Tech for the Big Press

Jumbo sheetfed presses, the 81" and 73" wide models sold in North America by KBA and MAN Roland, commonly have achieved levels of automation undreamed of a few years ago, driving down makeready and turnaround times as speeds, product volumes and quality rise dramatically. Meanwhile, as automation has made shorter runs more economically practical on web offset machines, the crossover point between web and sheetfed platforms has shifted a scoche. Now the two have been brought closer together by operational changes at these two manufacturers.

KBA North America, which offers sheetfeds up to 81" wide, has integrated its web and gravure press sales, service and parts activities with its sheetfed division—all under the direction of CEO Ralf Sammeck, who formerly oversaw strictly sheetfed. MAN Roland USA, with its XXL sheetfeds up to 73" wide, named Vincent Lapinski CEO effective Jan. 1, expanding his responsibility for newspaper and commercial web press operations to include sheetfed presses as well.

The newest jumbo presses are being used in a range of applications, such as folding cartons, posters and POP displays to general commercial work. While available in a conventional, hybrid or full UV configurations, the machines' larger dimensions do not accommodate perfecting.

The enhanced level of automation KBA has applied to its large-format presses is typified by the 60×81" Rapida 205, which “effectively has the same print quality, consistency and low makeready times of a smaller format press,” says Sammeck. Its sheet area effectively equals four 40´´ press sheets, running on a platform that “has every bell and whistle from fully automatic plate mounting to complete color control systems,” he says. “And the press can also run the widest range of stocks in our industry.”

The JDF-compliant Rapida 205 features an automatic camera register control, cutting the time to good register at startup. It takes a microscopic look at register marks to guide adjustment, reading up to seven colors at once, and adjusts all seven units accordingly at the same time.

The density measuring system on the 205 reads density and spectral values from anywhere across the 81´´ sheet and adjusts the press to match input from prepress or customer-approved proofs.

The press includes a shaftless feeder for better timing and sheet reversing back into the pile, a declutchable inking system on the fifth unit of a five-unit press that allows easy switching between 5- and 4-color runs, automated air settings for sheet travel, Qualitronic II inline sheet-inspection system and an inline cutting system to slit the sheet in the delivery.

Grippers are designed for easy switching between light and heavy stocks, allowing for faster makeready without time-consuming manual resetting.

For MAN Roland, jumbo press automation is showcased on the 900 XXL presses. Reflecting efforts to increase image area, the manufacturer recently enlarged the format of its 64´´ Roland 900, equipping the press to up the page count of its signatures from 40 to 48 pages—a 20% increase.

“Those additional eight pages are an enormous gain to printers involved in signature work,” says Lapinski. “By being able to produce more on every sheet, they'll be more cost competitive and achieve higher profits.”

The new, higher-output format was created by expanding the 7B format, which accommodates 40 landscape-oriented pages, to 7B-plus, which can carry 48 portrait-oriented pages. That was accomplished by adding 2.35´´ of printable image area using the press's existing plate. Image area has increased from 46.85×64´´ to 49.2×64´´.

The new format also allows printers and their customers to reduce paper costs. While the page output from each sheet increases by 20%, the overall sheet size, or paper usage, increases by less than 5%.

In addition to the expanded 64´´ format, MAN Roland offers the 73´´ XXL that produces 64-page signatures.

“Gaining the ability to produce more on every sheet is the reason printers turn to these larger presses in the first place,” Lapinski adds. “A high level of automation is required on both ends for these presses. Printers need fast makereadies to handle short-run work, and for high-volume jobs they require a quick and effective way to move material to and from the press as it prints.”

MAN Roland's printnet networking and control system automates virtually every makeready function on a Roland 900 XXL. Its printnet PressManager lets crews start makeready for the next job while the current project prints, saving valuable time on every changeover. Automatic roller, blanket and back cylinder wash-up also are part of the automation options on all five Roland 900 XXL models, as is Power Plate Loading.

“For uninterrupted operation on high-volume jobs, we offer continuous feeders and delivery systems,” Lapinski notes. “Printers can also opt for our AUPASYS material logistics system.”

