The stationery availability of all major companies seem weird here but thatā€™s a matter for itā€™s own postā€¦ I actually canā€™t even speak about the silver accent version since I havenā€™t seen it up for sale in used markets, only the black version appears. The silver version was definitely sold here though (at least in some way) since Iā€™ve seen stationery shops with some listings for it (all out of stock, of course).

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