Retractable 2020

I finished 2019 saying that there had been very little new in Japan in the pen scene, and 2020 starts in a very different way.

On the last days of 2019 we saw Pilot marketing its latest variation on the Capless family—the Capless LS. Its novelty is a new mechanism to release the nib by a push button without making any noise. The nib units are the same as on the other members of the family. The LS is, in actual terms, a hybrid between the Capless-Décimo and the Fermo.

The Capless family (save variations on body color and trim) until this past December. Now there is a new model,the LS.

The newly released Capless LS.
Source: Pilot press release at https://www.pilot.co.jp/press_release/2019/12/06/post_60.html (retrieved on 4/Jan/2020).

And the price is also a combination of both the regular Capless –JPY 15000—and the Fermo –JPY 20000—: JPY 35000, plus taxes.

But more exciting news are those of Platinum's: this company will release its own version of a capless model in March of 2020. Its name will be “Curidas”, after the Japanese word “kuridasu” (繰り出す, くりだす)--to roll out.

This document has been published on a number of social media, including Facebook. Intentional leak?

The Curidas will be an inexpensive model –JPY 7000— aimed at the business market, according to the leaked leaflet, although some other sources speak of the student market.

The lineup includes five different body colors, all of them transparent. There will be two or three nib points on steel nibs. The pen clip will be detachable.

The big question is whether the nib is a totally new unit or an adaptation of one of the several steel nibs Platinum currently manufactures. The filtration (intentional?) did not go that far.

Pilot Short – Bril Turquoise Blue

Bruno Taut
Kusatsu, January 3rd 2020
etiquetas: Pilot, Platinum, capless, mercado