Ballpoints · Plate 1 / 23
Société BIC·FR·ballpoint
Société BIC
Cristal Original
Ink level visible without disassembly — a consequence of the transparent barrel, not an added feature.
Trounce, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY · commons.wikimedia.org
The Cristal is the best-documented pen in this catalogue and also the one carrying the most accumulated misinformation. A hexagonal transparent polystyrene barrel, a brass point with a tungsten carbide ball, a cap in the colour of the ink — a shape recognisable without a logo, in production since December 1950.
The ballpoint mechanism is not BIC's invention. Marcel Bich bought László Bíró's patent and only then went looking for the right ink formula and a way to fit ball to tube precisely enough. Authorship of the form itself is credited by museums not to Bich but to the Décolletage Plastique team — though London's Design Museum names Bich and Édouard Buffard, so the attribution is not uniform.
Country of design and country of manufacture have long since parted. The Cristal was designed and first made in Clichy near Paris, but BIC produces it in its own plants in France, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa. Where any given pen comes from depends on the market it was sold into.
Two holes that do different things
This is the most frequently conflated pair of facts about the pen.
The hole in the barrel is original and purely technical: it equalises pressure inside and out, pushes ink toward the point and prevents leaks. It was there from the start.
The hole in the cap was added around 1990 and does something else entirely — it is meant to allow airflow if the cap lodges in the airway. The familiar story about "the hole that saves lives" concerns only the second one.
And here is what matters for assessing the model: the drilled cap is not BIC's invention. It originated in Britain with standard BS 7272 of 1990, adopted after nine British children choked to death on pen caps between 1970 and 1984. The strongest evidence comes from the manufacturer's own material: BIC's 75th-anniversary press kit describes the hole as made in order to comply with BS 7272-1. That is the language of conformity, not authorship. ISO 11540 internationalised the solution in 1993. BIC was the standard's global propagator — not its author.
An icon of disposability that started out refillable
The Cristal that left the Clichy factory in December 1950 was refillable. BIC stresses this in its own anniversary material. Only later did the model become the archetype of the thing you throw away, and the separate "BIC Cristal B3" refills disappeared from the catalogue. The circle closed in 2020, when the company launched the Cristal Re'New with a metal body — a different product, despite the shared name.
The claim "unchanged since 1950", which BIC repeats in marketing copy, is therefore false. Beyond refillability, at least the ball (stainless steel to tungsten carbide) and the cap have changed. What has not: the hexagonal transparent barrel, the equalisation hole, the brass point and the colour-coded ink.
The numbers, and what they actually count
A Reuters dispatch of 8 September 2005 reports that BIC sold its hundred-billionth disposable pen — potentially the whole category, not the Cristal alone. The Design Museum attributes the same figure directly to the model. By 2025 the figure quoted is 120 billion, at a rate of four thousand pens a minute. These are manufacturer-communicated numbers, repeated rather than independently audited — but even on the most cautious reading the scale exceeds the hundreds-of-millions threshold many times over.
Both museum acquisitions are gifts from the manufacturer, not curatorial purchases, five years apart: MoMA in 2001 (1409.2001.1-2, "Gift of the manufacturer"), Centre Pompidou in 2006 (AM 2006-1-37, "Don de Bic"). The New York object is not a dormant database entry — it was shown in exhibitions in 2004 and again in 2025.
A common noun, but for the brand
Larousse carries an entry for "Bic" as a masculine noun marked nom déposé, defined as stylo à bille. Le Robert goes further and separately marks the generic use abusivement — the dictionary thus records that French calls any ballpoint a "bic", not only BIC's own.
That is hard lexicographic evidence, but it attaches to the brand name, not to the Cristal as a model. So it counts here as context rather than as a point in the rubric.
The cricothyrotomy myth
Worth recording separately, because it persists: the idea of an emergency cricothyrotomy performed with a pen barrel has been tested and refuted. Owens and colleagues measured internal diameters, disassembly times and flow resistance of common pens in the Emergency Medicine Journal (2010). Two models met the criteria — the Cristal was not among them. A separate cadaver study found in addition that the cricothyroid membrane is too tough to puncture with a pen.
