Tombow Mono Graph Lite Ballpoint Pen 0.38 mm Review

Micro tip pens (sub-0.5mm) are my favorite category of pens. Yes, ahead of fountain pens, and other most-used products like fineliners and mechanical pencils. So when I saw these 0.38 mm Tombow Mono Graph Lite Ballpoints pop up on JetPens, I ordered a few right away.

Now, within the micro tip category, gel ink pens are my favorite (Uni-ball Signo DX 0.38 mm take a bow.) After that come ballpoints, then way down the line are the few rollerball options on the market. Gel pens have dominated this market for ages, but ballpoints have made headway, led by the Uni-ball Jetstream. The 0.7 mm Jetstream has long been my go to for standard writing, and they have created some exceptional tiny-writers in pens like the Jetstream Edge.

Where Uni leads, others will follow, and Tombow put an excellent option on the market with the Graph Lite. It comes in 0.5 mm and 0.38 mm tip sizes, and in black, blue, and red ballpoint ink colors. There are various barrel color options featuring solid metallic colors, or the traditional Tombow tri-color blue/white/black flag stripes.

I went for the traditional, as the Mono logo is one of my favorites in all of the stationery world, and, as the title states, grabbed the 0.38 mm tip size.

One quick note on ballpoint tip sizes as compared to gel: An 0.38 mm ballpoint tip writes finer than an 0.38 mm gel tip. The general assumption you can make across the board is that ballpoint pens will write one tip size finer than their gel ink counterparts. An 0.7 mm ballpoint writes like an 0.5 mm gel. An 0.5 mm ballpoint writes like an 0.38 mm gel. And so on down the line. Make sure you are buying a size that is good for you because these are some of the finest writing pens on the market.

The Tombow Mono Graph Lite handles that fineness with ease. The lines are sharp, solid, clean, and shockingly smooth. Smooth is relative at this tip size, but I’m not sure I could expect anything better. Blue is far and away my favorite ballpoint ink color, and I think it is the standout of this group. Black is a close second, and red brings up the rear, but not far behind the other two. Red would make for an excellent margin pen, for example.

I’m a big fan of the grip Tombow uses for this pen. It’s like a knurled rubber, which makes for excellent grippiness. That’s appreciated when this pen is designed for fine lines or detailed drawing. It’s also very light, comfortable in the hand, and has a solid knock and clip.

At $3.00 each (either tip size, any barrel color,) that’s right in line with the going rate for a pen like this. I would happily pay that for a handful of the Tombow Mono Graph Lite pens, because really, who buys just one?

(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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Uni Limex Ballpoint Pen Review, feat. R.E.M.’s “Sitting Still”

The Uni Boxy 100 is a pen I’ve long admired. It is a classic office supply pen, most likely found on desks and in cabinets across Japan for the last 40 years.

And it’s great. I’d say it is right where it belongs - in the office - but that would be underselling it. Is it the Uni-ball Jetstream? No. Is it better than 9 out of 10 ballpoint pens I’ve used, and worth residing on my desk? Absolutely.

If you are still interested after reading those few words above, then you may find the Uni Limex to be a fun pen to add to your arsenal.

What is Limex? A nearly inexhaustible raw material, often used as a paper or plastic replacement. Now, my stance on stone paper is well known, but this is a different rock altogether. And I dig it.

There is no difference in the Limex barrel shape, design, or functionality over the Boxy, but there is a slight weight difference - 7 grams for the original, 9 grams for the Limex. Still, it is a rather lightweight pen, making it good for nearly any use.

The color of the barrel is great, too, taking on the off-white appearance of its namesake material. I keep inspecting the barrel to see if I see any small, darker bits in the material, and there are none. It’s very clean.

Like the Boxy, the Limex ships with an 0.7 mm standard black ballpoint refill, and I enjoy using it. The lines are clean and sharp, and while there is some slight scratchiness from time to time, it’s remarkably smooth for an 0.7 mm that feels like an 0.5 mm.

As much as I enjoy this pen, there is a kicker. One of the most popular kickers of all, in fact: Price! It’s $3.50, versus the $1.75 of the Boxy. In my original Boxy review, I thought the price was high, and that was from the perspective of buying them as an office pen by the dozen. So of course I think the price is high for the Limex, but it’s different in my mind. This is a singular pen purchase. It’s unique, it’s cool, it has a story, and I’m not trying to stock the entire office with it.

