While books are fairly simple to make with little equipment such as glue, paper, and a few heavy bricks, I eventually caved and got my own thermal binder. Using one is not particularly well received by bookbinders, but it is efficient and clean. Many commercial books are produced using perfect binding, which uses essentially the same mechanics as a thermal binder and produces a similar result. A word of warning. Be careful with the prongs. It should be common knowledge that metal is conductive, but I overlooked that little fact and ended up shocking my ring finger on the plug.