Specification
- Introduced
- 1950
- Status
- in production
- Category
- ballpoint
- Designed in
- FR
- Made in
- FR, BR, MX, ZA
- Designer
- Décolletage Plastique Design Team
- Mechanism
- capped
- Cross-section
- hexagonal
- Materials
- barrel: transparent polystyrene, cap: polypropylene, end plug: plastic in the ink colour, ink tube: polypropylene, holding 0.4 g of ink, tip: brass (Design Museum records it as brass/nickel), ball: tungsten carbide, 1 mm diameter (stainless steel until 1961)
- Finishes
- clear, uncoloured polystyrene barrel with visible ink level, cap in the colour of the ink, end plug in the colour of the ink, plain, uncoated plastic surface, ink colours: black, blue, green, red
- Length
- 147 mm
- Diameter
- 8.3 mm
- Weight
- 5.8 g
- Market tier
- entry
Refill
- Standard
- B3 (wkład typu BIC Cristal)
The factory refill is a polypropylene tube holding 0.4 g of ink, sealed with an end plug in the ink colour and fitted with a brass tip carrying a 1 mm tungsten carbide ball. BIC publishes no catalogue code for a Cristal Original refill, hence refillOemCode is left empty rather than guessed. Historically the pen was refillable — BIC's own press kit stresses that the 1950 launch model "was...refillable!" — and BIC later sold separate "BIC Cristal B3" refills in black, blue, red and green. Those refills have been withdrawn and today the Cristal Original is marketed as a disposable pen.
Legend rubric
Criteria met 4 of 7
A model qualifies on at least two criteria. Every criterion marked as met must cite a source.
Longevity
metprimary sourceContinuous production from December 1950 to the present (75 years). The Centre Pompidou record dates the object to December 1950; BIC's own 75th-anniversary press kit confirms the first pens left the Clichy factory in December 1950 and that the Cristal is still made in BIC's own plants in France, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa; Belgian public broadcaster RTBF confirmed on 3 Sept 2025 that it is still produced in France. The core construction is unchanged: transparent hexagonal polystyrene barrel (8.3 mm, 14.7 cm), polypropylene ink tube visible through the barrel, brass tip, cap in the ink colour, 5.8 g. Documented changes are incremental rather than a redesign: a 1 mm tungsten-carbide ball replacing the original steel one, and the cap vent hole added around 1990-91 to comply with BS 7272. Caveat: the 1950 Cristal was refillable, while today's base variant is disposable, so "unchanged construction" applies to the form and layout, not the usage model.
Stylo BIC Cristal - Centre Pompidou, Musée national d'art moderne (inw. AM 2006-1-37) · BIC Cristal - 75 years of inspiration (press kit, BIC Group) · L'Éco sans Détour : il y a 65 ans, la rentrée des classes du BIC - RTBF (3 Sept 2025) · Perforated Ballpoint Pen Caps Prevent Choking? - Snopes (5 June 2024) · BIC Cristal Anniversary 75 - BIC Group
Design recognition
metprimary sourceTwo independent permanent-collection records, both for exactly this model. (1) Centre Pompidou / Musée national d'art moderne, Design department, inventory number AM 2006-1-37: "Stylo BIC Cristal", dated December 1950, credited to Décolletage Plastique, a set of four pens (red, blue, black, green) in polystyrene and polypropylene with a tungsten-carbide ball, acquired as "Don de Bic, 2006". (2) MoMA, Architecture and Design department, object number 1409.2001.1-2, "Bic Cristal Ballpoint pen", 1950, Décolletage Plastique Design Team, credit line "Gift of the manufacturer", acquired 2001. The MoMA object was shown in "Humble Masterpieces" (8 Apr - 27 Sep 2004) and "Pirouette: Turning Points in Design" (26 Jan - 15 Nov 2025), proving it is an exhibited holding rather than a database entry alone. Fair caveat: both museums received the object as a manufacturer's gift, not as a curatorial purchase.
