I have one of those Pro Touch II with Sanford branding stashed away somewhere. I love this aspect of personal history… you never know how a particular model of MP played a part in someone’s journey, whether it was a lowly model that was owned and used or a painfully just-out-of-reach-back-then grail like the Micromatic.
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Cool pieces would always catch my eye; knurled grips would send me swooning; and discovering pencils I never knew existed would always feel like vacationing somewhere new and incredible.
Absolutely love this. Your enthusiasm brightens my day.
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The Pentel Quicker Clicker wasn’t the first mechanical pencil that I used as a kid growing up in the 80’s, however once I got one, I decided it was so perfect in every way that I used them exclusively through 2021.
First off, it’s gorgeous! Not just the overall shape and style but the transparent colors are super clean and being able to see the internals is just plain cool! You can fill the lead reservoir with a whole container of lead! The eraser is actually a usable normal size and doesn’t move or extend any lead when you use it! It has a metal clip. The side click is absolute perfection and always right there when you need it.
Yes, I was a total QC snob. In my eyes, you just couldn’t get any better, and so I never even looked for anything else! How could anything else compare??
Then something finally happened to my last one and I had to find a replacement. At this point though, they had long stopped making the no grip model and only sold the rubber grip version. I reluctantly bought some and just dealt with it - occasionally going back to Pentel’s website to see if they started selling the no-grip version again but alas, no. I was hopeful though because there were other folks commenting about the no-grip version and begging them to re-release it. At least I wasn’t alone!
After a few years of using the rubber grip version they started getting sticky and I need to find a replacement. Looking back, I’m not sure why but I never thought to look anywhere else for them except the Pentel website. I start looking on eBay and HOLY COW, there were other colors!?! Yellow, green and red too!! I’ll get me a few sets of these thank you very much! Oh and look at these solid color ones from this dude in Russia! I’ll take a set of those too, thank you!
Feeling pretty awesome at this point and waiting for them to arrive, I stumble across @sideknocks’ blog with the freaking metal PD505 and almost shit myself. OMG where can I get one of these?! Search some more, find the Reddit sub, strike up a conversation with Thomas about them and before I know it I’m in a Slack group with him and other hard core collectors and see ya - down the rabbit hole I go!
Edit: 2021
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Sometimes I forget that I was once known as @sideknocks. Friggin @nimrodd and @knocktype11 got me deep deep in the real vintage stuff.
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Your admiration to one pencil is inspiring! I wish I had such a story, but i guess I’m stuck in an eternal loop trying to replace the initial feeling I had with my Jotter!
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Current pencils are fun, but the real challenges and interesting pencils are vintage. Once you start pulling on that thread is never seems to stop.
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After a few years of sporadic collecting… my silver collection:
I have a bunch more different models that have been easier to track down, but couldn’t fit them in one shot. I’m not serious enough a collector to pick up every variant made for a given line… just don’t have the patience to do that. Left much of what I’ve found to random chance… and sometimes got lucky (other times not, missing huge opportunities).
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Enjoyed your QC story! I have the same feeling about their perfect design and utility. Interesting how they still feel relevant today, even with all the modern advances in titanium/Kuru Toga mechanisms etc…. Still use ‘em every day and pick up a couple here and there for backups
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I’ve seen your pencil sketches/journals in various posts…these are great!
Wondering if these are all in one sketchbook…would be fun to see it published 
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I was born in a socialist country where the presence of any at least a little bit finer design was zero. I started drawing in elementary school and had a wonderful light blue Staedtler Polo which was my best friend. But I was a kid and didn’t appreciate it, it was just a tool for school and I don’t even know how I lost it or when I threw it away.
In secondary school I had a Staedtler retro and my friend, who lived in Japan as a kid, when he saw that I like MPs, showed me his green transparent Quicker Clicker, white Pilot Rocky shaker and black Pilot 1010 shaker. When I saw those, oh man. You could imagine the feeling. I did not know that something like that could exist! He fortunately agreed to sell them to me. But I was still a kid and I lost those too lol. I got bored with them and traded them for some comics probably. Don’t remember. Anyway things change quickly at that age, became interested in music and girls, and forgot everything about mechanical pencils.
Until like four years ago, when I just remembered them out of the blue and thought to myself “I wonder what is happening on the MP scene now”. So I googled “mechanical pencil”. And found a Rotring 500 and thought “this is a perfect MP, got to have it”. That is when I discovered Reddit and, just like you said happens often, this wonderful place. So I learned that there is a Rotring 600, and something called kuru toga, and orenz, and delguard, etc. Now I have at least 200 of them - but mostly the current, cheaper, regular pieces, so I don’t consider myself a collector - I am a sympathizer.
