Bindery / Muller Martini Perfect Binders

Muller Martini is one the the World's largest builders of all sizes of perfect binders. Traditionally these have been made in Switzerland. The machines Perfect binders divide into groups basically on speed and thickness of book that can be created, but mostly speed. Within the machines technical specifications the quality of the book will be very good no matter if it is bound on a Pony or a Normbinder. The smaller machines like the Baby Pony or Amigo tend to be hand fed, and all the bigger machines mostly have feeder pockets. Please keep in mind that when you are figuring out the speed of a particular machine you have to consider the binders speed, and also the pockets rated speed. A 10,000 per hour Normbinder will only run 6,000 per hour if it is hooked up to 256E pockets rated at 6,000 per hour. The smallest Muller machine is the Baby Pony, which in it's later models was called the Amigo. This is a 1,500 per hour rated had fed machine. In the last 12-18 months Muller has added an auto feed Amigo to put at the end of variable imaging devices. I saw one of these at the just-ended Chicago Show, and it worked slick. Basically the idea is print books digitally one at a time, and then go right into a binder. This means you can order 1 copy of an out of print book. Or you can produce at a reasonable price small quantities of custom books. One step up from entry level is the Muller Pony and RB5, which are now called the Panda and Panda II. These machines are rated at around 3,000 books per hour and mostly come with feeders. To see a picture of one of a Pony CLICK HERE. In addition to in line feeders these machines commonly have in line trimmers, and sometimes stackers. The next step up is 5,000-7,000 per hour and is represtented by the Monoblock and Star-MonoStar lines. These machines generally have 12-30 feeders and an inline trimmer. At the top you find the Muller Normbinders and Coronas. These are 10,000 - 18,0000 per hour machines. There is a huge difference in cost and complexity between a 1,500 per hour and a 10,000 per hour perfect binder. As with the Monoblocks and Starbinders, these machine have feeders and in line trimmers, plus usually stackers. And with these fast machines the pockets and trimmers tend to be the heavier high speed versions. For example 256S pockets instead of 256E, and Zenith trimmers and not Alpines.