Stylo BIC Cristal - Centre Pompidou, Musée national d'art moderne (inw. AM 2006-1-37) · Décolletage Plastique Design Team. Bic Cristal Ballpoint pen. 1950 - MoMA · Bic Biro - Design Museum (London)
Technical first
not metCriterion NOT met - and the vented-cap thread is what settles it. I looked for a solution BIC originated that became an industry standard, and found evidence to the contrary. The idea of perforating pen caps started in the United Kingdom, where BS 7272 was adopted in 1990 (after nine UK children died choking on pen caps between 1970 and 1984). BIC spokeswoman Astrid Canevet confirmed the company began perforating the Cristal's cap that same year and "decided to apply this British norm everywhere in the world". Decisively, BIC's own 75th-anniversary press kit labels the feature "Cap in the color of the ink - With a hole so as to conform to the BS 7272-1 norm" - the language of conformity to an external standard, not of authorship. The solution was then internationalised by ISO 11540 (1993, revised 2014 and 2021), not by BIC. BIC was the standard's global propagator, not its author. I also checked the alternatives: the ballpoint mechanism itself is not BIC's invention - Marcel Bich bought László Bíró's patent (confirmed by BIC's own press kit); the barrel vent hole (pressure equalisation) and the 1 mm tungsten-carbide ball are engineering refinements with no independent evidence of becoming an industry norm; and Bruno Bich's claim to Reuters that his father "was the first to use very precise production techniques" is an owner-family self-declaration, which the rubric explicitly treats as insufficient.
Perforated Ballpoint Pen Caps Prevent Choking? - Snopes (5 June 2024) · BIC Cristal - 75 years of inspiration (press kit, BIC Group) · Disposable ballpoint writes its way into history (Reuters, 8 Sept 2005) - NBC News · Décolletage Plastique Design Team. Bic Cristal Ballpoint pen. 1950 - MoMA
Cultural footprint
not metNo documented role for the model itself outside stationery was found. Checked: space mission, act of state, narrative role in film. The artistic strand — drawing with a Cristal — is documented largely by the manufacturer, and its best-known instance was produced within a BIC-sponsored campaign, so we do not treat it as independent evidence. The dictionary genericisation applies to the brand name rather than the model — see the entry below.
Scale
metprimary sourceThe scale exceeds the required hundreds of millions many times over, with one caveat about what the number covers. A Reuters dispatch carried by NBC News on 8 September 2005 reports that BIC "had sold its 100 billionth -- 100,000,000,000th --- disposable ballpoint", quoting BIC that "The pens have been sold on average 57 times a second since 1950". Reuters phrases it as "disposable ballpoint", potentially the whole category rather than the Cristal alone. The Design Museum attributes the figure directly to the model: "By 2006, over 100 billion had been sold" in its Bic Cristal entry. RTBF updated it in 2025 to "120 milliards d'unités", with a rate of "4000 petits tubes en plastiques remplis d'encre se vendent chaque minute dans le monde". I performed no multiplication of my own - every figure is cumulative at the source.
Disposable ballpoint writes its way into history (Reuters, 8 Sept 2005) - NBC News · Bic Biro - Design Museum (London) · L'Éco sans Détour : il y a 65 ans, la rentrée des classes du BIC - RTBF (3 Sept 2025)
Enthusiast canon
metsecondary sourceMet, though this is the weakest of the satisfied criteria. Three independent editorial outlets with specific, dated articles about this exact model: (1) The Pen Addict, review by Brad Dowdy dated 17-18 January 2016, with a measured verdict - "The fact is, this is a good pen, if not a great one" - and the complaint that the line "is not as solid or deep in color as a Uni-ball Jetstream or Pilot Acroball"; (2) The Gentleman Stationer, 13 December 2017, arguing it may be the greatest pen ever made and judging that "it's become the gold standard for how a basic ballpoint pen should look and write", naming the Cristal alongside the Schmidt Easyflow 9000 as the best pure ballpoints; (3) The Outline, Laura June, 11 January 2017 - "This is the best pen on planet Earth". Fair caveats: the first two are niche stationery publications run by single authors rather than large trade newsrooms, and this review layer clusters in 2016-2017, so the "sustained over many years" leg is less well evidenced than the plurality-of-outlets leg. Retailer catalogues were not counted.
Bic Cristal Ballpoint Pen Review - The Pen Addict (Brad Dowdy, 17 Jan 2016) · The Bic Cristal Is (Arguably) The Greatest Pen Ever Made - The Gentleman Stationer (13 Dec 2017) · Gold Standard: the Bic Cristal pen - The Outline (Laura June, 11 Jan 2017)
Practice influence
not metNo use practice attributable to this model was found. The evidence that exists applies to a broader scope — see the entry below.
