I bought this compass because I was looking for the strongest locking compass I could find. It is very strong, unfortunately this thing is very difficult to use. It's heavy, so it's difficult to gently rotate it with your fingers. The balance point swings very slightly to the side of the pencil, releasing the needle. There's no central pivot bar on this top, so you'll have to get really creative with how you hold it. But the problem is that the tip of the needle is very roughly constructed. This is a rectangular jagged dot. So when you rotate it tears the paper hard where you are anchored and prevents it from staying centered. I've tried every compass I could find and I'm convinced that for some reason the perfect compass doesn't exist.