11-Unit Rapida Press With Perfecting And Coater

Russian printing house Obraztsovaya Tipografia in St Petersburg has signed the acceptance certificate for its first KBA press, a Rapida 105.

The Rapida 105 will join one half-format and four medium-format Heidelberg presses at the Obraztsovaya Tipografia plant.

KBA said the press will have an 11-unit configuration with perfecting after the fifth unit, a coater as the 11th unit, an extended delivery and a board-printing capability.

Whilst the configuration was chosen to print high-quality tea packaging, it is said to be also suitable for any type of light packaging - for example, for health care products, cosmetics, food and semi-luxury goods - whilst enhancing cost efficiency and automation.

In Russia, embedding security features as a means of distinguishing branded goods from counterfeits is as important as adding a protective coating, added KBA.

Obraztsovaya Tipografia proprietor Alexey Filatov, a trained physicist, uses high-grade UV coatings and holograms.

Nitrogen recovered in the printing plant is used amongst other things to cool the inking units.

Any surplus is sold to an established customer base outside the print media industry.

Other ideas the firm has implemented include a shift system in which two 12-hour working days are followed by two days off.

German press operators will soon be joining the shift workers to provide on-the-job training for their Russian counterparts to optimise quality and output.

According to KBA Obraztsovaya Tipografia's management is looking forward to the capacity boost the long Rapida 105 will bring.

Although Obraztsovaya Tipografia is based in the centre of St Petersburg, the new press will be installed in a production plant on the outskirts of the city.

Yuri Ukolov, the new managing director of KBA's Moscow-based Russian agency, KBA RUS, reports that printers in St Petersburg have shown more interest in KBA sheetfed presses since the contract for the Rapida was signed.

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