And I realized that the way I love MPs is 100% shaped by that first moment of my infatuation with the “gimmick-iness” of The Shaker. That is why I’m mostly indifferent to metal ones, and I especially do not like the “executive style”, which is “too adult” for my taste. What I like is Tombow Olno, Pentel Smash, the fun pencils. And another good thing is that I started to draw more to justify buying them.
Also, shout out to Anton from Moscow, a sweetheart who gifted me two light blue Staedtler Polos when he heard me whining about them on Reddit. So now I have my first love again. Just the white Rocky is missing, which is no biggie I think, they are not that rare.
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A ‘sympathizer’. I love that.
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I like technology and spending money
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Grew up in China where domestically made stationery is insanely cheap (My first fountain pen was 50 US cents equivalent) and most stores didn’t carry mid/high end products knowing they won’t sell. When I was in grade 5 or 6 (early 2010s) a Pilot Frixion Ball was considered the biggest flex. I was lucky enough to convince my parents to buy me one. Imagine the feeling of erasing with it while everyone else struggles with bad quality correction tapes… that was the first time stationery appeared to me as something worth paying attention to.
Then I got into secondary/middle school. It was a semi-boarding school where students can choose whether they live on campus. Those who did live in dorms, for security purposes, weren’t allowed to leave campus at all on weekdays. I wasn’t one of them, and coincidentally, the apartment I moved to at the time had a nice stationery store nearby, ran by a family. As my classmates burned through pen refills from increasing workload, or just simply lost things, I became their stationery purchasing agent and would visit that store more than once per week, and got familiar with the store owner. It was from there/him I learned about Kuru Toga, Alpha Gel, and shaker mechanism, thinking those were as advanced as mechanical pencils get, until one day he brought an OHTO Super Promecha and blew my mind. I didn’t end up buying it, but that was when I realized how little of the stationery rabbit hole I knew because I was limited by what my local stores offer.
So I started reading on the internet, and over the next year slowly acquired a 925 25, Graph 1000, Graphgear 1000, Rotring 500, and a Smash one by one, and in 2017, an S20. Then there’s no going back.
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Epic journey, @Ras .
Have you seen the current day made-in-China stationery? They are still crazy cheap but I think in terms of design they have progressed quite a lot. Some brands like M&G have opened lifestyle stores here in Singapore and I’m quite impressed by the range and selection.
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This thread has been fantastic.
Beyond seeing how everyone first fell down the mechanical pencil rabbit hole, it also satisfies that little curiosity we all have about other people’s lives. Reading these posts feels like reading a collection of short stories. Every reply offers a glimpse into a world outside my own, and I’ve enjoyed every bit of it.
I come from a fairly ordinary Taiwanese family, but from a young age it was obvious that art and design ran through the family. My grandfather and father were both sculptors, and naturally I entered an art-focused high school program and eventually built my entire education and career around art and design.
Because of that background, pencils have always been a familiar tool. Oil painting, printmaking, illustration, watercolor, sketching, graphic design, multimedia, architectural drafting… pencils were always somewhere in the process.
Even after computers replaced much of the drafting world in the early 2000s, pencils never disappeared for me. They’re still the fastest way to organize thoughts, explore ideas, and refine a design direction. Back in art school, I spent countless hours discussing pencil mechanisms with classmates. Looking back, I’m pretty sure I was responsible for converting more than a few people into collectors.
Once I started working professionally, I became interested in higher-end and more specialized mechanical pencils. Before that, most of my pencils were the usual student favorites from Uni, Pilot, and Platinum, with only a few drafting models mixed in.
After college, I started collecting much more systematically. Different lead sizes, different colors, different variations within a model line. This was when brands like Staedtler, Faber-Castell, and Rotring entered my life in a serious way.
Looking back, there are four categories that clearly stand out in my spending history: Macs, musical instruments, beer, and mechanical pencils.
As I got older and reached a few important milestones in life, I received Montblanc and Cross pens as gifts from family members. Around that time I developed a habit of researching pen and pencil models online, comparing variations and learning their histories. What I didn’t realize was that I was slowly developing an obsession that would eventually become harder to quit than rock music.
At first it was simply reading articles and looking at photos of legendary models online. Then my financial situation improved. Then a former design client moved to Japan and became my personal buying connection. Before I knew it, I had spent countless hours searching eBay and Yahoo Japan for dream pieces that satisfied my interests in history, rarity, engineering, and design. Before I knew it, nearly twenty years had passed.
