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New Staples Arc Vs Levenger Circa


kiavonne

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I went to Staples earlier today to look for an engineering note pad and some soft lead for my mech pencil. I am taking an electrical engineering course and needed some paper for homework. Well... as usual when I start looking at office supplies and pens and paper I spend FOREVER in the store. Having decided previously that the circa system may be too expensive, I had searched staples a few months ago for a rollabind/circa style system and found nothing. I figured they did not and would not ever be carrying these type of items. Needing a new notebook today (three ring or other) to categorize notes, I picked up one of the five star flex binds when I turned around and saw the Arc notebooks. I was excited to say the least! I marveled at how cheap the full size leather system was -I was tempted to buy two! Bought some graph paper to go in it as well -prepunched.

 

Coming home I decided to search for "arc vs circa" to see if the systems were compatible because I need a punch. Low and behold FPN had a review and all the info I was searching for. Being and FPN noob I am continually surprised at the depth of information I find here! I just received my first batch of ink from goulet to go into my first Pens -two TWSBIs. What a great day!

 

Jim

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Jim, welcome to FPN! We've always got something good to find out about just about everything related to pens and writing. It's a good reason to keep coming back around, there's always something new.

Scribere est agere.

To write is to act.

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  • 2 weeks later...

yes, circa bleedthrough is a bit...unique, isnt it. apparently it was a sourcing problem, but even my best pages still arent the best. Printer paper wins.

From inquisitive newbie coveter to utilitarian (ultra) fine point user to calligraphy flourisher. The life cycle of a fountain pen lover.

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  • 1 year later...

Welcome to FPN!

Does anyone know if Staples lets you use one of the Arc punches without buying it, just to try punching a few sheets?

Edited by stevesurf

Best regards,
Steve Surfaro
Fountain Pen Fun
Cities of the world (please visit my Facebook page for more albums)
Paris | Venezia

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Does anyone know if Staples lets you use one of the Arc punches without buying it, just to try punching a few sheets?

 

Not that I'm aware of, frankly. You might try a personal approach to someone in the store, but Staples hasn't let me "test drive" too many items over the years.

 

However, I have both the Staples Arc and the "new" Levenger Circa punches, so I can offer a few comments.

 

The Levenger Circa punch is built like a tank, all metal excepting the collection base which is a polymer base. It punches tidily and well, up to ten pages. It's better in the four to six page range, but I've tested it successfully with ten. It's relatively small compared with the Arc punch which has a much larger vertical dimension. I wrote a longer review of the Circa punch here.

 

The Staples Arc punch will successfully punch fourteen pages tidily and well in my tests. It's better in the six to eight page range. The Arc punch handle mechanism lends itself more to the higher number of pages than the Circa punch, but it's not an easily stored item, where the Levenger punch can fit into a desk drawer simply. The Arc punch mechanism handle is largely polymer (plastic) construction, with a sliding arrangement between two "arms", and so there may be questions about the longevity of the punch. I have no questions at all about the longevity of the Levenger Circa punch - it will last a good few years.

 

Both punches perform well in terms of correctly punching the "smurfs" with sharp edges, but still allowing sufficient room for the punched paper to slide easily over the disks for both formats.

 

I hope that this helps.

 

 

 

 

John P.

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One thing to remember is that if you have a nearby Staples, you can ship to the store for free.

 

That said, the paper is very nice, but I doubt Staples will come out with a punch since they want you to buy their refills.

 

They have a very good punch which also costs less that the Levenger one.

Letter writing is the only device for combining

solitude with good company.

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Welcome to FPN!

Does anyone know if Staples lets you use one of the Arc punches without buying it, just to try punching a few sheets?

 

The punch works great. I use it on 28lbs paper for my custom printouts.

 

I have a heavy guillotine style paper cutter at work as well so I just laser print and chop then punch.

 

Both the full size and 1/2 size preset detent on mine lines up perfectly with their refills.

 

Their paper center will cut a ream in half for you as well so you can just print whenever you desire (assuming a printer that can handle oddball sizes)

 

Not to sound like a fanboy but for the cost and the benefit you can't go wrong if you want a custom planner/notebook. The disc system is so much easier to move things around than any sort of ring system.

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I bought the Arc system from Staples and while it is a fun customized notebook, it just was not for me. I returned it a couple days later. Even with the large sized discs I just didn't like how the notebook felt and how the pages turned when loaded with lots of paper.

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  • 2 months later...

Hi! I just bought an Arc at Staples yesterday, and bought the academic weekly planner pages, which I haven't opened yet, because I think I could find templates for pages that I like better online. I have three questions: 1) Does anyone know where some really good weekly planner templates are that will fit the 8/12 x 5 1/2 Arc? 2) Assuming I find a good template, what kind of paper would be good to print it on so that fountain pens won't bleed through? If the cost of such paper is prohibitively expensive, I might just use the planner pages that Arc makes. I understand from FPN and other reviews that it is pretty good about no bleed through and very light show-through. 3) If I print pages from a template, I'll need a hole punch. There is a portable Circa punch on Levenger right now for $20. I'd rather get this one than a $40 punch. Will I be able to punch Arc pages with a Circa punch? I think the answer is yes, but just want to double-check. Thank you! FPN has helped me so much with pen and paper decisions.

