As a small boy going to grade school I frequently wanted to wear my Boy Scout pants to school. Sure, I was made fun of but they were the cargo pants of my era and I could hide a lot of cool stuff in those pockets. A matchbox car here, an eraser there, a set of jacks that constantly poked me in the thigh and anything else I could play with throughout the day, at recess only of course. When my mom would remember she would always force a pocket dump right as we were walking out the door and I was busted. Later in life I would watch my dad unload his pockets for the day. I was surprised his pants stayed up.

Today is not much different except I have bigger pockets and they’re called cargo pants. Pocket knife, Sharpie, flashlight, tape measure, fitness tracker and of course a pen. I love pocket pens and I’ve written several blog posts about my quest for great ones. A recent financial backing of the Big Idea Design Ti Post Raw brought me their pocket XTS Raw Pen + Stylus in the same box as my backed XTS Titanium Pen + Stylus. This example of the pocket pen genre is very cool indeed.

Big Idea Design XTS Raw Titanium Pen + Stylus

Price: $55.00

4” capped

3 5/8” uncapped

5 1/2” Posted

32 grams

Finish – Raw Machined Titanium

Included:

Stylus Tip For Touchscreen Devices

Flat Coin – Screw Back Plug

Pilot G2 Mini 0.5mm Black Gel Ink Refill

Protective Micro-Fiber Black Felt Sleeve

$5 off coupon for your next order

Also available in silver, chrome or black

Packaging

Packaging is a nice printed watch/bracelet type box that comes sealed in shrink wrap. Inside is a dense foam insert with nice cut outs for the pen, finger notches to help remove the pen and a cut out for the stylus cap. The pen itself is wrapped in a thin plastic before being pressed into the foam. On top is a small and tastefully printed coupon for 5% off your next order and a black felt pen sleeve.

The whole packaging experience is very well executed and the best I have seen from a small production type pen maker.

Overall Appearance

The XTS comes in what Big Idea Design calls raw machined titanium finish. It’s an attractive industrial high tech look. A polished finish may yield a bit more pop right out of the box but polished I suspect would show scuffs, surface scratches and patina much sooner than the chosen finish. I prefer the slightly duller matte finish which has not been affected over the past couple of weeks of as my daily carry. The finished has survived well co-mingling with pocket knives, flashlights and other hardware banging around in shared pocket space.

Ergonomics

The ergonomic drawback to pocket pens is typically what draws us to them in the first place. The small size makes them less comfortable to write with over a long period of time. No fault of the XTS but it’s no different. You can write with it un-posted just fine but it’s a bit awkward, like all pocket pens, for long writing sessions. Where the XTS shines is the execution of the posting. The cap is a threaded design and it has matching threads on the posting end. A very short turn and the cap is securely posted which turns the XTS into a comfortable 5 ½” length. The extra credit given the XTS here is with their tight threaded posting there is no wobble or moving between the body and the cap so it truly does share the comfort of a much larger pen.

I’m typically not a fan of threaded caps for pocket pens as they slow down deployment for a quick receipt signature or other quick task. In the XTS case the benefits outweigh this slight time delay.

Gripping the pen is easy with the smooth body, short threads and the sloping section. There are 3 faint rings turned into the section that give your fingers a feel for exactly where to rest if your gripping the pen without looking. There is no cap to body gap whether the cap is posted on the pen is closed.

Construction and Quality

Titanium is cool. If Fonzie carried a pen it probably would have been made out of titanium. For a slightly later generation when MacGyver carried a pen it was probably titanium. Titanium is lighter than steel, non-corrosive and much stronger than conventional steels used in consumer goods. About 60 percent heavier and 3 times stronger than aluminum titanium wins out there as well. Downside is cost, it does cost more and has a few special needs for machining. I am glad the team at Big Idea Design has figured that out as they have implemented the material for a writing instrument flawlessly. Now before I go too far down a path that could be easily challenged by a first year metallurgist I will opine that Titanium is a niche material for writing instruments with a main property being coolness. That being said I love titanium products for that very reason, they are cool. I’m pretty sure you could roll over this pen with a small sedan and not damage it which means if I don’t lose it this pen will last me a lifetime.

The pen is promoted as a Pen + Stylus. I have little use for the stylus so the XTS has me covered with a nice metal coin that screws into the end of the pen to cover the hole giving the pen a finished look, not just like something has been removed and is missing. If you’re a stylus user the coin comes out and the stylus head screws in, again finished and complete. The cap works perfectly in either configuration.

Cap

The cap is the same diameter as the body of the pen and as mentioned above it matches up perfectly whether posted or closed. The threads are well cut and 1.5 turns uncaps the pen. The threads start easy every time. When brand new I did dab a little bit of silicone on the fresh, newly machined, threads so after a short time everything is smooth as glass.

Clip

The clip is thick and designed to hold up as well as the rest of the pen. Big Idea Design got the curve right so you don’t fight with the thickness while clipping and removing the pen. A tasteful Ti is printed in a small box on the top of the clip. No other markings or logos are on the pen. Very clean.

Refill

The refill is the venerable Pilot G2 that is very popular in both its size formats. The G2 is a smooth writer, dark vivid colors with no hard starts or skipping. I like the G2 in any pen and they are easy to source by buying a pack of donor G2 Mini pens by Pilot.

If you’re a pressured ink cartridge user I understand Carryolgy ran a piece on modifying a Schmidt Megaline 4876 M refill to work. Go about ¾ ways down in the post for more details.

Cost and Value

At $55 this is a higher line pocket pen. Not rich and famous out of reach but you’re probably not going to buy one for every pair of jeans. For me it will last forever, the refills are easy to get and write well and did I mention titanium is cool. I am a minimal packer so my XTS will go with me on my next plane trip. I can use it posted comfortably for longer writing sessions but it’s still very pocketable for traveling. You get what you pay for and in my opinion the XTS is deserving of high praise and a $55 admission price.

Conclusion

I have a new pocket pal that I really like. My staple rule to not carry a pocket pen with a threaded cap has been broken and frankly I haven’t run into an incident yet that the extra seconds it takes to unscrew a cap has really ruined my day. Good job Big Idea Design. I have purchased two of your other products and look forward to more in the future.

Have you tried any of the Big Idea Design products?

Remember:…Write something nice……

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