Web Presses: News
Features
COMBINATION WEB PRESSES
Jan 1, 2001 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
RDP Marathon's offset-based SR series of high-speed, variable repeat combination web presses are said to enable direct-mail printers to facilitate shorter runs and fast turnaround. Combination web press technology allows process printing and provides features such as spot adhesives, varnish and scratch-off coatings inline with interchangeable printing inserts, in hybrid configurations of litho, flexo,
WEB PRESS SIGNATURE FOLDER
Jan 1, 2001 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
Muller Martini's F-74 signature folder allows printers to use any variable-size web press to produce folded signatures for brochures, stitched inserts, manuals, mailings, calendars, short-run publications and other products. The folder is servo-driven and produces a wide variety of fold types and sizes, infinitely variable within its size range, inline with the press or offline. Products are delivered
INLINE CREASING/CUTTING/PERF
Jan 1, 2001 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
Carton Craft is distributing the PrintLine RSP Inline System, a creasing, cutting and perforating system currently for use on 40-inch Heidelberg Speedmaster presses. The product, developed in Germany in cooperation with Heidelberg, enables printers to print and finish jobs inline at full press speed. A grid sheet is put on a base plate, then wrapped around the impression cylinder. Offset creasing
WORLD-CLASS MAKEREADIES
Dec 1, 2000 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
In the face of increasingly shorter runs and turnaround times, printers discussed how they've improved makereadies at the Research & Engineering Council's 26th annual "Progress in the Pressroom" seminar in Chicago.At web printer Fry Communications, Inc. (Mechanicsburg, PA), paid performance and plate changers are shaving time off makeready. Press operators are awarded fixed bonuses when the presses
WEB OFFSET OUTLOOK 2001
Dec 1, 2000 12:00 AM, JILL ROTH
Concern about tough competition and lack of skilled employees continues to present challenges to web printers in 2000There's a lot of excitement about the future of the printing industry as it increasingly competes with other media. New technology continually fills the programs of seminars and conferences throughout the industry. But successful printers also must focus on the nuts and bolts of their
SAVE TIME AND POSTAGE WITH COMMINGLING
Nov 1, 2000 12:00 AM, KEN BOONE
For high-volume jobs, it can reduce postal costs, speed, delivery and provides accurate test marketing results.Commingling is the process of merging multiple strings of mail into a single mail stream. When the right types of large-volume jobs are combined, all clients involved can achieve significant postal discounts. The U.S. Postal Service (U.S.P.S.) requires a minumum of 150 pieces per zip code
EVOLUTION OF WEB PRINTING>
Nov 1, 2000 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
Champion International (Stamford, CT), a wholly owned subsidiary of International Paper, discusses web printing, paper and production in its z-fold brochure, "Evolution," the first in a series that will discuss the latest developments in web printing. It addresses five issues involved in prepress: scanning, PDF, electronic file transfer, proofing and computer-to-plate. The six-page, full-color brochure
GRAPH EXPO ORDERS EXCEED $150 MILLION
Nov 1, 2000 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
With more than 46,000 Graph Expo attendees, Heidelberg received orders in excess of $150 million. "This has been an extremely strong show, even after a very successful Drupa," says Niels M. Winther, president and CEO of Heidelberg USA.Heidelberg debuted new products to the North America market like NexPress 2100. NexPress four-color digital press is a joint venture between Heidelberg and Kodak.Heidelberg
SKILL TESTING
Sep 1, 2000 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
The National Council for Skill Standards in Graphic Communications (Kennebunk, ME) is offering exams for national certification in flexo and litho press operating. Testing dates for multicolor press operator certification are November 9, 2000, February 22, 2001, and May 24, 2001. Group testing is available by special arrangement. For more information and a free examination registration kit, contact
Increase your sales with short-run, four-color process labels
Sep 1, 2000 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
Label Art offers short-run, four-color process labels. Previously, running a small-quantity, four-color process order was simply not cost effective. In fact, one might even say it was prohibitive, but not any more. With new advances in technology and print quality, Label Art is able to produce affordable four-color process labels in quantities as small as 1,000.Label Art's inexpensive, four-color
