Thursday, December 24, 2020

I wish you all a wonderful time beside the loved ones Take care, stay safe and enjoy the holidays.



 

Friday, December 4, 2020

Faber Castell lead grade and a bit of history

I stumbled upon a catalog from Faber Castell which I consider to be very interesting, "Product Knowledge Manual".
The catalog starts with a short history of the company and its line. I like that the history was detailed and well documented.

I encourage you to read it but I will give below a short version presenting the important moments, so be aware, spoilers will come. 
-In 1761 Kasper Faber produces a pencil in Stein and sells it in a market in Nuremberg. 
-Then his son Anton Wilhelm Faber takes over and the workshop becomes A.W. Faber. After the business is taken over by Georg Leonhard Faber, but he doesn't do too well, as the business goes through rough times (political and economic difficult period). 
-The son of Georg, Lothar von Faber takes over and develops the business.
He develops the modern quality pencil, sets the length and different grades of hardness that remain valid today, also it is the first time to produce a hexagonal section
The pencil is labeled A.W. Faber, becoming the world's first brand pencil. Also, he expands and founds a branch in New York, and subsidiaries in London, Paris, Vienna, St Petersburg.
-Wilhelm von Faber, the son of Lothar runs the company for a while. 
-After Wilhelm's death, his daughter Baroness Ottilie von Faber marries Count Alexander zu Castell Rudenhausen. Lothar before his death through his testament assured that future generations will have to keep the Faber name. So after the marriage of Ottilie and Alexander, the family name became Faber - Castell. At this time the company became Faber-Castell.
In 1905 the green Castell pencil range is launched, with a new product logo "Tournament of the jousting Pencil Knights"
-Roland Graf von Faber-Castell, son of Ottilie and Alexander succeeds 
-Followed by his son Anton Wolfgang Graf von Faber-Castell ran the company until 2016
-After his death, the company was taken over by a board of directors of which Countess Mary von Faber-Castell is part of


Indeed an interesting history. So between 1839–1896, Lothar the 4th generation of Faber's running the pencil business standardized what today is a Faber Castell pencil, the basic shape, and the lead hardness grade. In 1905 Alexander, the 6th generation made the traditional Faber Castell green.

They tell us that "the ideal writing pencil (for example in office) is the medium degree of harness so-called HB, while the school student's pencil has a B hardness degree.

I always thought that a #2 pencil is the equivalent HB, but apparently, it is B.
1     2     2 1/2     3     4
2B  B      HB      H   2H

Faber Castell offers the model 9000 pencil in 16 degrees of hardness, which is awesome. Also, in the manual the diagram of the mixture between clay and graphite for all the hardnes's.

It is interesting as we can approximate the mixing of the two components to get the different hardness. Just at a glance, you can see around the HB is an inflection point where the increase of graphite in the composition is less and less. I mean that between a 2b and 4b the formula seems to be very similar. 
Based on this graphic the composition rounded up to an integer. The b - 8b is increasing the graphite by an increment of 2 percent. 
Also, the HB is not a 50% mix of the two but 66% of graphite and only 34% of clay.
This is true of course for Faber Castell as the hardness of the lead is not standardize, so different manufacturers can produce the HB pencils a bit different.

Wednesday, November 25, 2020

World record for sharpening pencils

A very interesting section can be found on speedrun.com on sharpening pencils.
For those of you who don't know, speedrun is a site where you can compete with other people via the internet in different challenges. For example, you can compete to finish a certain level of a game in the shortest time possible. It is not important the score, the execution, or anything else. You only have to obtain the fastest time possible.
You will find classic games like Mario or Wolfenstein, but also there is a section for sharpening pencils.
There are multiple disciplines in pencil sharpening, from sprint to marathon.
Sharpening 10, 69, 100, 420, 1000, 1500 and 6942 pencils.
The most competitive scene is the sprint with 10 pencils. The world record for sharpening 10 pencils is 3 minutes and 51 seconds, at this moment at least.
If you fancy being a world champion here is your opportunity.  In case the 3'51" proves too hard to beat you can opt for the marathon, in category 1500 there is only one time at the moment registered and for 6942 pencils there is no competitor. So this will guarantee a spot on the podium, indifferent of the time.

glhf = Good luck and have fun

For those of you who are more a board game type of player, there is a section In Real Life, which means exactly that. Sharper as fast as you can with a real sharpener, some real pencils.
The real life professional pencil sharpeners manage to beat the virtual time by a landslide. The competition is dominated by the USA in first and third place, and every other place, while Canada bringing home the silver.

Thursday, November 5, 2020

fountain pens in Dark series on Netflix s1e8

 Continuing the Dark binging this weekend I have spotted in season 1 episode 8 two nice fountain pens. This time the action is further back in time in 1953, and the camera doesn't show too much to be able to recognize easily what pens are in the picture.

The first fountain pen that appears in the shot is a classic looking cigar shape pen that resembles a Pelikan, but it is impossible for me to tell if indeed it's a Pelican or what model. We can only see the shape, the trim on the cap, and on the body, but the clip and nib are not visible.
The shot doesn't last too long and it presents the fountain pen on top of a case file.

The second fountain pen is used by a young boy to do math.
Again I can't really say what the young boy is using, but it seems to have a hooded or a semi hooded nib, gold color. It could be a Pelikan MK model but I think all of those were snap cap while this cap was screwed on to the body by the boy. Also, Montblanc nr 32 has a very close appearance but the logo on the cap is not present.

The cap has gold trim and the clip is also golden and looks flat, it could be different but in the pictures, the clip is not seen very well. The clip is connected with a golden metal part to the cap.
The body does not feature any trims, and the top part of it looks to be in a slightly different color

Another wild guess about the fountain pen is Lamy 27, it has the gold trim, it has the screw cap. In the end, it is guesswork as it is hard to see details, as no closeups are available.


Being so far back the director might intentionally omit such closeups just to be safe, and not mess up the story with products that were not available to the consumers back then.


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