E&P Technical: Trio of New Inserters
[2008-5-16]
Tag: Industrial Machine
Until recent years, eight companies made most U.S. newspapers' inserters. Though some names have changed, there still are seven suppliers today, but probably more machines to choose from, including three new ones — two of which are from companies relatively new to the U.S. market for inserters.
Back in 1989, Baldwin Technology Inc. bought Kansa. In 2002, however, Vektek Inc. and two Kansa founders bought back the Baldwin Kansa Corp. subsidiary's assets.
The number still didn't change when Goss International acquired Heidelberger's newspaper business and Quipp Inc. acquired USA Leader, while Muller Martini took more direct control of its GMA subsidiary. Up to that point, Muller Martini-developed inserters at U.S. newspapers consisted mostly of older 227 models, with most of the Swiss parent company's newer models sold overseas to papers with more modest inserting requirements.
Goss and Muller Martini still offered the same machines for the high end of the market — Goss' Heidelberg-developed Magnapak and its NP642 (based on Heidelberg's AM Graphics-developed NP630), and Muller Martini Mailroom Systems' SLS-3000 (which evolved from GMA's original SLS-1000). And Quipp had entered the inserter business with its In-Line machine, competing with Muller Martini's Model 227 and serving as the basis of its collator with polywrapper.
After Quipp also acquired inserter remanufacturer/upgrader and controls developer Newstec, the Miami-based company moved into mid-market inserters when it developed the High-Speed model.
Besides the linear (and older carousel) systems used for heavy inserting into Sunday editions, some sites use Ferag's big drum machine for smaller weekday inserting needs and, more recently, its RollStream precollecting technology for collating.
Until this year only two major inserters, both 25,000-cycle-per-hour machines, had been introduced since the high-end Magnapak (designed in the late 1990s) and SLS3000, which debuted in 2003. K&M Newspaper Services' Titan G60, which in 2005 helped propel the Monroe, N.Y., manufacturer further into the mid-size newspaper market, is expandable from eight to 62 shaftless hoppers in four-module increments (each four with local PLC). Lowered hoppers feature automatic zone-change engagement and on-the-fly pocket phasing. Options include light-section hoppers, dual-format pocket, and single or dual delivery, with belt or gripper conveyor.
The next year, Quipp unveiled its High-Speed, aiming to accurately handle single sheets and various formats and for simpler set-up and operation. Expandable to 30 stations in two-feeder modules, with two main-jacket feeders, the High-Speed uses jackets as narrow as 11 inches and holds packages as thick as 1.5 inch. It offers multiple stacker releases, miss repair, and zoning. Recent enhancements include a longer, less-steep delivery, as well as gripper and pick-up changes for better product control.
This spring, however, three new inserters from companies in three countries will give newspapers more choices among machines and manufacturers — a Swiss firm well- established in North America; a more recently arrived Danish company recognized for its palletizers; and a newer U.S. firm led by an inserter industry veteran and selling a different Danish company's palletizers.
Muller Martini's next moves
After showing an SLS4000 last year, when America East rolled around this year, Muller Martini kept the focus on a newer machine, referring to the former as an upgraded SLS3000. At the regional trade show and conference in Hershey, Pa., the company previewed its fourth inserter — the top-of-the-line ProLiner.
Muller Martini continues developing the SLS machine, according to company executives. The AlphaLiner, for light inserting, and NewsLiner also remain in production. In fact, the ProLiner is the product of an effort begun 2 years ago to combine the advantages of the SLS3000 and the NewsLiner. Muller Martini Marketing Manager Volker Leonhardt characterizes the ProLiner as "a further development of the NewsLiner" using the SLS feeding system.
Fed press-to-pocket, press-to hopper, manually loaded, or from a buffer, the machine is designed to handle difficult- to-open tabloid products, according to Leonhardt, who says "the newspaper is guided through the entire process — it doesn't work with gravity." Gripped at the fold, jackets are taken over a wheel, paddles combing them through open-side-up, at which point front and rear pairs of grippers open and hold them. "Now the feeder is over the pocket for the first time" on a Muller Martin machine, says Amrish Thacker, president and CEO at Muller Martini Mailroom Systems, Allentown, Pa.
