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Although I down have the pen, I have used and ITR and have no problems finding snapped ends by using a small piece of black electrical tape and some care

I’ve just become the proud owner of a Spider Pen and I must agree that the blowing on the spool tip does seem to work fine. Only had cause to do so once so far though so maybe next time…..
All in all a great product.
As for how easy or hard as people have asked I think the mechanics of using it are pretty straight forward. I’d guess that any idiot with five minutes instruction could perform an effect that would baffle most of the public. The difficult bit is simply the practise and acquiring the confidence to use it effectively and make the effects look polished and professional.
Its like a lot of things in life, you get out what you put in.

PLEASE DELETE

I bought one of these and before I had actually used it in front of anyone else, I lost the switch cap.

does anyone know of anywhere i can get replacement parts or of another pen which has a cap that will fit, won't stop the switch moving, and allow for the IT???

I know its a bit of a long shot, but otherwise that tiny caps going to cost me another £30 odd!!!

other than losing the cap the pen seems great, apart from making a bit of noise when you open it to write with sometimes. You can move so much further away than with 'normal' reels, just make sure no-one walks right through it, lol

Looks like I'm going to have to be the bad guy here.

I read an ad about the Spider Pen and decided to check it out. I was actually expecting some slightly cheesy looking pen but the look and feel is actually not bad at all. Looks plain and ordinary -- the way it supposed to.

Operation is another story. The ad's are so fixed on how amazing the "floating dollar trick" is. Well it's definetly not as advertisted, to say the least. Firstly, you can't levitate anything heavier then small scrap paper (to give you an idea, not even the $5-bill I tried would retract). You CAN however, make the dollar bill appear to "float", though retraction to your hand can only be done with the end of the IT is achored to something higher than the pen so that it creates sort of a downhill slope (in other words, the electric motor does not help).

The spool constantly breaks. I've worked with dozens of other IT's (and ITR's) and this brand seems to break the most often. (We're still talking light-weight paper -- nothing remotely "heavy."). Perhaps I'm just getting used to the device, but I have enough experience with IT's now, to know how to handle them.

To fix a broken thread from the spool, they recommend blowing on the spool. This can work if there is a loose end somewhere. Many times I did not have enough slack, and so I had to use a pair of tweezers, and a magnifying class to try to catch whatever loose end I could find, and repair it. This was a very lenghtly process.

Overall, I'm not satisified with this at all. In fact, with the way things are looking, I'd prefer traditional IT.

i ve bought it from penguin. Ok my first impression is good, but i don have experience about levitation effects so i never used it in public.
Can someone indicate to me some video or some ideas in order to use it?

Thanks

Giu

It's been a long time since the last post but....

Nightmare wrote:To fix a broken thread from the spool, they recommend blowing on the spool. This can work if there is a loose end somewhere. Many times I did not have enough slack, and so I had to use a pair of tweezers, and a magnifying class to try to catch whatever loose end I could find, and repair it. This was a very lenghtly process.

I'm afraid i would have to agree with this, i had problems with my first reel and this took quite long to fix. Although, i feel when you perform the trick it's a brilliant effect. I would consider buying some different IT though when purchasing the spider pen.

i just bought mine today. its okay. have to say its not as great as expected but still good. the annoying thing is that the IT falls off from the wax fairly easily. plus the IT isnt really strong (i.e. it can't take like heavy stuff). but all in all, not too bad, though with this price im expecting something better!

for video. if you type in spider pen in the youtube search, there are a few of them. here is one of the many:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=p6bwjbNKhZo

This thread is a few months old, but there definately doesn't need to be another thread on this topic started!

Have any other owners of the Spider Pen had problems with the clip? Mine isn't broken, but it feels loose like it could break at any second. Anyone else have this same problem or is mine defective?

Anyone serious about performing with IT should look into LeClair's Animator system - quite superb and the method I always use. No pen required!

Replicant wrote:Anyone serious about performing with IT should look into LeClair's Animator system - quite superb and the method I always use. No pen required!

WARNING! SARCASM!
Thanks for answering my question and staying on topic.

Josh Clarke wrote:WARNING! SARCASM!
Thanks for answering my question and staying on topic.

What an odd response to my post.

It was not my intention to answer your question or I would have quoted you. Indeed, my post was not aimed at anyone specific at all; it was just a general observation. The fact that it immediately followed your post was entirely coincidental.

My apologies, sir, if I did not answer your question and veered off on a slight tangent at the same time.

Replicant wrote:What an odd response to my post.

It was not my intention to answer your question or I would have quoted you. Indeed, my post was not aimed at anyone specific at all; it was just a general observation. The fact that it immediately followed your post was entirely coincidental.

My apologies, sir, if I did not answer your question and veered off on a slight tangent at the same time.

I have no problem with you not answering my question. It's just that the topic is titled "Spider Pen". And it hadn't been posted in, until I posted,
for about 6 months.

Been playing around with the Spider Pen and so far it seems to be the best ITR I have used. Very easy to operate and silent. I had one breakage and it was fixed pleasingly easily.