Review: Fisher Bullet Space Pen
Posted by Jon Lee in Offtopic, Reviews, tags: bullet, fisher-space-pen, hipster-pda, review
I recently bought a Fisher Bullet Space Pen off eBay for around $20. How can I justify spending $20 on a pen? Well besides the cool name, the space pen is in a class of its own. All Fisher pens are characterized by their gas pressurized ink cartridges and thixotropic ink. Unlike a regular ballpoint or gel pen, these pens can write upside down, underwater, through grease and of course, in space. The ink dries instantaneously and is always armed, meaning no scribbling required to get the ink running.
The bullet version of the Fisher Space Pen adds a unique compact design and a high quality finish. The finish I ordered was matte black to go along with my Thinkpad and modded model-m keyboard. Closed, the pen measures a bit under 4 inches but when open, the pen is a full-size, 5 and a half inch, perfectly weighted and balanced writing machine.
The pen clips perfectly to my hipster PDA and is a joy to write with. However, there are some areas where the Fisher pen is lacking compared to say, a $2 Pilot G2 that so many people swear by. For one, the ink of a G2 pen is a lot smoother than the Fisher – the Fisher is a ballpoint pen after all. And unlike the G2, the pen clip is detachable meaning it isn’t very secure and comes off easily unless you really push it in, in which case you probably don’t ever want to remove it again because it’ll leave a mark on the pen itself. The Fisher Bullet doesn’t even have a size advantage over a G2 Mini!
Refills themselves are cheap though, only about $4 for one. I bought a fine black refill to replace the default medium one since I like to write small. Fisher also sells universal ink refills that can be placed into a selection of non-Fisher pens to give the pen the versatility of a Fisher.
So to summarize:
Pros:
- Writes upside down, underwater etc.
- Always armed so it writes “on demand”
- High quality build and finish
- Compact size when closed
- Comfortable full-size/weight when opened
- Cheap refills
Cons:
- Not a gel pen if that’s what you like
- Expensive for a pen, but hey, it’s no Mont Blanc (see hack though)
- Clip comes off easily
Overall, I think it is worth the $20. I often write in bed and above my head so the writing upside down function actually does me some good. The pen writes fairly smooth for a ballpoint and plus it looks cool! I’ll try to get some pictures of the pen in action once I get my camera back in a few days. 
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