Quadtech systems reduce start-up waste at GAC

GAC, a magazine and commercial insert printer in Saitama, Japan, has reduced start-up waste and increased productivity after installing Quadtech's colour-to-colour and cut-off register systems.

GAC installed the Quadtech systems on its three MHI web-offset presses.

Both systems utilise Multicam, which is said to be an extremely fast register camera.

GAC decided to install the technology to stop profit margins from being eroded by steep rises in the prices of ink and paper.

Once installed, the Quadtech systems were capable of achieving precise colour and cut-off registration on four-colour work after just 700 sheets from the start of the printing run, resulting in a saving of 300 sheets per job.

Multicam is said to achieve good copy quickly because it can scan for registration marks at a rate of 30 times a second, in spite of web tension changes.

Multicam can also use the colour registration marks for cut-off control, without needing to search an area of print contrast.

Mr Tuda, production director at GAC, said: 'Abrupt web tension changes cause the circumferential register marks to jolt out of position.

'The previous registration system had a relatively small scanning window, so it would only take a small movement to send the marks outside the detection area, resulting in waste.

'Multicam, however, has a relatively large scanning window of 25mm2, so register marks remain detectable regardless of web movement,' he added.

Quadtech said that the savings are significant as in a typical day up to five jobs, ranging from 20,000 to 240,000 pages, are produced on each press.

The Multicam can identify register marks at up to 17.8m/s.

As a result, GAC could increase the speeds of the MHI presses by as much as 30 per cent to about 840 revolutions per minute, once Multicam was installed.

Working with register marks as small as 0.36mm, the Multicam camera allows GAC's press operators to use small, unobtrusive register marks, which are preferable as they avoid any conflict with the printed images or editorial content.

The marks can be positioned laterally across the web, or circumferentially, in line with the print.

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