Paper Mate Triangular 1.3mm
What We Like
- Thick 1.3mm lead withstands the pushing stroke that snaps finer mechanical cores.
- Triangular barrel seats fingers in a tripod hold, easing grip strain during long writing.
- Tip durability holds through heavy-pressure writing that exhausts finer alternatives.
Worth Noting
- Built-in eraser can leave smudges on corrections, so a dedicated eraser finishes the job more cleanly.
- Per-pencil cost runs above the bulk 0.9mm value alternative in this set.
- Grip Type
- Triangular contoured
- Lead Size
- 1.3mm
- Handedness
- Ambidextrous
- Pencil Type
- Mechanical
Read the full review
Paper Mate's 1.3mm lead is nearly double the width of a standard mechanical core, giving it the stiffness to survive the pushing stroke a left-hander naturally uses. That same lead glides smoothly across the page, and the triangular barrel seats the thumb, index, and middle finger into a stable tripod grip without correction from a parent. Refill lead and erasers come included, so the set keeps working well past its first pack.
Months of classroom use keep the tips holding shape while finer mechanical pencils under the same pressure chew through lead faster. Without wood to sharpen, the setup produces no shavings and no snapped point from a dulled blade. The stiff core also keeps lines crisp for left-handed writers, who otherwise fight smudging and drag from softer graphite.
This works best for left-handed kids who press hard, heavy-handed writers who snap finer cores, and children still learning the tripod grip — all of whom push the pencil rather than pull it across the page. The mechanical barrel also removes the sharpening step that derails wiggly writers mid-assignment.
Bottom line: For left-handed kids who press hard on their pencils, this two-pack removes both the lead snapping and the sharpening in one step. It is the everyday writing pencil the rest of this set only gestures toward.