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| Since the traditional woodcased pencil was invented a means of producing a writing point on the product has been required. Initially this was carried out by the quite basic method, still used, of a knife. This does not give reproducible results and in unskilled hands can be rather wasteful, although as a manufacturer perhaps we should cynically encourage this method of pointing. In skilled hands the quality of pointing can however be extremely high and it is a joy to watch a carpenter use his wood chisel to point his pencil. |
| For many years draughtsmen would use a sandpaper block to produce the fine point they required and frequently would 'hone' the pencil almost without appreciating the action. |
| However for most users some form of mechanical apparatus was needed and by far the most common is the small hand held pocket sharpener that we all had in our pencil cases for all of our school years. Although very basic, providing the blade wasn't allowed to rust and dull, even the cheap and cheerful plastic bodied items would give many years of sterling service. More sophisticated, metal bodied items became available with replacement blades and two differing diameter holes. The basic design was however the same with a sharpener blade being offered to the pencil at 20 to 30 degrees and paring away the Incense Cedar wood. Perhaps in some ways the plastic bodied sharpener was one of the first disposable products. When the blade became blunt, throw the complete item away, don't try and replace the parts. |
| In a classroom or drawing office environment however sharpening many pencils was time consuming, quite hard on the hands and still didn't give reproducible results. There was also the problem of what to do with the shavings produced, hold in the hand, drop on the floor! Mechanical sharpeners therefore came along of which the Berol Sword is a good example. Here the majority of the problems have been solved by means of a multi-holed chuck which caters for different sized pencils, an internal stop by which the blunt/sharpness of the point can be accurately set, and a shavings container. A precision, hard faced replaceable cutter carries out the actual sharpening. |
| The unit may be screwed to a work surface or clamped, although a more recent innovation is sharpeners where a vacuum cup holds the unit to a flat surface, and thus leaves no marks when removed. |
| The principle of the hand operated mechanical pencil sharpener has a 'big brother'. In Thetford Forest the Forestry Commission use a scaled up version, petrol powered to point fence poles. |
| The early 'propelling pencils' had leads 2mm in diameter and thus needed repointing, they were usually supplied with a small sharpener inside the removable end cap. Often this also covered an eraser and held spare leads in place. The Fine Line lead holders with diameters of 0.3, 0.5, 0.7 and 0.9 mm removed any need for pointing as the lead remained the required width as it was worn away. |
| In the United States of America many pencil users have electrically operated pencil sharpeners which removed all manual effort completely. |
| There is an interesting difference between pencil output in the UK and the USA. In Britain the majority of pencils are sold in a sharpened, pointed form, whereas in the US the majority are sent out un-sharpened. We have always put this down to the free availability of electric sharpeners, but it may simply be custom and practise. |
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