M3 XXT, Styli straight, tungsten carbide sphere, carbon fibre shaft

Styli with standard diameters are manufactured in batches with a high amount of spheres and can thus be produced cost-effectively. Styli with special diameters can also be produced as custom-made styli with higher cost or higher amount. The majority of possible spherical materials in this category are hard metal, while ceramic materials are used in inch sizes.

Carbon fiber shafts represent an optimum combination of stiffness, weight, and thermal linear expansion. This makes them particularly suitable for long styli and demanding measurement tasks, such as in production with constantly changing ambient temperatures. They are also ideal for magnetic applications. The straight shaft is the simplest stylus design and the one with the longest usable length. The full shaft length can be used as measuring length. Carbon fibre shafts have the best thermal behaviour and the lowest weight, but a little less stiffness.

Tungsten carbide spheres are manufactured using a special grinding process, which theoretically enables the generation of any desired diameter. Hard metal is significantly heavier than other stylus materials, therefore the hard metal version is not recommended for large diameters. Also the accuracy of tungsten carbide spheres is significantly worse than othe materials