The whole point of a mechanical pencil is to have perfect sharpness forever. Yet without precise engineering and build quality, the standard slender leads are doomed to constant breakages. This ...

Staedtler Mars Lumograph Drawing and Sketching Pencils and SetsThe casual sketcher perhaps doesn’t need the extended range of values that Staedtler provides, all the way from a very soft 12B to ...

"Keep in mind that most mechanical pencils come with HB pre-inserted, which gives you only the middle range to work with." See our pick of the best mechanical pencils for recommendations.

Pat said, “The 0.9 lead feels like when a regular pencil starts getting dull and the line starts getting schlumpy.” Another looker was the Zebra stainless-steel pencil ($3.44 for two at Walmart).