Mid-Sized Spread

Printers seeking a skosh more room on their mid-sized sized sheetfeds have been finding it in the latest models of six-up presses. Having embraced 29´´ widths and, lately, even a little wider, six-up half sizes now feature larger cylinder circumferences as well, measuring 23´´ and more to allow a slightly longer sheet.

The demand is driven in part by a desire for a press that can squeeze in more orders as it turns around short-run work faster, in many instances for jobs that speed in from Web portals to the pressroom. Many fast-moving job tickets can't wait for a gang run to fill a 40´´ sheet. In these cases, the penalty is less on smaller presses if you go ahead with a print run that must deliver immediately, even if the sheet isn't quite full (see chart on next page).

The sizes are especially popular in the North American market, which has given MAN Roland a resounding endorsement of the six-up, 23x29´´ Roland 500 first introduced at drupa nearly eight years ago. MAN raised the ante when it increased the speed to 18,000 sph on its this model. At drupa 2004 Heidelberg debuted a 23x29´´ F format Speedmaster 74, and brought a speedy “Peak Performance” version to Graph Expo in 2006. Komori also moved into 29´´ territory in 2006 at Ipex with the Lithrone LS29, then in 2007 launched the 24x29´´ LSX29, which it promotes as giving “the whole inchilada.” Akiyama announced at IGAS that it is developing a 32´´ version of the J-Print press, with its uniquely configured two-sided format. (While KBA offers the half-sized Rapida 74 and Performa models, the focus of this report is on the slightly larger circumference machines.)

At Graph Expo 2007, Sakurai launched the Oliver 96SD series of 25×38´´ six-up presses (4- and 5-color models), which joined the 75SD and its 23.5×31.6´´ sheet size. Also at that show, Ryobi launched the 920 line, with a 24.6×36.2´´ format. Ryobi already had in place the 23×31´´ 780E series and the 23×29´´ 750 product line.

The demand for this format is strong in the U.S. In fact, Heidelberg USA reports that the vast majority of 29´´ CD 74 presses it has sold in the U.S. are in the “F format,” with a maximum 23.82´´ sheet length. This format has far outsold the more standard 20´´ “C” format ever since the model was introduced in 2000.

Adding three or four inches seems like a small change, but it makes a big difference: It gives printers a lot more flexibility and even opens up new markets.

“The extra four inches allows us to do a 12-page signature,” says Paul Marino, president and owner of Impress Communications, Chatsworth, CA. The firm was the first U.S. printer to install a Komori Lithrone LSX when it bought a 6-color this fall. The 24×29´´ format allows them to print six A4 pages work-and-tumble much more efficiently than printing them sheetwise. “It really makes the press what I call a three-quarter size,” says Marino.

Adventure Graphics of Dallas, acquired the 23×29´´ Ryobi 750 in mid-2006 specifically because of the larger format. “We can print a 25.5´´ sheet front and back, work-and-turn,” explains president Norman Cohen. The extra three inches also gives the printer the ability to add a third 11×17´´ spread, turned across the end of the sheet, perpendicular to the other two spreads.

The printer can also use the extra area to gang smaller jobs, like business cards, along with a booklet or magazine. Orlando's SunDance Graphics gangs art prints on its new 23.5×30´´ 5-color Sakurai 575 (below). “We do a lot of 8×10´´ art prints, so the extra space allows us to gang several together with some smaller sizes as well,” explains operations director JohnHenry Ruggieri. “A 20×22´´ print is a pretty popular format with our clients. With our new press, we can gang one with a couple of 8×10s.”

The installation of the Sakurai 575 in 2006 turned the company from an art print publisher into a full-blown commercial printer, Ruggieri says. Now it's competitive with gallery catalogs and publications produced from 12-page signatures. SunDance is printing two monthly art magazines as well.

The larger format of the mid-size presses is “a big deal when you're trying to compete with 40´´ presses,” says Ralph Myers, president of MPress Graphics, Kansas City, MO. MPress bought a Heidelberg CD 74 at GraphExpo 2006. The company selected the F-format, with its maximum sheet size of 23.82×29.13´´ and top rated speed of 18,000 sph, partly because the larger format allows them to run six pages, or three 11×17´´ spreads, on one sheet. Meyers says running this type of job on the larger F-format makes the company competitive with eight-page presses in runs even longer than 150,000 to 200,000 copies. That is the case even if not running flat out, but at a more modest 14,000 sph. “We've developed a new market for that type of job,” he says.

The new press also plays a role in retaining existing clients. “We work with customers who really care about their printing,” Myers notes, including demanding buyers at Hallmark Cards, the Nelson-Atkins Museum in Kansas City and the Peruvian Connection catalog, for whom print quality is critical. “It's important to our customers that the last copy look like the first one,” he says.

In addition to the bigger format, manufacturers are bringing many of the same automation features found in the big presses to the mid-size models. MPress's Speedmaster CD 74 was the first 6-color 74 in North America to include Heidelberg's Prinect Inpress Control. The press also includes Heidelberg's Peak Performance Package, a set of automated features that boosts its rated speed to 18,000 sph while maintaining quality. The package includes a new suction head (above right) intended to feed sheets straight and smoothly, and requiring no manual adjustment. It also has auto pile-height and check-pile adjustment, as well as extended delivery, a PowderStar AP500 spraying system, a stronger antistatic system and dynamic sheet braking to slow down sheets and avoid marking at delivery.