Evidence outside the score
Applies to the product line or the brand, not to this model. Does not count toward the score.
- Cultural footprint evidence applies to: the brand
The answer to the common-noun question is YES and it is documented lexicographically, but it attaches to the BRAND name, not the model - hence appliesTo "brand". Larousse carries the entry: "Bic / nom masculin / (nom déposé) / Stylo à bille." Le Robert goes further and explicitly flags the generic use: "familier Stylo à bille de cette marque. abusivement Stylo à bille" - the dictionary records that French uses "bic" for any ballpoint, not only BIC's product. That is a dictionary source, not an anecdote. The role in ballpoint drawing is real and partly model-specific: BIC's press kit lists dated works made with the Cristal (Paolo Barlusconi "Crystal Palace" 1998, a sculpture of Cristal tubes; Paolo Ulian "Anémone" 2010, a lamp of Cristal tubes; Enam Bosokah "Ethiopian Crystal III" 2015; Kevin Lucbert "BIC Cristal Original project" 2022; Tamaz Avaliani 2023, "BIC Cristal on 360g/m paper") plus James Mylne's 2010 recreation of Vermeer's "Girl with a Pearl Earring" with a single Cristal. Weakness: this is a manufacturer source, and the Mylne piece was made for a sponsored "Bic Challenge" campaign, so it is not independent evidence. State-act context: BIC records 1965 as the year the ballpoint was admitted to French schools, but that act concerns the ballpoint class, not the Cristal. I found no documented space-mission use and no narrative role in a film.
- Practice influence evidence applies to: the product line
Met, but at line level rather than for the single model. Independent makers build entire pens around BIC's classic stick refill — the one that sits in the Cristal. Ensso sells the machined aluminium ARIA body, described outright as a pen that accepts 'all classic BiC refills', with a campaign titled 'metal pen for the BIC ballpoint refill'. Earlier, Dan Conti released the Baux Pen, an aluminium barrel into which you transfer the refill and parts from a BIC stick pen; the writeup even floats a retractable version 'to swap in the Clic Stic parts'. These are not universal accessories that happen to fit: they are products designed around this specific refill, alongside 3D-printable body designs and small-shop machined barrels matched to the Cristal tube diameter. Because the Cristal shares that refill with the Round Stic, I assign this to BIC's stick line rather than the Cristal alone. I rejected three other routes. Drawing with a ballpoint is material use, not object modification — Casas and Mylne work with 'BIC blue biro' generically and modify nothing about the Cristal. Pen spinning fails outright: the community's named mods ('BICtory') are built from the BIC Round Stic, and the spinners' wiki states the Cristal is unsuitable for spinning. Finally, French Ministry of Education circular 65-338 of 3 September 1965 admits 'crayons à bille' as a category and names no brand or model — only Wikipedia attaches the Cristal to it, a single source, which is not enough for model-level institutional adoption. MoMA and the Centre Pompidou are design canon, not user practice.
Where to buy
We do not list prices. We list a market tier and the date each link was last checked.
- TopOffice.plPLspecialistverified 08/11/2026
Polish office-supplies retailer, sold as single pens. Domestic dispatch within 24 hours. No physical store listed on the page.
- Przystanek PapierniczyPLspecialistverified 08/11/2026
Stationery shop with a brick-and-mortar store in Krakow (ul. Michalowskiego 1/1a), open Mon-Fri and Saturday. Stated dispatch within 48 hours.
- Biurowi.plPLspecialistverified 08/11/2026
The model is a catalogue item, but the page shows contradictory availability flags (available vs. out of stock) - confirm stock before ordering.
- Pen StoreEUspecialistverified 08/11/2026
Swedish pen specialist shipping to all EU countries. The 50-pack can show as unavailable in the selected quantity while individual colour options list 1-2 working days.
- KCS EducationUKspecialistverified 08/11/2026
UK supplier serving schools and institutions; catalogue is aimed mainly at institutional buyers. Next-day delivery within the UK is offered.
- Boxes2uUKspecialistverified 08/11/2026
UK office and packaging supplies shop. The page confirms stock and ship-readiness but gives no SKU and does not describe the barrel; the model is identified by the "Cristal Original" name and 1.0mm point.
- Cult PensUKspecialistverified 08/11/2026
Well-known UK pen specialist. Note: at the time of checking the black/single variant was backordered rather than immediately available.
