What’s New in the Bindery?
THOUGH SOME major digital printing equipment vendors may have sat out this year's AIIM/On Demand Conference and Exposition in Philadelphia, all of the key bindery vendors were there, showing off their latest innovations. IPG spent time at all of their booths. Here's a look at what we saw:
Binding and Stitching
The Sterling Doublebinder, from Spiel Associates, was honored with the On Demand Best of Show award in the bindery category. The Doublebinder is a lay-flat perfect binder that reportedly binds as strong as PUR and will bind up to 300 books per hour and 2˝ thick with no messy cleanup. Books dry instantly. This new technology produces a lay-flat book by gluing not only the spine, but between the sheets.
Earning an honorable mention in the On Demand Best of Show awards was the New Bind America Adventure PUR perfect binder. It does not require an external glue system, and is able to run both hot-melt and PUR glue with no mechanical changeover. It is auto cleaning, and there is no need to purge the glue from the system. Bindery operators simply add glue when needed, cutting down on wasted glue. It can handle up to 200 binding cycles per hour with spine thicknesses from .0625˝ to 2˝.
New from Standard Finishing Systems was the Standard Horizon BQ-160 single-clamp perfect binder, equipped with an intuitive, icon-based color touchscreen. The BQ-160 can produce perfect binding, tape binding and pad binding at speeds up to 180 cycles per hour with books up to 1.1˝ thick. It features an electric book clamp, two-way notching, an efficient paper dust vacuum system, nipper height and tilt adjustment from the touchscreen, and a dynamic nipper table for auto book sizing.
Also new was the Standard Horizon StitchLiner 6000 digital high-speed saddle stitcher. Integrated with Hunkeler's UW6 unwinder and CS6 rotary cutter, it produces up to 6,000 booklets per hour, and offers in-line cover feeding.
Standard's new pXnet Bindery Control System was demon–strated through–out the booth. It features drag-and-drop functionality, real-time reporting of work in process, job schedul–ing, and JDF opera–bility. Job parameters can be entered at a central control console and then called up by any Horizon finisher on the network.
On top of all the digital printing technology on display in its booth, Océ also showed an innovative tape binder, the Océ DFS30. At the show it was demonstrated inline on the VarioPrint 6320, but it can be directly attached to any of Océ's medium- to high-volume black-and-white cut-sheet printers, including the Océ VarioPrint Ultra family. It offers quick setup and simple operation via an LCD control panel. The tape binder's capacity ranges from a minimum of 10 sheets to a maximum of 120 sheets (240 pages), with support for flush cut tabs. Card covers can be added. Tape strips are available in four colors: black, dark blue, red and white, with 100 strips in each quick-loading cartridge.
Coating and Laminating
In addition to causing a stir with its award-winning Meteor DP60 Pro color digital press, MGI Digital Graphic Technology also previewed the new air-fed Digital Finisher 360 inline laminator, cutter, creaser, scorer and slitter. It provides duplex lamination (matte, satin or glossy finish), or it can provide multiple finishes, such as matte on one side, satin on the other. It handles both horizontal and vertical cutting. It can accommodate sheet widths up to 14˝ and lengths up to 29˝, making it ideal for applications such as book covers, brochures, business cards, photo books and invitations (with tear-off response card).
After the success of its DocuMate Plus 13˝ coating machine, Drytac debuted the DocuMate Plus 20˝ at On Demand. The additional width of the user friendly DocuMate Plus 20˝ gives clients more flexibility in press jobs that need coating. This machine will coat more eco-friendly, low melt, wax-infused toners and is compatible with traditional photo, offset, litho and all digital color presses.
Morgana brought a whole array of equipment to On Demand, including the DigiCoater 33 entry-level coater. It comes with three tanks (enclosed within the body of the machine) and a coating roller, and can be used for UV coating or priming. The DigiCoater 33 is controlled by a sophisticated touchscreen panel. Full control over coating thickness and stock thickness is provided by calibrated levers on either side of the coater.