Unlike drum models, says Western Sales Manager Keith Hockenbery, the machine handles two products at once because the sucker comes off the sheet before the sheet is turned completely around, allowing it to pick up the next sheet — an arrangement that boosts throughput without increasing machine speed.
The quiet-running ProLiner features variable-format pockets and on-the-fly lap adjustment. Training relies on a two-page set-up sheet, says Hockenbery, in contrast to the 14 steps of 20 years ago. Automation's effect on staffing, throughput, reliability, and versatility justifies investment in the inserter, according to Thacker. While a ProLiner may cost more, he says, "your total cost of ownership may not change" in comparison with other inserting systems.
A test machine was installed in mid-2006 at AZ Medien, near the Swiss com-pany's Zofingen headquarters. Sales began six months later. Twenty systems are running now in Europe.
U.S. sales began at Nexpo, where a machine run at near maximum speed put two inserts into a 24-page broadsheet using a hopper and satellite feeder to simulate a FlexiRoll buffer. Later this month, a complete ProLiner will be shown at the Drupa trade show in Düsseldorf, Germany, where it will have improved feeding technology, according to Hans Peter Sutter, president at Muller Martini Mailroom in Zofingen.
Developed by the company's U.S. and Swiss units, the modular inserter "can adapt to any market requirements worldwide," says Thacker. The system can be expanded as needed to as many as 30 feeders. Easily integrated intermediate openings enable precise insert placement into sections.
Calling it "a complementary addition" to the SLS systems, Thacker says the ProLiner is aimed at mid- to high-circulation papers that require high-throughput inserting.
Cycle time is put at 45,000 per hour. Designed for easy and fast insert change, the feeder's short set-up time boosts net output, the company says. Streamfeeders that simplify manual loading also add to net output, with one person able to operate several Streamfeeders with thinner inserts. Also, the Promo feeder station is available for smaller pieces, such as CDs. Configurable controls check for misses and doubles, with incompletes either rejected or completed using back-up feeders.
According to Thacker, the ProLiner is user-friendly and safe, functions with a wide range of products, and offers opportunities to increase revenue through associated inline stitching, labeling, and inkjet addressing. Sutter describes it as a "high-end integrated process" that relies on fewer people to provide more capabilities and achieve higher throughput. Unlike an inline trimmer at the press stitching whole products, the ProLiner can stitch different sections, according to Sutter.
Inserting in '08, collating in '09
In the two years since leaving the firm that dominated the inserter business in the U.S., Randy Seidel has had his hand in industrial battery testing, core cutting and printing, and simple conveyors. He soon moved into new and rebuilt newspaper mailroom equipment, eventually re-entering the inserter manufacturing business.
With its first 25,000-per-hour SE2500 installed last August across the state at The Derrick, in Oil City, and five more ordered, Seidel Enterprises Inc. in Easton, Pa., is introducing a 35,000-per-hour SE3500 and is completing work on what Seidel describes as a highly automated, high-throughput collator. The company also offers control software, training, enhancements, and preventive maintenance programs.
As in the first years at his old company, GMA, Seidel is involved in rebuilding inserters. And while the SE2500 is his new company's design, he says, it has used the model's components in some rebuilds.
The SE3500, however, is a brand-new design "from the ground up," Seidel says. Both models are straight-line machines with gripper delivery, independently driven feeders, miss and double detection and repair, and control software from Prism Inc. Both are expandable by two feeder modules, from 2:1 to 40:1. The 3500 feeder works on two papers at a time. "That's what gets us the speed," says Seidel, who calls it "a more simplistic feeder, [requiring] far less maintenance than most."
A two-wire RF controller communicates with each feeder, for easier operation and troubleshooting, with a long-life 24-volt system, Seidel adds.
"We're able to open the newspaper without air and without vacuum," he says. The pocket's geometry, he explains, is such that airflow across one corner "forces the newspaper open." Made of a light, quiet, static-free material, the pockets can be configured for quarterfold and Berliner products.