- Amazon.comUSmarketplaceverified 08/11/2026
Marketplace, primarily US shipping. The listing confirms the model (Cristal Original, 1.0mm, clear barrel), but current stock status could not be read from the fetched page content.
- Staples (US)USspecialistverified 08/11/2026
Variant caveat: this is the 1.6mm Bold (US "Xtra Bold") Cristal, not the classic 1.0mm Original - same clear hexagonal barrel. In-store pickup available at US branches.
Related models
Sources
- 01BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
Comfortable grip, doesn't role on the desk, 8.3 mm in diameter, 14.7 cm long
- 02BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
Nothing is superfluous with the BIC Cristal that weighs only 5.8 grams!
- 03BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
With a hole so as to conform to the BS 7272-1 norm
- 04BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
today, BIC Cristal is still produced by BIC in its own factories in France, Brazil, Mexico, and South Africa
- 05BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
Polypropylene tube with 0.4 grams of ink
- 06BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
Tungsten carbide ball [...] 1 mm in diameter
- 07BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
he joined forces with Edouard Buffard in 1945 to create a company that manufactured writing instrument parts just outside of Paris in Clichy, France
- 08BIC CRISTAL — 75 years of inspiration (press kit, EN)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
Behold BIC Cristal! It cost only o.5o French Francs and was...refillable!
- 09BIC Cristal Anniversary 75 | BIC Group
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
In 2001, the BIC Cristal pen entered the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art of New York (MoMA) and was later added in 2006 to the Musée National d'Art Moderne Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris.
- 10BIC Cristal Anniversary 75 | BIC Group
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
by end of the year 1950, the Cristal pen was born, the first high quality ballpoint pen affordable to all.
- 11OUR STORY | BIC Corporate
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
Marcel Bich improves László Biró's ballpoint design and launches his own pen under the BIC® brand. The first BIC® Cristal pen is introduced in France.
- 12BIC Cristal | BIC (APAC product page)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
First introduced in 1950, same great pen
- 13Bic Biro — Design Museum
museum · accessed 08/11/2026
The ball itself was made from stainless steel until 1961. It was then changed to tungsten carbide, which is made from fusing carbon and tungsten together at a heat of a whopping 2000 degrees Celsius!
- 14Bic Biro — Design Museum
museum · accessed 08/11/2026
The streamlined caps of Bic pens are made from polypropylene (a kind of plastic), and are the same colour as the ink of the pen.
- 15
- 16
- 17Bic Cristal — Wikipedia
community · accessed 08/11/2026
Between 1949 and 1950, the Bic Cristal was designed by the Décolletage Plastique design team at Société PPA.
- 18Bic Cristal — Wikipedia
community · accessed 08/11/2026
Since 1991 the pen's streamlined polypropylene cap has a small hole added, to reduce the risk of suffocation if the cap is inhaled.
- 19Bic Cristal — Wikipedia
community · accessed 08/11/2026
5+7⁄8 by 1⁄2 inch (14.9 cm × 1.3 cm) with the cap, or 5+11⁄16 by 1⁄4 inch (14.45 cm × 0.64 cm) without the cap
- 20First Versions: BIC (ballpoint pen)
other · accessed 08/11/2026
Production start: December 1950 - Clichy, France
- 21BS 7272-1:2008 — Writing and marking instruments. Specification for caps to reduce the risk of asphyxiation (BSI)
other · accessed 08/11/2026
Writing and marking instruments. Specification for caps to reduce the risk of asphyxiation
- 22Guide to Ballpoint Pen Refills — The Pen Refill Guide
community · accessed 08/11/2026
The B3 is a stick refill with a cone-shaped tip.