Clean your way to profits: The company that cleaned up the pressroom brings its white glove to prepress
Sep 1, 2000 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
Since its introduction to the printing industry, the JDS Airtech 2000 has cleaned up hundreds of pressrooms.By removing spray powder residue in the pressroom, printers had fewer hickeys and less press maintenance. This resulted in greater productivity and higher profits. These customers were also able to reduce waste and the wear and tear on their heating and cooling systems.Prepress successNow the
MANAGING A MIXED PLATFORM
Jul 1, 2000 12:00 AM, DAVID L. ZWANG
An integrated solution can provide maximum flexibility.Over the years, mixed platform management issues have both fascinated and frustrated me. Early on, I was a techno nerd. I started in the graphic arts in the 1960s and got involved with computers in the late 1970s. Initially, using a computer was an emotional, almost religious experience, but it soon became just a tool.Which platform is best for
IMPROVING WEB PRESS PRODUCTIVITY
Apr 1, 2000 12:00 AM, Richard C. Holliday
Old timers remember well the salad days when web offset, flexing its economic muscles, bullied its way into market segment after market segment. Print buyers discovered they couldn't afford to print growing numbers of catalog, magazine, brochure, book and even packaging jobs on large sheetfed presses, letterpresses and, in some cases, gravure presses.Heatset web offset was the printing industry success
the outlook for web offset
Nov 1, 1999 12:00 AM, Jill Roth
Close attention to production efficiencies and concern about labor shortages mark the web offset printing market in 1999.Representing the largest segment of the printing industry in terms of volume, the web offset market boasts the biggest companies and the most employees. What happens in web offset affects the entire printing industry. Checking the pulse of this industry segment is a strong indicator
RAISING THE QUALITY BAR
Oct 1, 1999 12:00 AM, AMERICAN PRINTER STAFF
With the advent of digital technologies, mediocre printing is something that few print buyers, ad agencies and customers accept from commercial, catalog and publication offset printers. Now, national retailers are raising the quality bar on the most disposable of printed materials--the insert.Retailers know that high-caliber printing of these multi-page advertisements helps lure customers into store
SOMETHING'S BURNING
Aug 1, 1999 12:00 AM, KATHERINE O'BRIEN
The dream is always the same. You are walking through your sheet-fed pressroom. Not a sound can be heard. No one is there. The silence unnerves you. You stop to examine pallets of paper near the end of a press. Only it isn't paper. It's money. Stacks and stacks of it as far as you can see. Just as you are about to grasp a handful of bills, the money spontaneously combusts and Johnny Cash is standing
ALL TOO HUMAN
Jun 1, 1999 12:00 AM, KATHERINE O'BRIEN
There's something wrong with the majority of today's sheet-fed presses. Automation is not the issue--the blanket and roller washing, plate loading, hickey picking, etc., works just fine. We can't fault bearer-to-bearer ring contact, or plate-to-blanket squeeze, or the shore hardness of rollers or water and fountain solution pH and conductivity, either. So what's the problem? We are. Old-fashioned
PRESSROOM OPERATIONS; MOVING RIGHT ALONG
May 1, 1999 12:00 AM, KATHERINE M. O'BRIEN
If today's web presses had a theme song it would be "Ride of the Valkries" (a.k.a. That Superman Music). Modern iron might not be faster than a speeding bullet, but at 3,000 fpm it would be a close race. New technology--including an arsenal of automated features--figuratively lets printers leap tall buildings in a single bound. However, just as Lex Luthor and the occasional pocketful of Kryptonite
PRESSROOM: ON YOUR MARK, GET SET, MAKEREADY!
Apr 1, 1999 12:00 AM, KATHERINE O'BRIEN
An inefficient sheet-fed makeready is similar to driving a car with a flat tire. You can bump along for awhile on the rim, but you'll run up huge repair bills. Plus, you will probably cause a massive traffic jam as fellow motorists slow down either to savor your misfortune or shower you with abuse for slowing them down.Efficient makereadies, on the other hand, are like a pitstop at the Indy 500. "It
SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW
Jan 1, 1999 12:00 AM, JIM KINGSBY
John Glenn's recent return to space as member of the space shuttle Discovery crew provides an apt metaphor for thermography foil stamping and embossing and holography. Even though NASA's cutting edge technology now enables us to peer deep into the cosmos, we retain a certain mixture of awe, gratitude and nostalgia for the pioneers who made it all possible. As space shuttle missions have become routine,
