How to Get the Most Life Out of Your Mechanical Pencil Eraser

Refillable mechanical pencils are a wonderful invention. I have one that I use at work as my exclusive pencil. Not only is the lead refillable, but the eraser is too.

The eraser refills start out at 1.5 inches in length. You push the new eraser into the holder at the top of the pencil and then turn it so it winds down. As you use the eraser and the nub shortens, you twist the top to raise the eraser further. This is a very notable feature, however there is a slight flaw in the design. In order to hold the eraser securely, a certain amount of the eraser must remain inside the holder at all times. This leftover portion is almost 1/2 inch in length, probably closer to 3/8, but still a considerable amount. Especially in today's times where we try to conserve and be as economical as possible.

I grew tired of trying to use up the little eraser stubs by hand. It is quite difficult to hold an eraser less than 1/2 inch in length and only about 1/4 inch in diameter between your fingers and erase effectively. Put any amount of full pressure while erasing and the little bugger flies out from your grip.

Being the ingenious and resourceful person that I am, I devised a quick and easy method to further extend the life of those annoying eraser stubs as well as eliminate the need to erase manually.

Have I ever mentioned that I can do wondrous things with toothpicks? For whatever reason, I often resort to using toothpicks for many odd fixes. The handy-dandy toothpick stepped up to the plate once again for this new task.

Take a party toothpick (round toothpick with pointy ends) and cut it in half. You only need one half of the toothpick, keep the other half stored for another day.

Stick the eraser stub on the pointy end of the half toothpick

With the eraser holder all the way down, stick the eraser back into the holder until it stops.

Wind the top until the eraser raises to a usable level.

Voila! With this simple technique you can use nearly all of the eraser refill which means less waste for the environment and less waste of money on eraser refills!