Evil D wrote:I absolutely won't carry a pen that isn't retractable. Not a chance, I don't care how nice it is, you could give me a solid platinum Hinderer pen and I'd just sell it. Two handed pens are right there with two handed knives and just have no place in my life lol.
That said, I've carried a Boker Cal .50 for about a year now and I like it. I use a Fisher space pen cartridge in it. I like it for two reasons; 1) the clip is "pocket knife style" and can be removed and bent to make it tighter. This is a HUGE issue for me, as it seems I'm always snagging and breaking clips, so I can't carry something like a Parker Jotter or I just destroy the clip, and 2) the bolt action is just fun.
My only complaints are that the area around the bolt has worn quite a bit from the bolt rubbing it, since the bolt is steel and the pen is machined aluminum, and that being aluminum if you drop it and it lands right on the tip, it's going to dent and on a few occasions that dent has prevented the pen tip from coming out. I've been able to fix it by reaming the hole out with my multi tool though. Overall, for the price I haven't found a pen that suits my preferences better.
I've been carrying the same model for about 14 months. I found the bolt action a little hard to get used to at first but it became second nature after a week or so. I used a Fisher Space Pen refill for a couple months but I started having problems with the refill. I think I might have gotten a bad one because I've read mostly good reviews on them. In all honesty, the cartridge that came with the pen wasn't bad at all.
I switched to Schmidt Easy Flow 9000 refills and I'm pretty impressed with those. As for the pen, I have to agree. Great pen for under 50 bucks. The finish is way more durable than I expected it to be. I expected that by now the finish would be pretty worn. The photo was taken when the pen was new but but it doesn't really look much different now. A couple of very fine scratches but nothing like I would have thought after 14 months of almost daily use.
I like the short, fat design of the Boker. Fits my hand perfectly and doesn't take up a lot of room like some longer pens. I've never really been a pen fanatic. I just wanted something a little different than what the average person carries and I wanted a pen that would last me a long time. So far so good.
