What do you use to sharpen your Pencil? I got mine today and within 5 minutes it broke 3 times in my pencil sharpener. Then I used a knife, which was an improvement.ø, but not great.
Are the pencils the right ones?
Edit. I’m gonna get an Afmat sharpener.
I recently did a lot of research on this, and some testing. While most sharpeners will do fine with more hard lead and charcoal pencils, I think the 6B charcoal pencil is the most fragile, so that’s what I used for testing. I already had a very nice brass German-engineered small sharpener, but that was breaking the tips of my 6B. The winner was the Dahle 155 for getting a pretty sharp tip without breaking it. It doesn’t give as long a tip as the electric X-acto professional school sharpener I tried (and returned because it did break the tip off the 6B often enough). There is an artist on YouTube who recommends the AFMAT electric that gives long tips, but I did not test that one since I prefer manual, and I was only going to move on to test that one if the Dahle didn’t work to my satisfaction. There is also an exclusive to Jerry’s Artorama that seems very similar to the Dahle but has a little more adjustability inside to stabilize the wood part of the pencil. That little extra is probably a great feature that the Dahle doesn’t have.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001V1ZG9C
https://www.jerrysartarama.com/multipoint-professional-pencil-sharpener
https://www.amazon.com/AFMAT-Sharpener-Electric-Sketching-Sharpeners/dp/B099PVYGNQ/
I do apologize that I only have links to USA stores.
Yes, those are the correct pencils. Some pencils may have their cores fractured which causes them to break off very easily when placed into an electric sharpener. It’s was a smart move to try hand sharpening, but it there are still breaking often, you may just have a “bad” batch of the pencils. We have that happen every now and again at the academy. Unfortunately, as careful as we are as artists, we cannot control how shippers and retailers handle the tools. If they are too cavalier with their handling these issues can easily happen. Thankfully It seems Satre has listed some good sharpeners here to try!
Thanks for the recommendations Satre!!!
This is the one we currently use. It is the School Smart Vertical Electric Pencil Sharpener,
In the interest of Science, I have ordered one of those School Smarts and I will put it through the same tests! @mokxmatic Please let us know your results with the Afmat when you get it. 
Just got the School Smarts and I was almost at the very end of one of my 6B’s and I’m overjoyed with the performance. It wasn’t quite long enough to get the tip razor sharp as I still needed a little nub to hold onto so I could take the sharpened pencil out, but here’s a pic. 6B charcoal pencil and the sharpener was very gentle. No breaks, just sharpening. More later…
Fantastic!!! 
After a few days, some comments… As others describe in other threads, I also have found that there is a variable quality of the charcoal rod within the wood casing on General’s. Sometimes it’s crumbly and breaks easily while drawing and within the sharpener, and sometimes it’s good and doesn’t break. The electric School Smart does very well, but still will shred a poor-quality charcoal center. The Dahle 155 is a little more gentle and can sometimes make the best of the crumbly pencil, but it’s still pretty tricky to get much out of a bad pencil. Even with a good 6B charcoal pencil, there is a limit to the sharpest point I can get with either sharpener (see first pic below for the typical sharpest result). I find I get the best results if I “clean” the sharpener’s blades before sharpening a 6B by sharpening a standard No. 2 (HB) graphite pencil beforehand which will get needle-sharp (2nd pic is tip after “cleaning”). I’m guessing that a needle-sharp tip on 6B is just too fragile and will snap off no matter what sharpener you’re using (but that’s entirely conjecture on my part).
@mokxmatic I’m very interested in your experience with the Afmat. Please do post here when you have some info. Thanks all!
I’ll let you know
I have contacted General’s and asked for their recommendation. I saw pictures of a sharpened point with the Afmat, and it looks blunted.
Pictures are from here
Most sharpeners do leave that very tiny “blunting” at the tip. Even if you manage to get rid of it with a brand new sharpener, once the blades even slightly dull—it going to start happening. To deal with it here at the Academy, any of the artists bring a small sanding block or adhere sandpaper to the easel’s lower tray as shown here:
Their grit of choice is the 220.
