Lightweight Pen Hack for Journaling

I recently saw a lightweight gear manufacturer offer an ultralight titanium pen with two refills for $20. It’s actually kind of cool, but I have a lightweight pen hack that weighs about the same and costs about $1. If you’re into fancy pens, you’d probably like the one that I saw, but if you like functional things that cost very little, then my hack is for you. I’ve been using this hack for decades.

The hack is simple. You get yourself a G2 Pen Refill pack and use one of the refills. Then where you normally hold a pen, you add a tab of tape. I used gaffers tape for the one in the photo, but you could use masking tape or duct tape. You could mix it up by using fancy tape that has different colors.

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I really like that this hack works well with Moleskine Cahier Journals in the 5.5″ x 3.5″ size. The pen refill is smaller than the journals, so you can tuck it inside. The G2 pen is also great to write with. The ink flows smoothly onto the paper. The only downside is that it’s a bit dark for the Moleskine journals. Sometimes it will bleed through, but that doesn’t bother me. I just write anyway.

This hack would work with any refillable pen’s refill or you could take apart a Bic pen or other brand and just use the ink cartridge in the same way. There’s nothing stopping you from doing this, and the outside of the pen is just extra weight that you don’t need if you’re a lightweight junky.

At any rate, this simple lightweight pen hack works well. It weighs 0.2 ounces. Packs of two refills are $2.