Amazon BasicsComb Binding Machine, 350 Sheets Capacity, for paper sizes A5(15 holes)/Letter(19 holes)/A4(21 holes) with Adjustable Margin, Grey

I had several 'books' to bind, each about 100 pages, and with cardstock front and back covers. I bought this machine because it was cheap, and I didn't really anticipate using it again once I had made the books.I was able to successfully make a perfect book on my first attempt. The machine is relatively straightforward to use, and it's difficult to mess up as long as you take your time and are careful.The instructions aren't very good, so I watched a youtube tutorial. I kind of wish I hadn't though, because I figured out a better way of doing it.Instead of trying to hook each sheet onto the comb, I found it was much easier to stack the entire book as a block, then hold in in place while slowly pulling the lever to close the comb, capturing all of the pages at once.I would say the claimed 12 sheet punching capacity is quite optimistic. I was punching standard 2lb copy paper, and I found I could punch a maximum of about 8 sheets at a time without feeling like I was going to damage the machine.This is fine for small-scale production though. Once I got the hang of it, I found I could make a book in just a couple of minutes.I made a mistake with one of my books (printed the pages wrong) and I was able to use the machine to easily open the comb back up, remove the offending pages, and replace them with corrected versions.Once I had finished my books, I was looking around the house for other stuff I could comb-bind.I don't need the machine any more now I have my books made, but I'm glad I have it, and will definitely get some use out of it in future.

I read the reviews, good and bad, before buying, so I knew to treat it as the lightweight, low-cost product that it is. My first project was printing and binding a 144-page book (so about 72 sheets) on the fall of Jerusalem. Following the helpful advice in past reviews, I only tried to punch 4 or 5 sheets at a time, did not attempt to punch a plastic cover, only loaded about 10 sheets at a time onto the spine, and used a spine somewhat larger than the usability charts recommend. In this case, a 1/2" spine should have worked, but I used a 5/8" spine instead. The whole job was quick, easy, and totally free of frustration. The bound book ended up looking great and is a pleasure to handle and read.

This product appears simple enough, but to get an actual binding is almost impossible. Threading the comb through the sheets is tedious, time-consuming and almost impossible to line up all the holes with the comb.

If you need to bind up a report every once in awhile, this will do the trick. But every time you pull the lever to punch holes, you'll swear you're going to snap the lever right off. Punch fewer pages at a time than you think you should.

During my working years, I had access to a heavy duty commercial comb binding machine and used it weekly. Now that I'm retired, I wanted something similar for personal use but didn't want to pay hundreds of dollars for a machine I would only need occasionally. So, I bought the Amazon Basics machine for less than $50, thinking that if it didn't work out I wouldn't be out much money. However, I found that it works very well! It weighs perhaps a third of my old office machine (or less!), so it's obviously not as durable, but (with care and a little patience) it does the job. Because it's light weight, I don't try to punch out it's rated volume of 12 sheets (maybe 4 or 5); I take extra time to make sure they're properly aligned before punching; and in the binding operation I collate 8 or 10 pages at a time onto the comb. But, as I said, it does the job, and the finished product looks identical to those I produced in the office. If you've never used a binding machine before, check out the process on YouTube or on Amazon's user videos, because the instructions printed on the machine are anything but clear. I've had this machine on my Wish List for months. I only wish I'd purchased it sooner.

More mechanical than some products I've seen but certainly lacks mechanical forces as well. Ok for the money. Can be frustrating to use at times but great for small jobs.

For this homeschooling mom, it works!!! I spent $40+ (not including the 4 cab rides I had to take to them and back) at the UPS store last year in just binding. I had the good sense to print my stuff first. SMH, I vowed never to do that again especially since the girl miss punched and mess some up, which I noticed way into our school year. But back to my review.This is ready and easy to use right out the box and all I had to do is attach the handle. Thank you Amazon basics! Choosing the paper size was a no brainer since they have it labeled "letter size" and all I had to do was move the marker over to it. Again, thank you Ab! It punched my tester sheet nicely so I went to town and punched and comb bound our math curriculum.It was kind of a smooth punching process. It says 12 sheets at a time and I kind of tried to stick to that dictate. No guess work on the positioning of the pages to be punched. Just insert sheets until you can't go any further to insure edges don't get torn. Ummm, not to teach bad habits or anything but I punched my plastic cover sheet without thinking about it. I had it layered under my cardstocky back cover and it punched through. Not completely clean on the plastic but well enough that, holes were punched with maybe 2/3 spots that still had the top part that you had to pop off or snip. Tried it with just the plastic aannd will never do that again. My baby said "heck no lady! Ain't built for that". So, maybe not do that, lol....binding part was easy too and I used 2" comb binding.It's light but stays put on flat surface. Prayerfully it makes it through all the other work I have lined up. Pretty good value for my money. Now I feel like I accomplished something today, I'm going back to bed, it's Sunday and it just arrived so. I had to try it.