RAK #2: A4 MiracleBind book

Just before I went away (literally, the DAY before I went away) I received a MiracleBind notebook from Philofaxy Steve (via Filofax). I was sent a black A4 version, with 120 pages of 5 mm quadrille paper inside.

The concept of the binder is that, although the book seems spiral bound, the pages are removable and replaceable. The inner edge of the sheets have a waxy feel, like they are reinforced in some way and there is a slit from the hole to the edge of the page, allowing the page to be removed and replaced in a different part of the book if required.

Walk through:

Cover:
The cover is a very stiff board, covered with black vinyl. There is an embossed oval on the front, to indicate where a label could be placed. The cover of the one I was sent was quite dinged, as if it had been scraped against another binder and the rings had dug into the card cover, but they aren’t very noticeable and anyway, it was a RAK!

Front (still wrapped in plastic)

Back (still wrapped in plastic)

Front (unwrapped)

Close-up of label

Rings:
There are 11 rings, split into 4 at the top and 7 at the bottom, with a gap between them. I’m not sure what the gap is for? So that a label can be put on the spine?

Rings (with gap that makes it look like one is missing)

Contents:
The first page has an explanation of the system, in several languages.

First page

After this, there is an index page (which is used in conjunction with the index flags – see later), the reverse side of which has an info space and a message from MiracleBind saying thank you for buying the product.

Index page

Info and 'thank you'

Next up were the 120 pages of 5 mm quadrille paper, which had a small margin around the edges. The inner edge has the reinforcing I mentioned, then there are fine perforations so that the page can be torn out cleanly, if required.

After this is a page of peel-off index flags/stickers for the sides, front and spine of the binder.

Right at the very back there is a plastic pocket – the pocket slot is halfway down the page, with two business card slots right at the bottom. It too is repositionable.

Fountain pen tests:
Naturally, I have tried out all my inked pens on it to see how the paper stands up.
It wasn’t too horrendous, but the paper was quite ‘grabby’ and almost sticky with a couple of the pens. There was a little bit of bleeding (the line being laid down thicker than the nib intended) but not much feathering or spidering.

Fountain pen tests (front)

The reverse of the page was better than I expected. There was some bleed-through to the reverse but it was almost (almost!) usable on the other side. The Sharpie was naturally a disaster zone.

Fountain pen tests (reverse)

It’s an interesting product. Thank you to Steve for having it sent to me!!