Do you have a Personal size and Pocket size organiser? Or just one of those two sizes? And you want to be able to punch your own pages, but the cost of a Filofax Punch seems a bit high at £26.75 each ($40 or €49)? Then this punch at a typical price of about £10 plus postage might be your answer...
The Rapesco Diary Punch 66-P has two sets of sliding punch blocks which you can easily move in their slots. Each punch block has three 6mm punches spaced 19mm (3/4") apart.
With the punch blocks in the outer most position, it will punch up to 8 sheets of paper for a Personal size organiser. Slide both punch blocks fully towards the centre and it punches 6 holes perfectly spaced for a Pocket Filofax.
As the Mini uses the same ring spacing as the Pocket but only 5 rings not 6 this punch should work for that size as well, although I've not tried it, but looking at the paper size the mini page finishes where the 6th hole would start, if that makes sense!
It will not punch pages for an A5 as standard, although with a little bit of experimenting (remember I am an engineer!) you can punch holes the right spacing for an A5 organiser, but it involves two punches of the three holes and careful alignment in the punch. I will work out the distance you need to offset the outer edge of the paper from the centre point and post this later.
I also tried just moving one punch block to the outer position and the other punch block to the inner position, but you end up with a spacing that doesn't appear to be suitable for any size that I'm aware of.
The punch is easy to empty, the whole base unclips... but don't do as I did... turn it upside down on my desk only to discover that because it has the slots... the chads (the bits of punched paper) manage to escape through the slots!!
It is very well made and Rapesco do a large variety of other products as well. See their website for details.
They say that they sell 'Worldwide' and there is a 'Where to Buy' page. These punches also come up on Ebay from time to time. I missed out on one on Saturday on the EBay UK site. So I then ordered one on line instead.
I bought this punch mainly because the Perforex 610 personal size one I bought back in the 1980's is getting a little blunt and this brand appears to be discontinued on the few sites I found it listed on. I also thought it would be useful to review the Rapesco one for the blog...
If you have any questions pop them in to the comments.
Steve
Filofax A5 punch
Wow this looks great, and at a great price! I have a question--what size are the punched holes? Are they the same size as the holes in Filofax paper, or are they larger? Any problems/ issues with the hole size?
ReplyDeleteThe holes are the same size as punched by my Filofax punch, the info says 6 mm, which is within the ISO standard size. ISO standard 838, hole size is 5.5 to 6.5mm
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hole_punch
A wiki page for hole punches... how sad is that!
It's nice to have nice crisp holes punched, compared to the plastic single sheet punch I was using previously.
I have one of these & would definitely recommend them. Have used it to punch holes for both mini & personal size.
ReplyDeleteIs there an easy way to make sure my calendar or whatnot is centered so the holes are perfect? :)
ReplyDelete