Drop timing on the 3500 can be advanced and retarded on the fly. The overlap for opening can be as little as a quarter inch, which Seidel believes to be the smallest in use. Jackets can be as large as 96 broadsheet or 130 tabloid pages. Completed packages can run to 1,000 tabloid pages. Dual zoning enables concurrent handling of different products.
The Derrick, which also installed a stackPro stacker, SE500 hopper loaders and conveyors from Seidel Enterprises, reports improved staffing and off times and a 12-month ROI after moving from its two older Muller Martini 227s to one 12:1 SE2500.
Designed to be able to handle light, small, hard-to-run inserts as well as other preprints, the SE500 has a built-in stream aligner. The shorter hopper loader rises at 45°, conserving space and enabling vertical insert stacking to create a cleaner, more-precise shingle up to the feeder, adds Seidel.
An animation shown at Nexpo shows what's next in the product pipeline for next year: a fully automated SE6000 (60,000 cph) collator. With engineering completed, "we expect to have the prototype complete this year," says Seidel, who calls it "pretty much lights-out operations — no people."
Danish modern mailroom
In the meantime, newspapers contemplating automated palletizing have a wider selection now that Seidel Enterprises represents DAN-Palletiser A/S in the Americas. The Danish manufacturer installed units — adapted from designs used by canneries— at several large British newspaper printers.
That gives another Danish manufacturer, Schur Packaging Systems A/S, one more competitor in this country, where it is best known for Winrob automatic palletizers at several metro and midsize dailies, one of which it supplied with a complete mailroom — inserter, collator, poly-wrapper, stackers, strappers, bottom wrapper, labelers.
Now, as Muller Martini and Seidel are doing, Schur is bringing out a higher-end inserter. Moving from the A 855, introduced here nine years ago with up to 30 inserting stations and throughput as high as 35,000 copies per hour, the A 1055 NewsStar can hit 50,000 cph, depending on product, and expand to 60 stations, with at least two hoppers per inserter.
According to Schur, the 1055, like its other equipment, is a low-maintenance machine designed with standard components to be largely customer-serviced.
"We have the prototype still in our shop, waiting to go to a customer site," says Gerry Russell, sales manager at Schur's U.S. subsidiary, in Schaumburg, Ill.
Shown last fall at IfraExpo in Vienna, the 1055 was not shipped to Nexpo last month and won't be at Drupa this month. Instead, the company will arrange for interested attendees to visit that first customer site, says Russell.
The 1055's ejector wheel has twice the circumference of the 855's, doubling the number of products fed and reducing their spacing. "We're actually slowing down the machine speed but getting 50,000 copies," says Schur Packaging Systems Inc. President Dan Kemper. An even larger wheel used with the machine shown at Ifra was changed "so we could pack it in tighter but still keep the speed," he adds.
Schur says it designed the 1055's large, 48-pocket "star wheel" to function with very thin products, and the NewsStar gripper delivery's extraction chain for operation at high speed to assure reliability. The standard opener relies on a 0.40-inch minimum overlap; optional finger opening works with products without overlap. Other options include zoning, small-bundle production and individual product inkjet addressing.
At set-up, the inlet conveyor's servo-driven insert ejection allows feeders to be run without sending products along to stackers.
Features include miss and double detection, possible tandem operation of two stations per insert to maintain speed when running difficult inserts, and fast, automatic format change and zoning down to a single copy if operated with Schur's Ifra Track-based TMS management system, which brings together all mailroom components.
Minimum insert dimension for the A 1055 NewsStar is 4.13 x 5.91 inches. Jackets may range from 16 to 160 tabloid pages, with an option for 256. Maximum package size is 750 tabloid pages, or 1.2 inch, with an option to go to two inches.
Russell acknowledges that the A 1055 NewsStar is not for every shop. But where it meets a newspaper's requirements, it may be operated with either Schur's insert magazine or another manufacturer's buffer.
