Midsize sheetfeds:just right

Today's minicomputers have become more and more popular, even medium-sized, especially half-width presses. Many businesses have recognized that large-scale is not always a good thing, and the continued growth in the sales of half-width presses has attracted the funding of many manufacturers. “The 26- to 29-inch midsize press has changed from a younger brother to a big brother on the market. It already has the same automation capabilities as a mainframe, five to six workgroups, and double-sided printing and in-line dryers. "C. Clint Bolte and Association consultant, C. Klein Petter, said. Although the manufacturers explained differently, they all admitted that the sales volume of medium-sized printing presses was expanding. This also reflected the fact that the market long-run printing is on the way down, and the short-run printing is on the increase. Sales Hot Spot manoland sales manager Rudy Watson said: “The social changes are really fast now. No one wants to save the prints too long. The market for 28-inch presses is the hottest” Komori's Douglas Sand He also agreed with Wadeyin’s point of view. He said: “If it is not compelling, no one is willing to use a 40-inch printing press for short-run printing. Long-term readiness does not bring a profit.” In fact, this The half-width printing press is both strong and inexpensive and has a good response in the secondary market. Martin Patterson, marketing manager of Akiyama, reflected that their old 28-inch press was soon sold. "We don't have to wait long," he said. The advantages of the 28-inch machine Many people believe that the popularity of medium-sized printing presses is inseparable from the quality of their prints. Bruno Assmann, Product Manager at Heidelberg, said: “For some printing jobs, it is most convenient to use mid-sized machine registration and color correction.” Because of the automation programs developed for large 40-inch machines, such as automatic plate change, Blanket and drum cleaning, print control, preset ink keys, etc., can all be achieved on medium machines. "These are all things that have been tested on the mainframe. It shouldn't be difficult for medium-sized presses," Pault commented. Dan Mark, sales manager of Polly USA, also believes that printing quality is fundamental, and printing capacity is only a secondary issue. According to Heidelberg Assmann, in general, medium-sized machines can save a lot of labor. The biggest cost of a company is the labor cost. Labor-saving machines are doomed to save a lot of costs for the company. The general manager of Shinohara USA, L. Capranone, insisted: "If you have a 40-inch press, but you can't guarantee two or three shifts, you won't be able to make a profit at all. If a medium-sized press is equipped with automation, Its production capacity will be comparable to a 40-inch mainframe." That's the way it is. Many printers also do not see where the difference between four- and eight-open is. “Large-scale printing presses have large workloads and the number of personnel has to increase. In fact, the workload of personnel is not related to the size of the printing press. If these two large and medium printing presses are put together and worked together, the final results of the personnel work must be the same. “Said Weaver, the printer at Valdosta, said. The mainframe consumes a lot of "The mainframe's workload is relatively large and requires more ink. The ink in the ink fountain and the fountain solution in the dampening tank also need to be changed frequently." "If there is not a lot of such activity, the mainframe The advantage of high work capacity is offset by the large amount of material consumed for each shutdown.” Weaver added. If you often do text printing, it is best to avoid using the mainframe. Because in addition to the cover or thick cardboard, the mainframe printing is relatively large when the paper is stretched, the amount of ink is also more demand, resulting in a relatively long preparation time, the printing workers sometimes have to reduce the ink viscosity or change the order. Smaller models do not have to be replaced, and print quality can be justified. Commercial printers who are moving toward multi-color printing are major consumers of medium-sized printing presses. Year after year, integrated printers account for 70% to 85% of the sales of medium-sized 28-inch machines. They mainly include two major categories: large commercial printers and small-scale instant printing shops. According to John Sentai, product manager of Mitsubishi offset printing (USA) sheet-fed presses, many businesses who already have 40-inch large presses are hoping to add a small press. Because "the 28-inch press has high flexibility, people can't always rely on 40-inch mainframes when printing small paper or short-run printing," he said. As a small-scale instant-to-print printing shop, the main purpose of their purchase of this medium-sized machine was to find a cornerstone for entering the multi-color printing market. Another kind of printer for internal use, the purpose of their purchase of the printing press is to better serve the various departments of the company, and then to provide convenience for the outside world. The digital influence experts are convinced that the digitization of printing, whether using ink or toner, is the main reason for the rise of short-run printing, and it is also an important factor driving the popularity of medium-sized printing presses. But fundamentally speaking, digital direct imaging (DI) is inherently a competitor to traditional medium-sized printing, and ultimately it must grab a share from its mouth. Presstek Inc. The company's DI product marketing manager, Sentika, said so: "We hope that this market is entirely the world of DI printing machines. Of course, this is not something that can happen overnight. Can it be achieved within the next five years? It's hard to say, but we do hope that the future DI4 press will eventually be able to overcome the traditional medium-sized printing press and completely occupy its market." Presstek's ProFire imaging technology integrates laser, laser drive, and digital electronic control, and it is equipped with many four. Open the printing press above. Machines such as Adast, Sakurai, Shinohara, and Akiyama, which is under development, are examples. Other four-port printers include the Karat Digital Press Karat74 using Creo-SkySquare SquareSpot imaging technology and the Speedmaster 74 DI printing presses in Heidelberg, as well as the TruePress 744 in the screen company. The biggest advantage of direct platemaking is that it can shorten the ready time. Most manufacturers of four-way DI presses claim that their machine preparation time is within 10 to 15 minutes. Since the basic prices of the four-port DI printers ranged from $850,000 to $1.24 million, many small printers chose small two-spread printers that cost between 350,000 and 420,000 as a four-year-old printer after one year. The transition model. Like many other new products, as the technology advances, DI printer prices will eventually decline. As far as 1995 is concerned, there were only two kinds of two-port models, and the prices were all around $640,000. “By nature, digital printing opportunities to eat a part of the traditional four-copy printing machine market, but from the quality and speed point of view, the traditional medium-sized printing press will still exist for a considerable period of time.” Mitsubishi's Senti said. Komoras also said that although their Adast 26-inch press has been selling, traditional presses still dominate. He believes that the reason for the slow sales of digital presses is that most printers still use traditional methods to bake plates. Needless to say, the manufacturers of four-press printers never thought that digital printing would kill traditional medium-sized presses. Polly USA's Mark even optimistically believes that the 26- to 29-type machines will still have strong competitiveness, because digital printing and traditional offset printing methods are mutually compatible. He said: "The computer-to-plate technology not only requires printers to spend 1 to 2 million to purchase plate-making equipment, but also requires the rest of the shop to be digitized, but digital printing machines are more expensive."