GBC introduced the HeatSeal Sprint H950 laminator, reportedly the first fully automated desktop laminator. This all-in-one system reduces labor, time and supply costs up to 49 percent, or $2,500 per year, versus standard pouch laminators. Simply load up to 50 documents and press start. It will automatically feed, laminate and trim those 50 documents in 12 minutes. Warm-up time is less than a minute.
Slitting and Cutting
MBM displayed its Triumph 5222 Digicut programmable hydraulic cutter in the GBC booth. The 20.5˝ cutter features a programmable back gauge module with a digital display capable of storing 99 programs with up to 99 steps each. The adjustable hydraulic clamp makes it well suited for digital applications. In addition to many safety features, the cutter boasts a self-diagnostic system with error indication on display.
Duplo unveiled two products at On Demand: the Alpha Saddle, a fully automatic, heavy-duty saddlestitch bookletmaker, which offers "Automatic Precision Control" and produces up to 6,000 books per hour; and the DC-745 slitter/cutter/creaser, which performs up to 10 slits, 20 cuts, and 15 creases in a single pass. The DC-745 eliminates white borders and toner cracking on digital color documents at speeds of up to 50 sheets per minute. It also provides a user-friendly PC Controller for quick job changeovers, new cross and micro perforation options, and an increased feeding capacity and elevator stacking function.
Rollem showed the Rollem Advantage short-run scoring, perforating, and slitting machine for finishing digital color multiple-up products. It can edge trim in both directions, it slits and scores in one step and it eliminates guillotine cutting.
Folding
Though Baumfolder had no booth at the show, the company chose to exhibit its BAUM 20 AutoSet pile feed folder at partner C.P. Bourg's booth. Capable of storing up to 100 user-defined jobs in memory (and 30 pre-programmed folding impositions), the folder has a maximum sheet size: of 20.5x33˝ and runs at a maximum speed of 8,200˝ per minute. It boasts a built-in batch and total counter, adjustable slitter shafts, combination folding rollers and sealed ball bearings.
Punching
Spiral Binding Co./James Burn USA showed the Alpha-Doc automatic punch, capable of producing up to 48,000 punched sheets per hour. It punches preprinted, collated documents directly from a copier or printer, including mixed stocks from 16 lb. bond to 110 lb. index. A turnover device keeps pre-collated document pages in order. Hands-free operation means operators are free to perform other tasks. Also at the show was the Binding Station 4 in 1, a heavy-duty punch and binding system that will punch and bind plastic comb, coil and Wire-O. It has four different punching dies and three binding stations.
Mailing
RENA Systems, now part of Neopost, showed the new T-650 Multi-side Tabber, which can handle all USPS tabbing automation regulations—current and proposed—in one pass. The tabber can apply tabs to folded self mailers, double postcards, booklets, CD/DVD cases and more. It can apply tabs to opposite sides of a mailer or booklet at the same time, and can even place a tab on the top edge while simultaneously applying multiple tabs to the side edge. The T-650 will reach speeds up to 25,000/hour, and can apply stamps too.
Pitney Bowes showed its new Connect+ 3000 system at On Demand, part of its new Connect+ Customer Communications Series, which enables mailers to print high-resolution graphics and messages on the outside of the envelope. The print technology was developed as a strategic collaboration with HP. It allows 1,200 dpi promotional messages to be printed across the top of envelopes with text, logos or photographs, while applying postage all in one pass. The Connect+ 3000 system can produce up to 300 letters per minute and features a color touchscreen display with graphic icons for online access to numerous mailing, printing and reporting applications. IPG
Bob has served as editor of In-plant Impressions since October of 1994. Prior to that he served for three years as managing editor of Printing Impressions, a commercial printing publication. Mr. Neubauer is very active in the U.S. in-plant industry. He attends all the major in-plant conferences and has visited more than 180 in-plant operations around the world. He has given presentations to numerous in-plant groups in the U.S., Canada and Australia, including the Association of College and University Printers and the In-plant Printing and Mailing Association. He also coordinates the annual In-Print contest, co-sponsored by IPMA and In-plant Impressions.