For customers of MAN Roland, increasingly web and sheetfed presses are found under the same roof. “This isn't really a management issue,” says Lapinski. “Yes, MAN Roland has separate sales forces for web and sheetfed presses, but they have always worked closely together and will continue to do so. What has changed dynamically is the marketplace,” he says. “In this period of consolidation, it is more likely for a printing facility to invest in both sheetfed and web technology.”

Among the large-format presses, the term used to describe today's relationship between jumbo sheetfeds and web presses is “complementary” rather than crossover. The large-format sheetfed is not replacing commercial web press work, but rather complementing it,” says KBA's Sammeck.

KBA sees little crossover between its wide sheetfed and web presses. Their major market for the Rapida 205 is proving to be for posters, packaging, POP, signature and odd-shaped work, not the long signature runs that would crossover with web.

The demand for large-scale graphics popularized by wide-format digital printers is seen as an important driver in the large-format market. Printers are turning to offset platforms to meet the needs of national retailers for big graphics in high volumes and at lower costs.

A similar view on jumbo sheetfed vs. web prevails at MAN Roland.

“We tend to think of it as convergence of web and sheetfed technology, rather than crossover,” says Lapinski. The fact is the two technologies complement each other—now more than ever.

“The extra output that wide sheetfed presses yield makes them suitable for higher run jobs,” says Lapinski. “On the other hand, the automated makeready and startup features that we've been building into web presses for years equips them to cost-effectively compete for medium-run jobs.”

KBA confirms the need to give customers—who may no longer be strictly sheetfed or web operations—a range of choices tailored to their requirements. “With a combined web and sheetfed organization, KBA is now uniquely positioned to come into a printing company and offer solutions that are exactly tailored to the printer's total needs,” Sammeck says.

In the KBA view, printers would prefer to meet with one salesperson who can help them with all their sheetfed, hybrid, perfecting, large format commercial web and publication needs.

With manufacturers providing un­­precedented levels of automation and organizing themselves to better serve large-format printers, users of jumbo machines from the two press manufacturers—one with a KBA press and the other with a MAN Roland press—are experiencing the benefits of this new equipment. A 6-color-plus-coater Rapida 205 came on line in December at The Garvey Group's Niles, IL, facility. The 60×81" sheet size is the largest one in the company's roster, which also includes 64" and 56" machines.

The new press is being used to print many of the same products run on the two other large-format presses—a variety of colorful products including top sheets to wrap retail product cartons, signs and posters.

“The big box retailers use large, colorful, artistic signs and posters and those are the things we like to do,” says Ed Garvey, president of the 200-employee, $44-million printer.

“We use many KBA presses because the scanning systems and spectrophotometer systems help them hold color really well throughout the run,” Garvey notes. “And the 81" press will be able to print the same quality as the 64" or 56" presses.

“KBA and MAN Roland have migrated their press technologies so that large-format equipment operates like state-of-the-art 40" presses,” says Garvey. “As a result, clients have the same expectations—imaging from corner to corner, color saturation, coverage, register and rapid turnarounds—in printing a very big sheet as for a 40" sheet.

“The reason we decided to go into large format with three different sizes is that we wanted to create price points for customers with a variety of sizes,” he says. “The new press also allows us to load level between the three presses and work to the options and turn-around time the customer requires.

“Makeready times are not far from a 40" press and it is a much bigger sheet with a considerably better yield,” says Garvey. “If you have volume in a niche market like this, it is better than volume in a commodity market.”

As this issue of GAM went to press, MAN Roland had begun installing the world's first 8-color-plus-coater version of its 900 XXL press at prepress giant Schawk, Inc.'s print facility in Los Angeles. The 73´´ sheetfed will run the billboards and bus shelter signage for which Schawk is well known.

Carl Taylor, managing director of the Los Angeles plant, says the outdoor market is heating up in terms of increased media buys. The 900 XXL's print quality and production speed should help Schawk serve it well.

“With bus shelters, the work is physically closer to the viewer,” says Taylor. “That requires the highest print quality. And movie industry campaigns are very time sensitive. The consolidated workflow we'll realize reduces manufacturing, which translates to faster speed to market.”

ONLINE: www.kba-usa.com, manroland.com, thegarveygroup.com, schawk.com