Until recent years, eight companies made most U.S. newspapers' inserters. Though some names have changed, there still are seven suppliers today, but probably more machines to choose from, including three new ones — two of which are from companies relatively new to the U.S. market for inserters.
Back in 1989, Baldwin Technology Inc. bought Kansa. In 2002, however, Vektek Inc. and two Kansa founders bought back the Baldwin Kansa Corp. subsidiary's assets.
The number still didn't change when Goss International acquired Heidelberger's newspaper business and Quipp Inc. acquired USA Leader, while Muller Martini took more direct control of its GMA subsidiary. Up to that point, Muller Martini-developed inserters at U.S. newspapers consisted mostly of older 227 models, with most of the Swiss parent company's newer models sold overseas to papers with more modest inserting requirements.
Goss and Muller Martini still offered the same machines for the high end of the market — Goss' Heidelberg-developed Magnapak and its NP642 (based on Heidelberg's AM Graphics-developed NP630), and Muller Martini Mailroom Systems' SLS-3000 (which evolved from GMA's original SLS-1000). And Quipp had entered the inserter business with its In-Line machine, competing with Muller Martini's Model 227 and serving as the basis of its collator with polywrapper.
After Quipp also acquired inserter remanufacturer/upgrader and controls developer Newstec, the Miami-based company moved into mid-market inserters when it developed the High-Speed model.
Besides the linear (and older carousel) systems used for heavy inserting into Sunday editions, some sites use Ferag's big drum machine for smaller weekday inserting needs and, more recently, its RollStream precollecting technology for collating.
Until this year only two major inserters, both 25,000-cycle-per-hour machines, had been introduced since the high-end Magnapak (designed in the late 1990s) and SLS3000, which debuted in 2003. K&M Newspaper Services' Titan G60, which in 2005 helped propel the Monroe, N.Y., manufacturer further into the mid-size newspaper market, is expandable from eight to 62 shaftless hoppers in four-module increments (each four with local PLC). Lowered hoppers feature automatic zone-change engagement and on-the-fly pocket phasing. Options include light-section hoppers, dual-format pocket, and single or dual delivery, with belt or gripper conveyor.
The next year, Quipp unveiled its High-Speed, aiming to accurately handle single sheets and various formats and for simpler set-up and operation. Expandable to 30 stations in two-feeder modules, with two main-jacket feeders, the High-Speed uses jackets as narrow as 11 inches and holds packages as thick as 1.5 inch. It offers multiple stacker releases, miss repair, and zoning. Recent enhancements include a longer, less-steep delivery, as well as gripper and pick-up changes for better product control.
This spring, however, three new inserters from companies in three countries will give newspapers more choices among machines and manufacturers — a Swiss firm well- established in North America; a more recently arrived Danish company recognized for its palletizers; and a newer U.S. firm led by an inserter industry veteran and selling a different Danish company's palletizers.
Muller Martini's next moves
After showing an SLS4000 last year, when America East rolled around this year, Muller Martini kept the focus on a newer machine, referring to the former as an upgraded SLS3000. At the regional trade show and conference in Hershey, Pa., the company previewed its fourth inserter — the top-of-the-line ProLiner.
Muller Martini continues developing the SLS machine, according to company executives. The AlphaLiner, for light inserting, and NewsLiner also remain in production. In fact, the ProLiner is the product of an effort begun 2 years ago to combine the advantages of the SLS3000 and the NewsLiner. Muller Martini Marketing Manager Volker Leonhardt characterizes the ProLiner as "a further development of the NewsLiner" using the SLS feeding system.
Fed press-to-pocket, press-to hopper, manually loaded, or from a buffer, the machine is designed to handle difficult- to-open tabloid products, according to Leonhardt, who says "the newspaper is guided through the entire process — it doesn't work with gravity." Gripped at the fold, jackets are taken over a wheel, paddles combing them through open-side-up, at which point front and rear pairs of grippers open and hold them. "Now the feeder is over the pocket for the first time" on a Muller Martin machine, says Amrish Thacker, president and CEO at Muller Martini Mailroom Systems, Allentown, Pa.
