Oosterhout, January 2014  - Q.I. Press Controls expands worldwide installation base mRC-3D and IDS: Now Sweden

Early 2014 Sydostpressarna AB and Q.I. Press Controls finalized the agreement for the supply of 12 IDS colour control camera’s, 24 mRC-3D register control camera’s and the quality and performance reporting tool IQM. All to be fitted on their manroland GEOMAN press.

Sydostpressarna located in the South-East of Sweden is part of Gota-Media AB who owns a total of 15 newspapers, all with a strong local presence. “At first our priority was in the reduction of production time and waste as we were working too close to deadlines. And of course savings in waste is always worth looking into. So initially we were investigating the options for register control only,” states Jan-Åke Lundgren, Sydostpressarna’s Plantmanager. “However, over time Q.I. Press Controls made us aware of more saving opportunities like in labour and ink. The presented results in customer case studies made us curious enough to visit one of their customers. This reference visit convinced us that Q.I. Press Controls’ solutions would truly automate the printing process. Our cost would significantly be reduced over different aspects of the printing process, much more than when just having a register system.”

Full automation for “True automation”
The final order by Sydostpressarna in Q.I. Press Controls’ equipment resulted in several Swedish firsts. Q.I. Press Controls have her Swedish premiere with the Intelligent Density System (IDS), that will be fitted on a manroland GEOMAN press consisting of 6 printing units and 2 folders. IDS is a unique markless automatic colour measurement and control system for web offset presses. It finds and holds the optimum quality by automatically increasing and reducing water on top of the existing automatic control of ink. By controlling the two component offset process IDS maintains colour consistency according to ISO standards and makes web-offset printing facilities more efficient.

Sydostpressarna will also be the first Swedish printer to have mRC-3D installed; 24 mRC-3D camera’s in total. The cameras, equipped with Automatic Ink Mist Shield (AIMS) technology, will provide precise control of colour, cut-off and sidelay register. Additionally it will also fully regulate plate to plate- unit-to-unit,- and fan-out registration. The mRC-3D detection camera has been equipped with double sensors and automatic self-cleaning. With the double sensors the camera can cope more effectively with depth; This concept proves its great added value particularly well in case of unsteady paper web routings and/or surfaces. With the AIMS, manual cleaning of the lens is no longer needed. When polluted automatically a new antistatic crystal-clear section of film is rolled in front of the sensors and, after fully automated calibration, the precision measurements resume undisturbed. And this without any action on the part of printing personnel, in only a few seconds, at any location on the rotary press.

All measured data from the mRC-3D and IDS camera’s will be gathered, analyzed and reported by the Intelligent Quality Management System IQM. A MIS that reports real time data on all quality related data of the printing process. It facilitates prompt decisions based on sound facts and makes the printing process transparent towards customers. As it gives clear indications of print process related problems it can initiate process improvements. It also offers customers evident product reporting.

Erwin van Rossem, Area Sales Manager of Q.I. Press Controls for Sweden: “The investigation phase of Sydostpressarna started almost at the same time we started working together with Piculell & Söderqvist, our new agent for Sweden and Denmark since early 2013. It was great to see how it all came together. I’m honoured that Sydostpressarna has selected Q.I. Press Controls to be their partner in this large automation project. This will enable us to show the Swedish market that our technologies can enable newspaper print shops to print more efficient, which is essential looking at today’s economic climate.”

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Jan-Ake Lundgren: "This reference visit convinced us that Q.I. Press Controls’ solutions would truly automate the printing process"