CTP Speeds Turnaround Times in Texas

“We had to reduce turn times,” declares Richard Beto, director of document services at the University of Texas at Austin. “It’s all ‘now, now, now.’ They want their jobs now.”

This is what drove the 68-employee in-plant to install a new semi-automatic Fuji Saber Luxel Vx 9600 violet computer-to-plate device with a Rampage front end in July. The platesetter is making metal plates for the shop’s 40˝ and 29˝ presses.

“The manual process was just taking too long,” adds Beto. By cutting out some of those extra steps, the in-plant was able to downsize its prepress staff, reducing costs. Print quality has also improved since film was eliminated, Beto says.

Jobs flowing through the Luxel Vx 9600 range from business cards, letterhead and envelopes to six-color brochures, booklets and marketing materials.

The semi-automatic platesetter features automatic plate feeding and processing. A single-laser violet plate­setter, it can output 19 eight-page plates per hour at 2,400 dpi.

“We found that violet plate­setters tend to be more productive at a lower cost than thermal devices,” explains Herman Garcia, electronic prepress supervisor. “Violet devices have a lower up-front cost, as well as lower lifetime service and maintenance costs. They have fewer laser diodes, consume less energy and operate at a greater speed.”

This isn’t all that’s new at UT-Austin. Last month the in-plant took over data center printing, moving that work from two unreliable 14-year-old printers onto its two Xerox Nuvera 120s and a DocuTech 6135.

“We saved the university hundreds of thousands of dollars in capital equipment costs,” contends Beto. “We’ve picked up about a million copies a month.”