Maker: Pilot.
The Custom 74 gets part of its name from the year it was first offered– Pilot’s seventy-fourth year in business. The design itself is not particularly evocative of pens made in 1918, but it is certainly a very conservative pen design. It is, in fact, not a pen meant to drive users into a particular passion over its looks, although there is enough brightwork in the trim that it’s not completely dull. It is essentially a basic pen with a rather nice gold point. Pilot offers a bewildering array of points for it, in fact, eleven different grades; this is, for those who have looked into the assortment of points most makers offered in the first half of the 20th century, also something of a throwback.
Production Run: 1992 to present.
Cost When New: ¥10,000 (¥12,000 extra-broad points).
Size: 14.2 cm long capped, 16.0 cm posted, 12.9 cm uncapped.
Point: 14K.
Body: Resin.
Filler: Cartridge, capacity approx. 0.8ml. All of Pilot’s converters will fit– the CON-20 press-bar type (0.7ml), the CON-50 piston type (0.5 ml), and the press-pump CON-70 (1.0 ml).
Pilot Custom 94: a very traditionally styled pen.
It also looks like a very traditional fountain pen when capped.
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