Myers is also enthusiastic about the press's air-transport system, which avoids gripper marks. At the same time, he says, the CD 74's automated wash-up and makeready, continuous dampening system and other features controlled by a Prinect CP2000 console optimize throughput. To him, one of the most important features is the Inpress Control closed-loop spectrophotometer,

“It stretches across the sheet after the last ink unit and checks register, reads the color bars and measures density, on the fly, without having to pull a sheet,” Myers explains. “It then communicates back to the control panel to adjust register and water-ink balance—it's like having an autopilot. The machine keeps inking even,” he says. “When we speed up the press, the system automatically adjusts the ink system.

“It's like having an additional shift,” he adds. “Because we can produce more work in a shift, we can take in more work and fill up the postpress area easily.”

In a market that keeps pushing printing prices lower, the success, even the survival of medium-size printers depends on finding the efficiencies resulting from automatic wash-up, registration and press settings from CIP3 and CIP4 data. All these mean fewer wasted sheets, less downtime, more sellable sheets produced per shift and higher profits.

Getz Color Graphics, a $5-million Lenexa, KS firm, chose a Mitsubishi Diamond 2000LS hybrid press to accommodate conventional and UV- curable inks and coatings. The firm, which also operates 28´´ and 40´´ presses, is using the 6-color, 23.5×29´´ press to produce brightly printed plastic cards, window clings and floor graphics.

Todd Getz, co-owner with his brother, Scott, says the 2000LS handles “24-pt. stock better than other presses,” which allowed it to move into this area. “Plastic cards represent a niche we have wanted to branch out into for a while,” says Getz. “Printing on plastic substrates and applying spot UV or flood coatings gives us an edge over other printers and gives our ad agency clients a better creative edge.” Getz Color Graphics has a thriving catalog business for postcards, presentation folders, brochures and business cards. “Some larger-sized and specialty brochures lend themselves to the 29´´ size,” Getz says. “The six-up layout increases productivity and minimizes paper consumption.”

Digital Ink, Richmond, VA, added a 6-color Speedmaster CD 74 with aqueous coater when it moved this summer into an expanded building more than five times larger than its original location. The new Heidelberg press, which replaced an earlier model, already has more than 11 million impressions. The F-format 23.82×29.13´´ has a top speed of 15,000 sph, at which it has been running around-the-clock since it arrived, reports the firm. The commercial shop serves high-end customers along the East Coast and also handles political print work from around the country.

The reality of today's printing market is larger numbers of smaller jobs with shorter run lengths and tighter turnaround times. Mid-size printers have to carefully balance the ability to turn small jobs around quickly against the capacity to handle a significant minority of longer runs. For this kind of printer, the mid-size press offers an economical choice: acquisition, operating and maintenance costs allow them to offer competitive prices for shorter or medium-length jobs.

“With the automatic makeready, plate hanging, closed-loop ink system and CIP3 press set up, we can get up to color in 50 sheets,” says SunDance's Ruggieri. That not only speeds turnaround, it also keeps operating costs low. Ruggieri also points out that the costs of blankets, rolls and even power and chemicals for the mid-size press are significantly lower than with full-size presses.

“We were looking for a press that would allow us to shave time off each stage of the print process,” says Kevin Sullivan, president of CCS Printing, Bellevue, WA. The company installed the first MAN Roland 500 in the Seattle area in this past summer.

CCS selected the 6-color, 23×29´´ Roland 500 press with coater specifically for the increased productivity provided by its automated features, including plate loading, registration, inking, ink flow control, plate ejection and wash up. “The press is as automated as you can buy in today's market,” Sullivan says. “We plan to show how the 500 stacks up against most of the older 40´´ hardware in the market.”

While few real-world printers can set up a press in five minutes like the manufacturers do at trade shows, they are finding that the new features result in significant time savings.

“Realistically, makeready on our new 29´´ press takes 20 to 30 minutes, depending on the number of colors,” says Paul Marino of Impress Communications. “Makeready for our 40´´ press takes 10 to 15 minutes longer.”

With an average print run of about 10,000 and a press speed of close to the rated 16,000 sph, Impress produces eight to 10 jobs per day with its LSX29. Faster makeready means, he says, “You can get one more job on the press in a day, or you can get the staff out without overtime.”

Making that increase from a 20´´ plate to 23´´ or 24´´ has made a huge difference for mid-size printers. It has given them the equipment and the format they need to pursue a growing market in between four-up and eight-up presses. The number of new models from almost every major manufacturer in the market attests to the demand for the format.

“It has allowed us to shift our market strategy: We're taking in more print-only work and are looking for the longest runs possible,” says Myers of MPress.

“The best thing about our 29´´ press is that it's very versatile,” says Impress's Marino. “It produces great quality work, and the speed of printing and the short makeready allow us to keep up with the crazy 'I want it today' market we're in.”

ONLINE: akiyama.com, kba-usa.com, komori-america.us, mlpusa.com, sakurai.com, shinohara.com, ryobi.xpedx.com and us.heidelberg.com