We often get asked to recommend which binding style is the best. The simple answer is that it really depends on the purpose of your documents and your personal preference. In this blog article we take a look at the different styles of binding and the pros and cons of each system. Some of the most common and popular binding styles include wire, coil (can be plastic or metal), plastic comb and thermal binding. In this article we refer to the binding pitch. In lay man’s terms this is simply the spacing in between the holes. Here we take a look at the most popular styles of binding;

 

Renz Wire;

*Recognised as a smart, secure, up-market presentation favoured by professionals

*360 degree page turn allowing document to be opened completely flat or folded back on itself which is great for meetings.

*Pages remain in perfect registration when turned compared to coil where the document pages can move up and down slightly.

* Binding wire is suitable for binding documents up to 34 mm thick. This is about 340 sheets if you are using 80 gsm paper.

*3:1 and 2:1 pitch are the standard pitches of wire

 

Plastic Comb;

*Main advantage is that if the document is continually being added to or changed plastic comb can be opened up and pages can be changed without damage to document or loss of comb

*Don’t get complete 360 degree page turn as spine getsin the way

*Suitable for binding documents up to 48 mm thick. This equates to 480 sheets of 80 gsm paper.

*Plastic comb is the original binding method and still used widely in offices across the country. However it is mostly being phased out by wire bound documents

*21 loops is the standard pitch used in the UK

 

Coil/Spiral

*Spirals are virtually indestructible

*360 degree page turn allowing document to be opened completely flat or folded back on itself

Note: The pages go out of registration when turned

*Suitable for binding documents up to 20 mm thick with standard rollers however you can bind larger documents but it is slightly harder to get the coil inserted easily into the document.

*The education sector love this style of binding as the coils are very durable

*The standard pitches are 6mm pitch.

*Coils can be PVC plastic or metal.

*Some people refer to it is as coil and others spiral! They are the same thing so it’s just a matter of preference.

 

Thermal binding

*Slightly different to the above styles as no hole punching is required.

*Involves using a hot melt adhesive to heat up the paper which then sticks to the inside cover. Empty covers have the glue strip already attached so all you have to do is place your inserts into the document and heat up in the binding machine

*Seen as one of the quickest forms of binding. With the Bindomatic thermal binding machines you can save hours of labour

*Standard thermal binding covers are A4 or A5

*A range of different thermal binding covers are available from Bindomatic including soft and hard covers in a variety of colours.