Sun-Star’s design team probably have a lot more fun than their counterparts at Pentel or Uni. They seem to know that the product concepts being pushed by the higher ups are not exactly cutting edge (see all the recent Metacil ‘forever pencil’ dead horses), so they turn to aesthetics to wrap the concept up as pretty as possible, and within the production budget.
The TOPULL certainly fulfils this modus operandi. A bright spark is inspired by the allure of the Unobtainium of a Hi-uni 5050 FF-matic and calls on the design team to reverse engineer the finger-tip knocking mechanism in a package that costs 6% of the original MSRP of 5000 yen.
Yes, for just a pinch over 300 yen, the FF-matic experience can be yours! Except, the force needed is more like a tug than a flick, and the whole pencil comes in plastic instead of a fancy carbon fiber weave.
Nevertheless, the TOPULL is a fun design. Kudos to the team for coming up with a visually pleasing interlocking ‘jigsaw’ motif and a mostly harmless integrated clip. This is a pencil that I know a 10 year old me would have loved to flaunt in the classroom. Perhaps the kid in you will like the TOPULL as much as I do.
I saw that SC pencil on the same Ebay shop as the one selling the Technopress at that high figure. Are there any other places where this contraption is available, possibly at a lower figure?
OK, I found the metal version thru the taobao app for Singapore. Three colors: frosted silver, cool black and space grey. RMB 169 (~24 USD) each with 1x parker style refill. I tried to screencap some pix from the app but the primitive HTML slicing made it very difficult to rejoin the pieces.
Note: the Chinese brand name 简创 (jian chuang) translates to ‘Simple Creation’ or ‘Simply Create’. In the app, the automatic transliteration calls the brand ‘Jane Chuang’ . If you search on Tao Bao, it is best to use the Chinese characters 简创 + 笔 (bi / pen).
Inspired ( should I say instigated? ) by @drifand I got one of these from mercari for 3$. First impressions: its big, almost bulky, the size of a Lamy Safari and slightly longer. The insides look flimsy, the plastic of the body is of good quality and has a nice texture. Too bad that the step on the tip where you grip to tug is shiny, slippery and rounded. It should have been straight and textured like the body.
While objectively, when tugging on it you move your hand less than when knocking a usual pencil, it feels more awkward as you have to grip it between the thumb and the side of the palm.
If, in addition to a grippier tip mentioned above, the body would have the ring texture like, say, a Pilot H-56x it would be far more easy to use.
One pencil cannot cost more than $10-11 to ship?
. If you search on Tao Bao, it is best to use the Chinese characters 简创 + 笔 (bi / pen).
