Tombow H300K… it's earliest fine lead knock pencil?


To be sure, I believe Tombow’s first knock pencil of any kind was probably the 2mm “HOMO Holder” from 1957:

I believe the naming was based on ‘homogenous lead formulation’, I.e. how smooth the lead cores were. I would love to find one for a reasonable price some day, but for now, my next closest equivalent is the H300K from 1967:

This places it five years behind Pentel’s 0.5mm pioneer models from 1965 1962. I had obtained a warped H300K-05 in black some time ago, and recently got lucky on a pristine, straight as an arrow H300K-07 in green.


To me, this shade of green is as close to a signature color for Tombow of the 1950s-60s Showa era. Pencils in this shade just feel the age…


A couple more oldie Tombows to share, including a red H 100-CLIP General Holder, and a H500-05 continuous twist in black. Apologies for hiding the banana-curve of my H300K-05.

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Honestly, I haven’t been able to find a nice one of these reasonably either!

Now I want one with a sticker though, I haven’t ever seen that!

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Pentel’s 0.5mm pencils came out in 1962.

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Amended, thank you :slight_smile:

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