Pilot Mogulair Vs. Zebra Delguard & U.s. Availability

[Drone]

Howdy All,

I just noticed Pilot came out with their "Mogulair" mechanical pencil (who picked that name?) It seems the Mogulair dropped (in the U.S. anyway) early in 2017. This thing is obviously trying to one-up the Zebra DelGuard pencil. Both the Mogulair and Delguard pencils have similar spring-cushioned tip mechanisms to reduce lead breakage, but the Mogulair adds a weighted Shaker (or Knock) mechanism to advance the lead. The shaker seems to be the only big difference. The added shaker in the Mogulair can be a plus or a minus depending on how you feel about it (I don't care for them).

Now we need someone to marry the spring cushioned tips on the Mogulair and/or DelGuard pencils with the self-sharpening, self-ejecting mechanism in the Uni Kuru-Toga

* U.S. availability at my post time on 20 May 2017:

In the U.S. I see Tokyo Pen Shop in Iowa is carrying the Mogulair for $8.30, which seems kind of pricey for what I'm seeing so-far (plasticky school pencil-ish). I have a black/chrome Zebra DelGuard standard, the build is mostly plastic but it looks and feels better than that. Tokyo Pen Shop sells the DelGuard standard for $7.00, $1.30 cheaper than the Mogulair, but still pretty high. (Note, there are higher-quality versions of the DelGuard such as the LX and the clipless ER.) At Tokyo Pen Shop basic U.S. shipping is free with orders over $25.

Jetpens in California is not carrying the Pilot Mogulair yet. Jetpens sells the Zebra DelGuard standard for $7.50 (as usual, Jetpens is the highest in price). At Jetpens basic U.S. shipping is free with orders over $25.

JStationary in Massachusetts is not carrying the Mogulair yet. JStationary sells the DelGuard standard for $5.95. At JStationary basic U.S. shipping is free with orders over $20.

Amazon returned nothing on a search for Mogulair. Amazon shows low prices for the DelGuard standard at between $4.50 and $5.50 plus shipping/eligible for free shipping. But to me it seems like $5.50 is the safe low-price for the DelGuard standard on Amazon.

 

I'm tired of fighting with ebay.

[Disclaimer: I'm not affiliated with any of the companies mentioned in this post.]

* Links:

- Pilot Japan has a whole Web site up (in Japanese) dedicated to the Mogulair. The pictures are nice, and there are some animations:

http://mogulair.jp/

- Pilot Mogulair for sale at Tokyo Pen Shop:

https://www.tokyopenshop.com/pilot-mogulair-p-1435.html

- Tokyo Pen Shop's YouTube intro to the Pilot Mogulair (English):

- An annoying Japanese kid demonstrates how the Mogulair's spring mechanism works on YouTube. (At-least I think he's demonstrating how it works, I don't speak Japanese.) Jump to 12:30 to see the relevant portion. I suggest you turn the sound off (even if you speak Japanese).

Have Fun, David

Edited May 20, 2017 by Drone

[Algester]

Mogulair, Delguard, OLEeNU all have unique mechanisms to prevent lead breakage I was in Tokyo and tried it, it works as advertised only that apparently the lead was also hard enough to pierce the paper and not break despite it was about 7 clicks long and since it uses the delful shaker mechanism as long as the nib is retracted the shaker mechanism wont work

Edited May 26, 2017 by Algester

[Drone]

Mogulair, Delguard, OLEeNU all have unique mechanisms to prevent lead breakage I was in Tokyo and tried it, it works as advertised only that apparently the lead was also hard enough to pierce the paper and not break despite it was about 7 clicks long and since it uses the delful shaker mechanism as long as the nib is retracted the shaker mechanism wont work

 

Thanks for the reply. It is interesting that the shaker in the DelGuard is disabled with the nib retracted. I have not seen this reported elsewhere.

 

I had completely forgotten abut the Platinum OLEeNU (another bizarre Japan product name), which has a similar anti-breakage mechanism. Thanks for the reminder. Jetpens describes what the OLEeNU does pretty well here:

 

https://www.jetpens.com/Platinum-OLEeNu-Lead-Breakage-Prevention-Mechanical-Pencil-0.5-mm-Black-Body/pd/7115

 

Note, Jetpens consistently shows the pencil's name as OLEeNu - wrong, it's OLEeNU.

 

A drawing that shows the OLeNU's mechanism:

 

https://static2.jetpens.com/images/a/000/056/56568.jpg?mark64=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5qZXRwZW5zLmNvbS9pbWFnZXMvYXNzZXRzL3dhdGVybWFyay5wbmc&markalign64=dG9wLHJpZ2h0&markscale=19&s=a222969216c813429ea2d893c9ca7c10

 

Here's a graphic PR page from Platinum describing the OLEeNU:

 

http://www.platinum-pen.co.jp/e_press_281013.html

 

There are lots of different OLEeNU/OLEeNU+ pencil versions ranging in price from a couple of bucks through over $10 dollars.

[Algester]

but I forgot if Mogulair does share the same mechanism as the delful because it would otherwise be stupid to make a shaker mechanism without a lock... much like a shaker 1050 I'll look around the Japanese youtube videos IIRC I found some videos reliable

welp... ok it just shares the basic shaker mechanism without a lock so... yeah... to me it doesnt sound a good idea but for Pilot's attempt I guess they are still experimenting much like Uni-ball's Kuro-toga I do hope they might give it the Delful's locking mechanism down the line

Edited May 27, 2017 by Algester