In short, it’s fun. And that’s what I enjoy most about stationery.

If you have some spare time after this short review, fire up your music player of choice and give “Sitting Still” by R.E.M. a listen. I got on an old school R.E.M. kick last week, with the album Murmur in heavy rotation. Days later, and countless internet searches later, “Sitting Still” is still stuck in my head.

Why? It is literal nonsense, while being an absolute banger.

I wanted to use the lyrics for the written part of this review, and if you know anything about this song, then you know that is asking the impossible. That’s what makes it so great. Enjoy!

(I purchased this pen at regular price from Yoseka Stationery)

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Membership starts at just $5/month, with a discounted annual option available. To find out more about membership click here and join us!

Pentel GlideWrite Ballpoint Pen Review

A bit of extra disclosure as we get into my review of the new Pentel GlideWrite Ballpoint Pen. I have a friend that works at Pentel of America, and the story of my first experience with the GlideWrite involves him directly.

It was at the 2019 San Francisco Pen Show, and my friend mentioned he had a game he wanted to me to play called the GlideWrite Challenge. The idea was a simple one - it was a blind writing test to pick the smoothest ballpoint pen. He loaded up several generic barrels with popular refills. Pentel’s GlideWrite and RSVP were included, along with the Uni-ball Jetstream, Pilot Acroball, and I think maybe the Fisher Space Pen. All refills were 1.0 mm black refills to make them as comparable as possible.

I took the handful of pens, broke out a Nock Co. note card, and began scribbling. Since I’m telling you this story, you likely already guessed how it ends. Yes, I blindly picked the GlideWrite as the smoothest pen out of this group. And if memory serves, only the Jetstream was even close. The rest were clearly down the smoothness list.

Now, smoothness alone does not make for a great pen. It’s mandatory to start there - a scratchy pen will immediately be dismissed - but in this market, it can’t end there. Are there additional properties in the ink that set it apart? Is the barrel well built, and comfortable to use? In the case of the GlideWrite, the answer is yes to both of those questions.

Pentel markets this ink as TechniFlo, which is a way to describe its low-viscosity properties. This makes the GlideWrite ink thinner than traditional ballpoint inks, which is a good thing. Thick ballpoint inks make a mess on the page, and on the tip of the pen. There are no such problems here.

The barrel itself is solidly built, and comfortable to hold. There is no rattle in the knock, or at the tip of the pen, and the grip feels good between your fingers. Now, is this design my style? Not particularly, but I also understand that this pen isn’t designed just for me. This is a mass market pen which will appear on retail and big box store shelves around the world, and I think it is perfectly designed for that.

Writing-wise, I’d be hard pressed to ask for more. The lines are smooth, clean, and consistent - with one exception I’ll mention below. What’s interesting is that in the sample packs Pentel sent me, there were no basic black, blue, or red colors included. That’s awesome! Good quality, easily accessible, out of the norm, ballpoint ink colors are hard to find. As best as I can tell, Pentel will be bringing out a cool dozen colors in the GlideWrite lineup, with additional barrel styles for standard black and blue.

My pack contained Purple, Pink, Sky Blue, and Green ballpoint pens. Out of that group, I found the Pink and Sky Blue lines to be the most solid and consistent. Purple was close, but did show a fraction more white space in the line than the previous two, possibly because it is darker. Green was the clear outlier, and not on the good side. It was almost like it was a different ink than the rest, in that it was far lighter (less saturated) and had much more white space in its lines. My expectation is that it should be in the ballpark as the others, and it wasn’t. This isn’t the first time I’ve experienced this with a green ballpoint pen, so maybe its just difficult to get that color right.

At around $1.50 each, the price is right for Pentel to be able to gain some shelf space at the office supply store. They have a huge challenge going up directly against the Uni-ball Jetstream, but the GlideWrite at least gives them a chance they never truly had with the RSVP. I hope it works well for them, because nothing is better for us as consumers than a little competition in the marketplace.

(Pentel of America provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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Membership starts at just $5/month, with a discounted annual option available. To find out more about membership click here and join us!