Unfortunately, parts of the collecting community I was involved with often felt weighed down by strange ideologies, unnecessary politics, and an atmosphere that sometimes reminded me of being managed by an elementary school teacher. Those of you who have spent time lurking in similar communities probably know exactly what I’m talking about. Because of that, I rarely shared new acquisitions or posted collection photos. Staying quiet and participating only lightly gradually became a habit. It was simply easier than navigating the double standards and frustrations that occasionally appeared around the hobby. Over the years, I watched many Taiwanese collectors leave for the very same reasons. Every friend who disappeared felt like another small brake being applied to my own enthusiasm.
Over time, I realized that collecting was never just about acquiring objects. The deeper you go, the more it becomes about history, friendships, discoveries, late-night searches, and the occasional thrill of finding something you thought you’d never see again.
A few years ago, when Knockology was gathering feedback on logos and beginning to build the forum, I mostly watched from a distance. I absorbed information but didn’t participate much. Only after I started engaging did I realize how different this place was. The freedom of discussion, the lack of advertising, and the genuinely helpful members completely changed my perspective. It reignited something in me that I didn’t realize was still there. The feeling is hard to describe. It’s like an engine reaching the RPM where the turbo finally kicks in and suddenly there’s a whole new wave of acceleration.
This year has been busy, but I haven’t stopped collecting. Every time I fill one hole in the collection, another one immediately appears. I’m sure I’m not the only one. Since joining the discussions here, I’ve seen plenty of people suffering from the exact same condition. (Yes, I’m looking at some of you. XD) Mechanical pencil mechanisms are simply too fascinating to me.
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Thank you for sharing your background, Tom. I’ve often wondered how many collectors are out there in the ether, lurking, watching, and learning but not engaging in the community. I have to imagine there are more than those who step up to participate in public.
Humanity continues to face all sorts of social challenges, for a myriad of reasons. There’s still so much more social evolution necessary. Some cultures are better at it… with respect and humility as core personal qualities, while other cultures are unbridled and enabling of unhelpful criticism and even hostility. The open ended social media arena makes the unsavory appear far more visible than normal. The anonymous nature of participation is what helps enable that.
Every so often, there are venues created to help foster a more friendly and safe environment for participants. Knockology is such a place. So much noise is also filtered out–those who aren’t really collectors that engage on the Reddit sub, and make rather mundane repetitive inquiries when the info is so easy to find by searching.
Anyway…
It sounds like you were very fortunate to get into the vintage mechanical pencil collecting hobby quite early on, having a friend who could buy for you well before the reasonably priced proxying buying services came about. Your collection must be amazing! Were you able to obtain most of the very sought after models that now command extremely high prices? What vintage pencils from your collection would you say that you appreciate most?
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I have not been in China much in recent years, and considering how advanced online shopping is in China, there wasn’t much reasons for me to visit storefronts. I also don’t have any Chinese branded stationery on hand. But from being on Chinese forums I’m kinda aware.
In respect of mechanical pencils, Chinese products are generally not there yet. Deli makes a seriously impressive and affordable double knock. (as well as a Delguard knockoff that does the job like the real thing) But that’s pretty much it, for students with limited budgets we are still recommending Pilot S3, Sakura XS125 and Pentel P205, instead of domestically made MPs.
I believe a lot of Chinese manufacturers have put their main focus on gel pens. Secondary and high school students in China have high academic load and write for extended periods every single day, which has helped gel pens beat ballpoint pens out of the market. I’m pretty sure China has the largest gel pen market in the world, and starting in the 2010s, China was already making very good gel pen bodies, but was behind in the refills - ink formula and tip processing, in which they did have significant progress in the recent years.
I think currently Chinese gel pens, as well as a lot of other office products, are only short on quality control. The quality isn’t bad, it’s just inconsistent, and for daily use, it’s even less of a concern given the price tag.
Your M&G post is interesting, despite M&G lifestyle’s establishment in 2016, its opening in Singapore seems like a fairly recent thing? (I stayed in sg from ‘19 to ‘22 but never saw those while I was there) I may add something up under that post as well.
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Yes, that M&G LIFE store opened back in 2024/25, in the tunnel of shops connecting Wisma Atria and Takashimya SC. I actually walked past it several times before noticing the ‘content’. Beside stationery, they had toys, smartphone chargers with licensed Evangelion designs, even a rack of actual Tomica models. Overall, a very fun and engaging retail space, especially for youngsters.
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