Uni Kurutoga Advance Upgrade Model 0.5mm Mechanical Pencil, Gun Metallic Body (M510301P.43), Black

Just received my Kuru Toga Advance Upgrade 0.5 mm mechanical pencil.TL;DR = What an Excellent Pencil! And the W-speed engine makes a big difference.Prior to owning this, my "go to" pencils were: (1) the Pentel GraphGear 1000 0.5mm (limited edition black), (2) the Pentel GraphGear 1000 0.7 mm, and (3) a standard Uni Kuru Toga 0.7mm (black barrel).My standard Uni Kuru Toga *works*, but is a distant 3rd place because of two issues. First, the lead sleeve doesn't retract, leaving it to poke holes in my pockets, digging into me if I move wrongly, and/or accidentally getting broken off on a hard surface. Second, while the Kuru Toga engine *works* (and is awesome), it was designed for writing Kanji, Hiragana, and Katakana. Those use MUCH shorter strokes than the Western (Latin) alphabet, so the lead is turned more gradually than I would like.Enter the Kuru Toga Advance Upgrade.PROSIt has the new W-speed engine. (I assume the "W" stands for "Western Scripts.") This rotates the lead roughly TWICE as fast as the standard Kuru Toga engine so that it stays sharper when writing in English. I can confirm this works, and works well.The lead sleeve is retractable. I could wish that it had the niftier mechanism found in the Pentel GraphGear 1000, but it certainly works well enough that I can carry it in a pocket without breaking it or having it stab me.The lead sleeve "rides" up with the lead as you write. This little trick reduces the number of times you have to click to feed the lead, and is a welcome feature. (If you want a true auto-feeding pencil, Uni makes the Kuru Toga "Dive" which advances the lead every time you lift it from the page. It even has a feed speed adjustment!)The color is vivid. Mine is a deep vibrant red and the metal and plastic parts all match without color variation. It is a beautiful, professional looking writing instrument.CONSThe Kuru Toga Advance Upgrade is both shorter and lighter than my GraphGear 1000. This may be a "PRO" to you if you prefer a less-weighty pencil, but I would spend an extra few dollars in a heartbeat if they made a heavier, all-metal version.The sleeve requires pressing on a hard surface to make it retract. This is just a MINOR nit! But I prefer how the GraphGear auto-retracts when I squeeze the top of the pocket clip.Coolness Factor?My standard Kuru Toga has the window that shows the engine. When I pull this out in front of any fellow pen/pencil afficionado, they ALWAYS immediately ask about it! Of course, my "Advance Upgrade" pencil looks a WHOLE lot more professional... but I'd certainly buy a version that had the clear window around the engine. Better yet? Sell a version that has swappable lower barrels -- you could then "dress it up" for professional meetings, or "geek it up" when you want the coolness factor. (Are you listening, Uni?).

So, to give some context, I got this for writing, and I got it as a curiosity since I absolutely love the original Kurutoga. I discovered the Kurutogas when I was still in Japan a while back. Due to the way Japanese is written, I was looking for the thinnest possible pencil that was still useable comfortably. 0.3mm pencils are not the best choice since the lead is so thin that it has a bad tendency to break, especially if you like using soft lead. 0.5mm became my go to due to that. The Kurutogas let you write with a thinner line than normal 0.5mm pencils, so it was a great solution to get what I was looking for, a nice easy to use pencil that gives you an extra thin line. I recently fell in love with dark graphite in pencils, since it gets close to the darkness of a nice pen, but it's immensely smooth to write with in most situations. The normal Kurutogas do spin the lead, but 2B is basically the limit for how soft you can go and still get a thinner than normal line when writing normally. I wanted to use 4B lead but it wears down too quickly for the normal Kurutoga engines to keep sharp. When I saw the Kurutoga Advance and I knew that would be the answer.I actually really love this pencil, and I don't think I'll ever actively use any other pencil at this point for writing. The build quality is excellent, it is decently weighty, and it's comfortable to use since there is some minor texturing for grip and it's a little thicker than most other pencils. The advanced engine makes it so using 4B lead is now an option for me. You can actually keep a thinner than normal line at almost all times due to the fact that the advanced engine turns twice as fast. It also has the nice feature of a retractable tip as well, so you are less likely to break it when storing it.Basically, if you are looking for a nice mechanical pencil for writing, and you want to use softer lead while being able to have the thinnest lines possible, this is the choice in 0.5mm.

My new favorite writing implement! I do most of my work in pencil, and this has been a real upgrade. The mechanism that rotates the leaf to keep the point sharp is genius. The body is sleek and solid. And it’s a real value at this price.

I love love love this pencil!I went through a stage of only using pencils, and this was great! I have a few notes, but overall it’s great!Pros:- Great build, it feels like GOOD quality.- The colors are nice and don’t wear.- It’s comfortable. I have bigger hands and usually get fatigue easily. This helped prevent that for me.Cons:- The eraser comes out really easy, I ended up carrying a handheld eraser with me.- It’s a little heavy, and I feel like I wouldn’t get writing fatigue as easy if it was a little lighter.- The press & twist feature doesn’t work for side writers. I write with the side of everything I use, not too drastic but I found that this didn’t work for me.Great pencil, will continue to use. Some notes, but I love it

I saw this mechanical pencil advertised on Facebook and was intrigued by the auto-rotating mechanism. I no longer have to constantly turn the pencil in my hand to get a consistent mark on paper. From what little experience I've had using the pencil, I can say it's a very good mechanical pencil. I didn't really notice the lead turning, but I can tell that it was because of how well the pencil writes.