Edited by pishee
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Thank you. I bought the ARC punch and I've used the ARC system with my Rollabind parts. They have worked well.

Fountain pens are my preferred COLOR DELIVERY SYSTEM (in part because crayons melt in Las Vegas).

Create a Ghostly Avatar and I'll send you a letter. Check out some Ink comparisons: The Great PPS Comparison 

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Will I be able to punch Arc pages with a Circa punch? I think the answer is yes, but just want to double-check. Thank you! FPN has helped me so much with pen and paper decisions.

 

The Circa punch will work for Arc sheets. There is the issue of the older Circa punches cutting slightly smaller "smurfs" which move less easily on the Arc and Circa disks, so it's worth finding out the vintage of the punch being sold. This isn't per se a dealbreaker, but the newer punches are seen as doing a better job.

 

 

 

 

John P.

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Hi! I just bought an Arc at Staples yesterday, and bought the academic weekly planner pages, which I haven't opened yet, because I think I could find templates for pages that I like better online. I have three questions: 1) Does anyone know where some really good weekly planner templates are that will fit the 8/12 x 5 1/2 Arc? 2) Assuming I find a good template, what kind of paper would be good to print it on so that fountain pens won't bleed through? If the cost of such paper is prohibitively expensive, I might just use the planner pages that Arc makes. I understand from FPN and other reviews that it is pretty good about no bleed through and very light show-through. 3) If I print pages from a template, I'll need a hole punch. There is a portable Circa punch on Levenger right now for $20. I'd rather get this one than a $40 punch. Will I be able to punch Arc pages with a Circa punch? I think the answer is yes, but just want to double-check. Thank you! FPN has helped me so much with pen and paper decisions.

 

Try DIY Planner for templates http://www.diyplanner.com/

 

HP Premium #32 paper works well.

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As you know the Levenger punch handles 8 or so pages and the ARC disc's. I think the key to paper is going to Staples and asking them about what they have and try 6-10 different sheets. Explaining you want to buy the paper but need to try it with some pens and fountain pens and they should cooperate...

Rob Maguire (Plse call me "M or Mags" like my friends do...)I use a Tablet, Apple Pencil and a fountain pen. Targas, Sailor, MB, Visconti, Aurora, vintage Parkers, all wonderful.

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  • 5 months later...

I just picked up an Arc yesterday. I haven't written in it yet but I wanted to comment that the pen loop is now like 3/4 leather and 1/4 elastic. So when you look at it from the outside it appears to be leather but the last 1/4 to 1/3 before it attaches on the back side is now elastic. I can easily fit a TWSBI Vac 700 in the loop up to and past the cap band which is the largest part of the pen and seems much larger than my VP (can't do a direct comparison yet as my VP is at work).

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Here's a crummy phone shot of some inks. I see some feathering depending on ink but none of these bled or showed through bad, not even the Ku-Jaku.post-81796-0-75843800-1356901814.jpg

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Here's a crummy phone shot of some inks. I see some feathering depending on ink but none of these bled or showed through bad, not even the Ku-Jaku.

 

 

I have found that the Arc branded graph paper is much more FP friendly than the lined paper; in fact, that the Arc GP is one of the better papers from the chain stores for FP use.

 

 

 

John P.

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As you know the Levenger punch handles 8 or so pages and the ARC disc's. I think the key to paper is going to Staples and asking them about what they have and try 6-10 different sheets. Explaining you want to buy the paper but need to try it with some pens and fountain pens and they should cooperate...

 

...or you could just try the Levenger Circa Rhodia and Circa Dot paper - very smooth and FP friendly. I do all my "ink charts" and notes with it; here are a few samples:

 

Fountain%2520pen%2520brown%2520family%2520Lo.jpg

Green%2520Day.jpg

Goulet%2520Pens%2520Lo.jpg

Best regards,
Steve Surfaro
Fountain Pen Fun
Cities of the world (please visit my Facebook page for more albums)
Paris | Venezia

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  • 1 year later...

Any way the common black punchs that sell on all paper sections could work with the ARC system? They should be placed similarly apart or maybe the problem is the diameter?

 

Hope someone in 2014 come around and sees this...LOL. This feels like a note to the past.

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Hi, here's another 2014 post. :-) The Circa/Arc punch makes special mushroom shaped cutouts in the edge of the paper, 1" apart. They require special punches made just for these systems. I dunno about the Staples Arc punches, but the newer Circa punches from Levenger punches slightly larger mushrooms than the older Levenger punches or the Rollabind punch I used to have. I think the Arc punch is similar to the Rollabind punch. The larger mushroom holes from the new Levenger punches makes for smoother, easier page turning.

 

I favor using my own paper rather than buying pre-punched paper from Levenger or Staples. I use templates from http://diyplanner.com to print my own pages on sheets of high quality 24# paper from Hammermill or HP. In the long run, I get better paper and it's cheaper. Since I like using 5.5" x 8.5" pages, I can get four pages from one sheet of 8.5" x 11" paper.

 

What's cool is that you can add any size pages you want to a disc-bound notebook. Index cards, business cards, any shape or size, can be added to a disc bound notebook if you have a punch.

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I have one of the Staples ARC punches and it works great! I like the ARC paper and have stocked about 1.5 lifetimes of it. I punch things I print. You will want to stock up on disks if you buy a punch...

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