Sheaffer Imperial Pencil

For some unknown reason I've never really been a fan of Sheaffer, but I’ve ended up with a couple of their pencils. Here’s one I picked up recently at auction. I’m not sure, but from some web searches I believe it is a Sheaffer Imperial pencil dating from the mid 1960’s to the mid 1970's. All photo’s are clickable to enlarge – I’d suggest you do so as this is a fine looking pencil.It uses 0.9mm lead, and is a screw mechanism. The top half of the body winds round and round to propel or retract the lead. Spare lead is stored inside the body, but it is a tip loading mechanism.

Around the centre it is marked “1/30 12K R.G.P CASING ‘crown’ SHEAFFER”. The ‘crown’ bit means there is a little crown logo there, which I assume is some reference to it being an Imperial. So, those markings mean the body is 12 carat rolled gold plate over base metal, the gold layer being 1/30th of the weight of the casing.
The body is decorated with panels of quite deeply engraved floral type designs. I’m not usually a fan of that sort of thing, but it really is quite striking and attractive.
The pocket clip is spring loaded, and carries the Sheaffer White Dot.