- 23Guide to Ballpoint Pen Refills — The Pen Refill Guide
community · accessed 08/11/2026
Length: 120 mm to 140 mm
- 24BIC Cristal Ballpoint B3 Refill — The Pen Refill Guide
community · accessed 08/11/2026
The BIC Cristal refill will fit in most pens that take the B3 standard
- 25The Ultimate Guide to BIC Pen Refills — Pen Vibe
community · accessed 08/11/2026
Sadly BIC no longer makes their BIC Cristal B3 ballpoint pen refills; they used to be available in black, blue, green, and red ink
- 26
- 27How Bic has kept the ball rolling for 75 years — Monocle
press · accessed 08/11/2026
made from tungsten carbide, which is polished with diamond paste and powder
- 28Stylo BIC Cristal - Centre Pompidou, Musée national d'art moderne (inw. AM 2006-1-37)
museum · accessed 08/11/2026
Don de Bic, 2006
- 29Décolletage Plastique Design Team. Bic Cristal Ballpoint pen. 1950 - MoMA
museum · accessed 08/11/2026
The Bic Cristal features two holes: one in the cap to prevent choking if swallowed, and another on the pen barrel to prevent a vacuum from forming within
- 30Disposable ballpoint writes its way into history (Reuters, 8 Sept 2005) - NBC News
press · accessed 08/11/2026
it had sold its 100 billionth -- 100,000,000,000th --- disposable ballpoint
- 31Perforated Ballpoint Pen Caps Prevent Choking? - Snopes (5 June 2024)
press · accessed 08/11/2026
The idea of perforating the caps of pens appears to have started in the United Kingdom, where a new safety standard was adopted in 1990 (BS 7272).
- 32BIC Cristal - 75 years of inspiration (press kit, BIC Group)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
With a hole so as to conform to the BS 7272-1 norm
- 33Définitions : Bic - Dictionnaire de français Larousse
book · accessed 08/11/2026
Bic nom masculin (nom déposé) Stylo à bille.
- 34Bic - Définition - Dico en ligne Le Robert
book · accessed 08/11/2026
familier Stylo à bille de cette marque. abusivement Stylo à bille.
- 35Bic Biro - Design Museum (London)
museum · accessed 08/11/2026
By 2006, over 100 billion had been sold
- 36L'Éco sans Détour : il y a 65 ans, la rentrée des classes du BIC - RTBF (3 Sept 2025)
press · accessed 08/11/2026
Il faut neuf jours pour produire un BIC Crystal. Ils sont toujours produits en France
- 37Bic Cristal Ballpoint Pen Review - The Pen Addict (Brad Dowdy, 17 Jan 2016)
press · accessed 08/11/2026
The fact is, this is a good pen, if not a great one.
- 38The Bic Cristal Is (Arguably) The Greatest Pen Ever Made - The Gentleman Stationer (13 Dec 2017)
press · accessed 08/11/2026
it's become the gold standard for how a basic ballpoint pen should look and write.
- 39Gold Standard: the Bic Cristal pen - The Outline (Laura June, 11 Jan 2017)
press · accessed 08/11/2026
This is the best pen on planet Earth
- 40BIC Cristal Anniversary 75 - BIC Group
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
by end of the year 1950, the Cristal pen was born
- 41Anniversaire BIC Cristal - BIC (eu.bic.com)
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
Fabriqué uniquement dans les usines BIC
- 42Notre histoire - Groupe BIC
manufacturer · accessed 08/11/2026
1950 - Marcel Bich améliore le stylo à bille de László Biró et lance son propre stylo sous la marque BIC®.
- 43Airflow efficacy of ballpoint pen tubes: a consideration for use in bystander cricothyrotomy - Emergency Medicine Journal (2010)
academic · accessed 08/11/2026
the majority of ballpoint pens appear unsuitable for use as a substitute tracheostomy tube
- 44ARIA Ballpoint Pen For BiC - Black Aluminum — ensso
manufacturer · accessed 08/12/2026
The result is ARIA, a minimalist all-metal pen conceived with utmost attention to detail... a premium, yet affordable pen that accepts all classic BiC refills.
- 45Kickstarter Baux (Box) Pen Aluminum Barrel for BIC Stics — The Clicky Post
press · accessed 08/12/2026
a metal barrel to swap in the Clic Stic parts for a retractable BAUX
- 46Introduction to Pen Spinning — Fen Spinner Wiki
community · accessed 08/12/2026
cheap pens like a Bic Crystal are hexagonal, light and difficult to spin
- 47Bic Cristal — Wikipedia
other · accessed 08/12/2026
In 1965, the French Ministry of Education approved the Bic Cristal for use in classrooms.
- 48Vive le stylo à bille, à bas le porte-plume — Kronos
press · accessed 08/12/2026
Lorsqu'en septembre 1965, le ministère de l'Éducation nationale autorise formellement par une circulaire l'usage des crayons à bille