on the manufacture of spiral notebooks

[crinklebat]

This has bothered me for a literal age:

How on earth are spiral notebooks made? They seem to be somewhat complex; the paper and cardboard are simple enough, but is there a machine that winds the wire around in a spiral? How does it get the spiral to look so nice?

And how on earth are they so incredibly cheap, if making them is as involved a process as I think it is?

Is there something obvious and fundamental that I’m missing?

[friedo]

Well, I may be missing something, but I don’t see why they can’t just have a machine that aligns the pieces of paper, and inserts the end of the spiral into the holes on the top and rotates it until the spiral makes its way down to the bottom of the page.

[Ice_Wolf]

From this page:

Coil or Spiral Binders are the most recognizable type of binding technology. Spiral binding has been available for many years in the form of spiral notebooks and steno pads. Wire binding coils come in a limited choice of colors, in maximum lengths of 12", and can bind documents up to approximately 1" thick. Wire coil binding machines, also known as wire inserters, are available in tabletop and floor standing models. The end of a long wire is inserted into the machine, where it coils in and out of the punched holes.

I’d imagine that in full-scale manufacturing, this would simply be done on a larger scale.

[postcards]

What a perfect question for “How Stuff Works.com”, yet they don’t know…

[slortar]

I thought they grew under cabbages.