Jotter Vs. 45 Ballpoint

[EBUCKTHORN]

Can anyone please provide a verbal or visual comparison between the grip section of a Jotter and a 45 ballpoint? I like my Jotter stainless but find the grip a bit too thin. Is the 45 ballpoint's grip section any larger in diameter? Thank you.

[joss]

The barrel diameter, measured at the barrel top, is the same for the Jotter and the 45 ballpoint.

Apart from barrel diameter, grip on a stainless barrel is always more 'slippery' than on a plastic barrel.

[FarmBoy]

The early Jotter Flighters had a ribbed barrel for writing pleasure.

[Estycollector]

Can anyone please provide a verbal or visual comparison between the grip section of a Jotter and a 45 ballpoint? I like my Jotter stainless but find the grip a bit too thin. Is the 45 ballpoint's grip section any larger in diameter? Thank you.

I just put my stainless/gold clip 45 over the plastic Jotter and I can see the taper is more narrow on the 45. As has been said, the stainless is more slippery which compounds the difficulting in cap actuating vs the button actuating mechanisim on the Jotter. That said, after several days of use, the muscle memory is kicking in and I am able to grap and click the 45 well now.

 

Having only recently discovered these pens and the availability of a gel refill, these have become a companion to whatever FP I am carring nearby.

 

I have read of a larger modern Jotter version being produced.

[EBUCKTHORN]

Thanks everyone for the quick responses. It seems that if the Jotter grip is too slim for my comfort the 45 ballpoint will be no better-stainless or plastic and, yes, there is the relatively new, larger Jotter XL available from several of the usual pen sources.

[sciumbasci]

Sheaffer Sentinel has a bit more girth.

[Mercian]

Here is a photograph of my Jotter & 45 ballpoints:

 

 

Top to bottom:

Black Jotter, “MADE IN UK”, 1991;

Stainless Steel 45, “MADE IN ENGLAND”, 1970s;

 

Stainless Steel Jotter, “MADE IN UK”, 2002.

 

I bought the two Jotters myself in their respective years of manufacture. The 45 belonged to my father, so I don’t know its date of manufacture. It doesn’t have a production date code stamped on it, so could have been produced at any time from the late 1960s up to the late 1970s.

 

The barrel of the 45 is slightly wider than the barrels of the Jotters. Mine is also one of the pens that was manufactured with thin grooves incised around its grip section.

If you can find one of the pens with this feature you may find that the grooves help you to grip it.

I don’t find my all-steel Jotter to be unusably slippery, but then I live in a country that is famously not very hot. And I must also admit that the 45 does feel ‘better’ in my hand.
For me, that preference is mostly due to the pen’s greater girth, but the grooves are also a nice tactile addition.

If you find the Jotter to be too thin, my advice to you would be to try a 45 before you buy it, because the difference between the two pens isn’t huge. The difference is great enough that I find that I always reach for the 45 before a Jotter, but that doesn’t mean that you will like the pen.

If you can try a 45 and find that you like it, I would advise you to specifically try to get one of the ones that, like mine, has those grooves incised on its grip-section.

 

All that said, there are other Parker ballpoints that are girthier than the 45 - e.g.s the Vector, Frontier, and the very curvaceous Urban ballpoint.

SBRE Brown included a short review of the (first-design) Urban ballpoint in his review of the Urban fountain pen in 2012.
The video can be found here. Discussion of the ballpoint starts at about 8’30” in to the video.

 

Good luck

[EBUCKTHORN]

Thanks, Mercian, for that comprehensive analysis. I'm watching a couple of 45s on eBay but, in the meantime had done exactly what you've suggested and ordered one of the curvaceous twist-action Urbans. I'll see how readily I adjust to the twist-action. One of the reasons I'm pursuing these Parkers is so I can use the Schmidt "easyFLOW 9000M" refills that I favor. Writing with them almost feels like they're not ballpoints and my understanding is that these metal refills can be captured from the solid waste stream when plastic refills cannot.

[Estycollector]

I don't have arthritis and can understand that thin pens can be problematic, but I have noticed that after carrying these for a few days the muscle memory kicks in and whatever the intial dexterity problems were disappears. I can transition from a Lamy Al Star/Vista to a Jotter/45 easily.

[Estycollector]

Was watching the movie Seberg, a recent release where the FBI was hounding Ms Seberg. During one of the scenes an agent picked up a black plastic Jotter to make an underline.

[FarmBoy]

Ill see if I can find the adaptor for arthritic hands made for the 51...cool bit of ephemera.

[pajaro]

Parker Big Red ball point from the 60s?

[Mangrove Jack]

I am a Parker fan and use Parker fountain pens more often than not.

However, I cannot say the same regarding their Jotter and 45 ballpoint pens which are uncomfortably thin and offer insufficient grip.

That's why I use almost exclusively Pelikan ballpoint pens which have excellent ergonomics.

[Estycollector]

I dont find them uncomfortable at all.

[pajaro]

The Pelikans I have, K215 Rings and K400 green bar, are click top and use Parker type refills. I like Sonnet ballpoints, but they are twist and not click. I sometimes find these twist pens awkward.