Unlike drum models, says Western Sales Manager Keith Hockenbery, the machine handles two products at once because the sucker comes off the sheet before the sheet is turned completely around, allowing it to pick up the next sheet — an arrangement that boosts throughput without increasing machine speed.
The quiet-running ProLiner features variable-format pockets and on-the-fly lap adjustment. Training relies on a two-page set-up sheet, says Hockenbery, in contrast to the 14 steps of 20 years ago. Automation's effect on staffing, throughput, reliability, and versatility justifies investment in the inserter, according to Thacker. While a ProLiner may cost more, he says, "your total cost of ownership may not change" in comparison with other inserting systems.
A test machine was installed in mid-2006 at AZ Medien, near the Swiss com-pany's Zofingen headquarters. Sales began six months later. Twenty systems are running now in Europe.
U.S. sales began at Nexpo, where a machine run at near maximum speed put two inserts into a 24-page broadsheet using a hopper and satellite feeder to simulate a FlexiRoll buffer. Later this month, a complete ProLiner will be shown at the Drupa trade show in Düsseldorf, Germany, where it will have improved feeding technology, according to Hans Peter Sutter, president at Muller Martini Mailroom in Zofingen.
Developed by the company's U.S. and Swiss units, the modular inserter "can adapt to any market requirements worldwide," says Thacker. The system can be expanded as needed to as many as 30 feeders. Easily integrated intermediate openings enable precise insert placement into sections.
Calling it "a complementary addition" to the SLS systems, Thacker says the ProLiner is aimed at mid- to high-circulation papers that require high-throughput inserting.
Cycle time is put at 45,000 per hour. Designed for easy and fast insert change, the feeder's short set-up time boosts net output, the company says. Streamfeeders that simplify manual loading also add to net output, with one person able to operate several Streamfeeders with thinner inserts. Also, the Promo feeder station is available for smaller pieces, such as CDs. Configurable controls check for misses and doubles, with incompletes either rejected or completed using back-up feeders.
According to Thacker, the ProLiner is user-friendly and safe, functions with a wide range of products, and offers opportunities to increase revenue through associated inline stitching, labeling, and inkjet addressing. Sutter describes it as a "high-end integrated process" that relies on fewer people to provide more capabilities and achieve higher throughput. Unlike an inline trimmer at the press stitching whole products, the ProLiner can stitch different sections, according to Sutter.
Inserting in '08, collating in '09
In the two years since leaving the firm that dominated the inserter business in the U.S., Randy Seidel has had his hand in industrial battery testing, core cutting and printing, and simple conveyors. He soon moved into new and rebuilt newspaper mailroom equipment, eventually re-entering the inserter manufacturing business.
With its first 25,000-per-hour SE2500 installed last August across the state at The Derrick, in Oil City, and five more ordered, Seidel Enterprises Inc. in Easton, Pa., is introducing a 35,000-per-hour SE3500 and is completing work on what Seidel describes as a highly automated, high-throughput collator. The company also offers control software, training, enhancements, and preventive maintenance programs.
As in the first years at his old company, GMA, Seidel is involved in rebuilding inserters. And while the SE2500 is his new company's design, he says, it has used the model's components in some rebuilds.
The SE3500, however, is a brand-new design "from the ground up," Seidel says. Both models are straight-line machines with gripper delivery, independently driven feeders, miss and double detection and repair, and control software from Prism Inc. Both are expandable by two feeder modules, from 2:1 to 40:1. The 3500 feeder works on two papers at a time. "That's what gets us the speed," says Seidel, who calls it "a more simplistic feeder, [requiring] far less maintenance than most."
A two-wire RF controller communicates with each feeder, for easier operation and troubleshooting, with a long-life 24-volt system, Seidel adds.
"We're able to open the newspaper without air and without vacuum," he says. The pocket's geometry, he explains, is such that airflow across one corner "forces the newspaper open." Made of a light, quiet, static-free material, the pockets can be configured for quarterfold and Berliner products.
