Review: AFMAT Electric Pencil Sharpener

 

AFMAT electric sharpener

I don’t use electric sharpeners routinely (that job goes to my favorite Carl Angel-5 Royal), but every now and then when I have a whole set of pencils to sharpen at once, doing all that cranking is tiresome and time-consuming. That’s when I pull out the behemoth Bostitch Quiet Sharp 6. Just lately, though, it has been making a worrisome noise, and I’m afraid it might malfunction one day. In any case, almost as if YouTube could read my mind (I hadn’t even typed “electric sharpener” into my browser!), I was presented with a review of this AFMAT sharpener.

I was already familiar with AFMAT sharpeners – I had purchased one quite a while back because it was known for producing crazy-long points, and I was curious about using pencils sharpened that way. I ended up returning it immediately because it has a ridiculous charging system that requires a USB port, not an AC adapter, and it can’t be used while it’s charging! What a stupid design for a pencil sharpener!

Anyway, that experience had made me leery of AFMAT. The review I viewed, however, showed some gorgeous points on larger-barreled pencils and even charcoal, pastel and other pencils that are known to be difficult to sharpen without breaking. The reviewer also mentioned that the sharpener uses a standard AC adapter – no charging necessary. (The Amazon description says it runs on batteries, but it does not.) My curiosity got the better of me.

I chose four pencils to test: First up was a Conte charcoal pencil with a hefty barrel – a smidge larger than Derwent Drawing and Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelle pencils, which are the two pencils I use most often with larger-than-average barrels. Due to their fragile nature, I typically sharpen charcoal pencils with a knife, but I shoved this one in with abandon. The auto-stop stopped, and out I pulled a beautiful point! The auto-stop is a handy feature for any electric sharpener.

...and after.

Conte charcoal pencil before sharpening... 

Next I tested a Derwent Drawing, a Museum Aquarelle, a vintage Berol Prismacolor and a Blackwing graphite pencil (the latter two have standard-size barrels). All came out with stunning points.

From top: Conte charcoal, Berol Prismacolor, Derwent Drawing, Caran d'Ache Museum Aquarelle, Blackwing

Since the AFMAT accommodates all the sizes of barrels I use most frequently, I can replace the now-questionable Bostitch that takes up so much space on my desktop. The slim AFMAT takes up less than half the footprint. Bonus: It comes in purple!

Edited: Anne’s question below prompted me to test a few more pencils, and I was surprised that these fit: The square-barreled Brutfuner colored pencil and the “jumbo mini” size Gekkoso 8B graphite pencil, which has a whopping 9mm diameter barrel! (Sadly, the Stabilo Woody does not fit, but I can’t imagine too many electrics or hand-cranks that could accommodate that fatty.) The AFMAT is becoming more versatile by the minute!

Square-barreled Brutfuner and Gekkoso: Two more difficult-to-sharpen pencils that the AFMAT handles with aplomb!

From left: Square Brutfuner, 9mm Gekkoso, Prismacolor for scale