Integrating Press Controls

To live up to its slogan—"If it's happening in direct mail, it's happening here"—Jetweb, one of the largest manufacturers of direct-mail products and business forms in North America, decided to upgrade its Muller Martini A68 and Concept offset press lines with a new system that integrates precise controls of web inspection, ink fountains, and image register.

The company's operations personnel were soon jolted by the resulting benefits and savings.

Jetweb, established in 1997 and located in a new production facility in Hamburg, Pa., is a part of the JDM Group (Jetson Direct Mail Services). The print quality control system it installed, OffCon-2 and FinColor from Eltromat Electronics, Inc., is called the only press control system of its type on the market.

The company equipped its A68 rotary presses (rated speed: 1,300 feet per minute, or fpm) with the OffCon-2 system in mid-1998, then upgraded its 1,000-fpm Concept presses a few months later. Jetweb equipped another Concept line with OffCon-2 a year later.

As Ed Newell, Jetweb plant manager, recalls, "Immediately after the start-up of OffCon-2, we reduced press set-up times and waste by 50%, not only in producing standard products on the Concept line but on the higher-speed A68 presses, where we use the higher color flexibility and larger format for special products."

He adds, "As we became more familiar with the system, we boosted our savings to nearly 80%."

The Eltromat system, designed to raise production yield and quality levels while reducing set-up times and material waste for register and color, incorporates multifunctional operating and control elements, precise camera positions, register control data, and ink key profile information displayed on high-resolution monitors.

Interfaced to the OffCon-2 control system are FinColor ink fountains, which utilize laser-cut segmented ink blades adjusted by computer-controlled drive units at the ink keys, providing fast, parallel setting of the specified ink profile. New jobs can be set up while the current job is running; repeatable repositioning of the ink screws is held to within .001 mm.

"Also," adds Newell, "by using Eltromat's CIPCon system, we use standardized CIP3 data to achieve complete process control, to optimize presetting values, shorten set-up times, reduce waste, and lower ink consumption. All these advantages strengthen our competitiveness."

The Jetweb team, notes Newell, has more than 50 years of experience in producing high-quality, color direct-mail products and business forms. The JDM Group, which employs more than 1,000 people and operates a manufacturing area encompassing about half-a-million square feet, produces upwards of 1.5 billion pieces of mail per year, serving clients in finance, publishing, and industrial markets.

The company's JetProof, JetTrack, and JetFinish services represent highly specialized electronic systems for project management and web finishing.

The OffCon-2 print quality control system, which is in use in sites around the world for continuous print and mailing presses, is now being applied to web offset presses printing commercial work. Users can further reduce press set-up times and waste by employing FinColor ink fountains and the CIP3-based CIPCon system.

Eltromat specializes in press control and measurement technology for register, web viewing and inspection, press presetting, ink fountains, plate scanning, CIP3 data, and ink deck positioning. The Germany-based supplier, whose U.S. office is in Chesapeake, Va., has installed its OffCon-2 system in a number of sheetfed and web offset facilities.

Carl Cattau, vice president and general manager of Jetweb, concludes, "To achieve continuous growth with consistent customer service, we must invest in our future as a permanent objective. We must get our equipment quickly into use, to get the most out of it for ourselves and our customers. We simply wouldn't be satisfied with anything less than the Eltromat systems."