Energel's New Clothes: The Kuro

I've always liked the EnerGel pens from Pentel. They're very good gel pens, with really good inks. Their most common body style here in the USA are the silver ones in the photo below. They're a really comfortable body, with a good grip to them, but they're not the most professional looking things available. Now, I'm a college professor. No one expects us to use a particular pen or ink color, but I've heard from others that they don't feel super comfortable pulling out a big sliver-and-color pen to take notes in a meeting. 

The other two styles shown in that image are better in taht way. The blue one looks a lot like a Pilot G2, and no one blinks at those. The black one has sort of a Bic Stic vibe to it with the very subdued look. They're just not all that comfortable to use for long periods because the grip is just hard plastic.

Enter the EnerGel Kuro! Kuro is the Japanese word for generic black, and that's mostly what this pen is. It's a matte barrel with a few ridges, and it has an almost rubbery feel to it. The back of the pack says that it's latex-free, though, so no worries about that if you have an allergy to it. 

They are slimmer than the usual EnerGel pens with a diameter of 9.4mm as opposed to 10.6mm. You can really feel that missing millimeter, and that's my only worry about this model. My hands are larger than average, and I usually want a thicker pen when I can get one. It remains to be seen if I can use these for long stretches without some hand cramping. I think they'll be fine, but that's my only gripe about them.
 

 

So, how is that ink?

 

Frankly, it's great. It dries fast and it's extra vivid. Gel inks usually have more pop to them than other stick-pen inks, but EnerGel really does a great job. While I love my Sarasa pens, I think EnerGel beats them on vibrancy. 

These refills are the same ones that you'll find in the regular line of EnerGels, though, so

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