Plastic Binding

One of the most popular and well known of the punch and bind styles, are the plastic binding. Also known as GBC bindings for short, plastic comb binders are no different then most binding machines. Most binders come in two different types of variations, either electric or manual, electric variations are more efficient and will save you a tremendous amount of time.

There are alot of schools and businesses that bind things daily, whether its for creating the rough draft of your upcoming book or outlining company policy. Plastic comb binders are fantastic as they allow for the books and bindings to stay in tact for years to come. There is a large amount of different size documents to choose from, as well as small, thin and think variations as well.

First you need to decide whether you'd like a manual or electric variations. Each type of binder will offer different type of usability, so be sure to choose wisely as to what exactly you are using it for. Electric models provide a higher capacity puncher, a faster approach towards binding, and a better consistency. Overall the electric versions will require a much larger expense up front and a dedicated power supply. On the other hand, manual devices are much cheaper than their counterparts but require a much longer time to bind, especially if the binder can only process a single or a few pages at a time. With enough searching you can find used manual plastic binding that are about half as expensive as the electric counterparts.

In regards to the type of supplies you will need, you only need to have the spines, binders, cover pages, and any internal documents. That's literally all you need to get started, not bad huh.

Every single binding machine was originally created for the standard document size 8.5 x 11, because all binded documents are usually created in the 8.5 x 11 format except for legal documents. Be sure to pay attention to the accepted bindings by the machine binders. Each machine will vary in the size of documents that it can bind. Therefore you must consider to find a binder that allows for throat and disengage dies. This allows you to have half letter documents such as 8.5 x 5.5 and legal sized documents that are 8.5 x 14.

Binded books always look legitimate, the clean beautiful and elegant documents will soon be your way of life. Next time you have that board meeting try bringing your binded documents, versus typical folder style information. The ability and luxury to bind at home is what makes this activity so attractive. Now you aren't stuck paying that added premium to have your books binded.