Heidelberg Sells First UK Suprasetter CTP.

Westdale Printing Group is to take its second 12-colour Speedmaster SM102 and two ST300 saddle-stitchers but it will also be the UK front-runner in ordering Heidelberg's new Suprasetter CTP.

Westdale Printing Group is to take its second 12-colour Speedmaster SM102 and two ST300 saddle-stitchers but it will also be the UK front-runner in ordering Heidelberg's new Suprasetter CTP technology that is being officially unveiled at Drupa this week.

Part of a total ?3 million investment, the new SM 102-12P, which will be delivered in the summer features Heidelberg's new Preset Plus feeder.

Having also bought a second hand Web 16 last year Westdale was keen to upgrade its Scitex Brisque with a more PDF capable workflow.

It was also very convinced by Heidelberg's own home-developed Suprasetter technology.

"We are so impressed by this new technology.

Our volume of PDF files has increased significantly and we want to be JDF compatible.

Suprasetter offers us that and also the ability to centre as well as side register means we can output plates as easily for web or sheetfed work.

It will enhance our ability to handle more short run multi-section work because it will output 30 plates an hour and with cassette loading can have up to 600 plates to feed at any one time," said Westdale managing director Alan Padbury.

The preflighting will automatically check the integrity of the PDF file prior to output.

The company will also take Realtime remote proofing and it will use the latest Printready 2.0 workflow, Prepress Interface and Imagecontrol spectrophotometry to give closed loop colour management.

It will undertake a print colour management consultancy programme to bring production quality to a set standard throughout the plant.

"I am convinced that running web and sheet presses together brings the quality standards of web up," says Padbury.

The company is replacing its three-year-old 12-colour B1 press because it wants to have Cutstar, the reel to sheets facility.

Alan Padbury said: "The price difference between reels and sheets has widened and we want Cutstar to further reduce costs and improve efficiency.

We are a web and sheetfed house so have the experience, materials handling and stock control capability for reels.

We are handling more multi-section perfect bound work and Cutstar will enhance the volumes we can handle." The Cardiff (UK) company offers a web and sheetfed service producing a huge range of material (report and accounts, covers, journals, multi-section catalogues, books and promotional material) for a broad range of customers including the Welsh Tourist Board, Welsh Assembly and Pearson.

Padbury added that a 12-colour press is enormously productive and the company has run its machine 24 hours a day with only three Christmas days off since installation in February 2001.

In that time it has clocked up 125 million impressions.

Completing its investment is the purchase of two Stitchmaster ST300s, both four-station with cover feeder, which will run alongside the ST300 installed in 2001.

Westdale Printing Group said that Heidelberg has secured each area of investment on its own merit and the fact that it gives it a future platform for full JDF networking provides a further sense of security.

The group comprises four companies: Double Six Press; Westdale Press; Bay Graphics and East Moors Binding.

There are three plants and it is Padbury's ambition to centralise in a single purpose built factory in the next five years.

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