A ballpoint pen

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A ballpoint pen
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How does it work?

• In the tip of the pen there is a small metal
  sphere. One internal tube filled with a viscous
  ink is above the ball. When you move the pen back
  and forth, the ball get wet by the rolling
  action, and puts the ink on the paper like a
  trail.

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.
A ballpoint pen works exactly the same way like
an antiperspirant roll-on. The ball is held in a
socket, and the back of the ball is exposed to
the liquid so it can transfer from the inside to
the outside. The ball fits into the socket with
just enough space to move freely
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History

• Before the biro there were some models of
  fountain pens for writing, but they had several
  disavantages
• Durabillity the pens had to be refilled
  frequently
• The leaking of the water based ink on the paper
• The slow drying of the ink
• How was it developed a new pen?

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• The story begins in 1888 when Jhon Loud an
  American leather tanner patented a
  roller-ball-tip marking pen. Louds invention
  featured a reservoir of ink and a roller ball
  that applied the thick ink to leather hides.
• About 1930 an Hungarian called Laszlo Bíró (who
  worked like an newspaper editor) was frustrated
  by the amount of time wasted filling fountain
  pens and the problems with the leakage of the
  pens.

• He got an idea of making a new pen during the
  visit to a printing press, where the ink dries
  quickly at the paper, because it was an oil based
  ink, instead of water based ink like fountain
  pens. He and his brother George, a chemical
  professional, began to work on the first
  commercially successful ballpoint pen. That
  occurred in 1938.

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• The brothers Biro emigrated with a friend Jorge
  Meyne to Argentina in the II World War because
  they were Jews. They patented their invention and
  then opened the first ballpoint manufacturing
  plant there.
• During the War the biro was used by the British
  Air Force an American flyers because it let write
  under lower atmospheric pressures, so the biro
  was introduce in American and European markets.
• Some companies, like Eversharp and Parker
  acquired the exclusive rights to Biro pens and
  manufactured several models.
• But, the invention was renewed at late 1950s by
  French Baron, Marcel Bich, who developed a
  simple, disposable and very cheap ballpoint pen,
  the BIC. Since then, BIC dominate the market and
  a daily world wide sales figure of 20 millions of
  pieces.

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How many pieces has the biro BIC?
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Manufacturing process

• The basic steps include
• ink compounding
• metal component formation,
• plastic component molding,
• piece assembly,
• packaging,
• labeling
• shipping.
• All the process is performed in a highly
  technology plant with high speed machines, pens
  can go from raw material to finished product in
  less than five minutes.

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Perfect spheres

• Like an example of the precision in the
  manufacturing process is how to achieve the
  highly resistant ball the tungsten carbide balls
  are first hardened in an oven (by heat) and then
  the balls are put between two flat diamond
  surfaces during 60 hours of work to become
  perfect spheres.
• 100 of the balls are checked by line inspectors
  for roundness and resistance (dimensions 1 and
  0,5 mm of diameter with an accuracy of one tenth
  of a micron)

• An alloy much harder than steel tungsten carbide
  (an inorganic chemical compound containing equal
  parts of tungsten and carbon atoms)

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Why this pen has had a such success?Because it's
a simple and perfect design

• -It has hexagonal shape to avoid go round to the
  table or other surfaces
• - Its transparent polystyrene barrel shows the
  ink level
• - A tiny hole drilled in the barrels body keeps
  the same air pressure both inside and outside the
  pen
• - The thick ink is pulled down by gravity and a
  capillary action from a tube to the ball of the
  tip
• - Its propylene cap clip has a small hole to
  prevent children from sucking it into the throat.

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Curiosities

• Can the ballpoint pen work in the space? No,
  because in the space there is not enough pressure
  and its necessary to flow the ink.
• There is a common urban legend claiming that the
  Americans spent millions of dollars developing
  the Space Pen, whereas the Russians are still
  used a pencil in their Spaces trips.

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The Space pen

• It is a pen that uses a viscous and pressurized
  ink It can write in zero gravity, upside down,
  underwater, over wet and greasy paper, at any
  angle, and in extreme temperature ranges.

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Challenge BIC

• The BIC is part of the collection of the MOMA
  (Museum of Modern Art) in New York
• You can see this video, I was amazed when I saw
  it, and I discovered a lot of masterpieces drawn
  with this pen .
• I think its incredible!
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vR6r9LhbQxvk
• The reproduction of "The Girl with a Pearl
  Earring" by Johannes Vermeer, took artist James
  approx 90 hours to complete, but thanks to its
  long writing length and oil based ink, just a
  single pen was needed to finish the work.