Processless Plates Reduce Chemical And Water Usage

With the aim of enhancing its environmental performance, East Anglian (UK) printer Breckland Print has begin to use Fuji's Brillia HD Pro-T thermal processless plates.

Used on Breckland Print's Heidelberg Topsetter press, the Brillia Pro-T plates are said to be compatible with most thermal (830nm) platesetters and approved for one per cent to 99 per cent at 200 lines per inch (lpi) conventional, 300lpi hybrid and FM screening.

Brillia Pro-T is a non-ablative plate that carries a latent image with contrast to allow visual inspection after imaging.

Fujifilm said that Brillia Pro-T only needs an imaging power very close to Fuji's existing thermal processed plate at 120mJ per square centimetre, resulting in the same production speeds.

Supporting run lengths up to 100,000 impressions, it will also meet the demands of most commercial printers and can be handled under daylight conditions.

Breckland Print was the first commercial printing company in East Anglia to achieve ISO 14001 accreditation.

Dave Spooner, commercial manager of Breckland Print, said: "We've been long time users of Fuji plates and switched to Pro-T to cut down on chemical and water usage and for the quality benefits of taking the processless route.

Unlike other processless plates on the market there are no speed sacrifices when using Pro-T plates and you also do not need a gumming unit, both factors which were critical in our decision." He continued: "Environmental issues are central to everything we do here.

By running Pro-T plates we've completely eradicated the use of chemicals and water in our platemaking operation, which has further reduced our raw material usage and overall impact on society." Breckland Print is a client of Fujifilm dealer Mayday Graphics, whose managing director, Graham Timson, commented: "We have been aware that Breckland Print is very serious about environmental issues and that it has won a number of important environmental awards, including several BPIF excellence awards.

Although the switch to processless required a minor adjustment to working practices, the enthusiasm of Breckland's production staff, combined with the company's environmental ethos, ensured a highly successful installation." Founded in 1976, Breckland Print has 70 staff and operates 24 hours, seven days-a-week.

The company runs a number of Komori B2 presses and for short run four-colour work it has two Xerox Docucolor digital presses.

Its customers include Jaguar Cars, The Museum of London, The Victoria and Albert Museum, Norwich City Football Club and The Medici Society.

It also prints the Buckingham Palace guide book in nine languages.

Back to top