Drop timing on the 3500 can be advanced and retarded on the fly. The overlap for opening can be as little as a quarter inch, which Seidel believes to be the smallest in use. Jackets can be as large as 96 broadsheet or 130 tabloid pages. Completed packages can run to 1,000 tabloid pages. Dual zoning enables concurrent handling of different products.
The Derrick, which also installed a stackPro stacker, SE500 hopper loaders and conveyors from Seidel Enterprises, reports improved staffing and off times and a 12-month ROI after moving from its two older Muller Martini 227s to one 12:1 SE2500.
Designed to be able to handle light, small, hard-to-run inserts as well as other preprints, the SE500 has a built-in stream aligner. The shorter hopper loader rises at 45°, conserving space and enabling vertical insert stacking to create a cleaner, more-precise shingle up to the feeder, adds Seidel.
An animation shown at Nexpo shows what's next in the product pipeline for next year: a fully automated SE6000 (60,000 cph) collator. With engineering completed, "we expect to have the prototype complete this year," says Seidel, who calls it "pretty much lights-out operations — no people."
Danish modern mailroom
In the meantime, newspapers contemplating automated palletizing have a wider selection now that Seidel Enterprises represents DAN-Palletiser A/S in the Americas. The Danish manufacturer installed units — adapted from designs used by canneries— at several large British newspaper printers.
That gives another Danish manufacturer, Schur Packaging Systems A/S, one more competitor in this country, where it is best known for Winrob automatic palletizers at several metro and midsize dailies, one of which it supplied with a complete mailroom — inserter, collator, poly-wrapper, stackers, strappers, bottom wrapper, labelers.
Now, as Muller Martini and Seidel are doing, Schur is bringing out a higher-end inserter. Moving from the A 855, introduced here nine years ago with up to 30 inserting stations and throughput as high as 35,000 copies per hour, the A 1055 NewsStar can hit 50,000 cph, depending on product, and expand to 60 stations, with at least two hoppers per inserter.
According to Schur, the 1055, like its other equipment, is a low-maintenance machine designed with standard components to be largely customer-serviced.
"We have the prototype still in our shop, waiting to go to a customer site," says Gerry Russell, sales manager at Schur's U.S. subsidiary, in Schaumburg, Ill.
Shown last fall at IfraExpo in Vienna, the 1055 was not shipped to Nexpo last month and won't be at Drupa this month. Instead, the company will arrange for interested attendees to visit that first customer site, says Russell.
The 1055's ejector wheel has twice the circumference of the 855's, doubling the number of products fed and reducing their spacing. "We're actually slowing down the machine speed but getting 50,000 copies," says Schur Packaging Systems Inc. President Dan Kemper. An even larger wheel used with the machine shown at Ifra was changed "so we could pack it in tighter but still keep the speed," he adds.
Schur says it designed the 1055's large, 48-pocket "star wheel" to function with very thin products, and the NewsStar gripper delivery's extraction chain for operation at high speed to assure reliability. The standard opener relies on a 0.40-inch minimum overlap; optional finger opening works with products without overlap. Other options include zoning, small-bundle production and individual product inkjet addressing.
At set-up, the inlet conveyor's servo-driven insert ejection allows feeders to be run without sending products along to stackers.
Features include miss and double detection, possible tandem operation of two stations per insert to maintain speed when running difficult inserts, and fast, automatic format change and zoning down to a single copy if operated with Schur's Ifra Track-based TMS management system, which brings together all mailroom components.
Minimum insert dimension for the A 1055 NewsStar is 4.13 x 5.91 inches. Jackets may range from 16 to 160 tabloid pages, with an option for 256. Maximum package size is 750 tabloid pages, or 1.2 inch, with an option to go to two inches.
Russell acknowledges that the A 1055 NewsStar is not for every shop. But where it meets a newspaper's requirements, it may be operated with either Schur's insert magazine or another manufacturer's buffer.
Related News »
In Focus »
footwear exports
Last month, European footwear manufacturers proposed extending anti-dumping measures against ..
B2B Keywords:
International market Chinese Importer Wholesale trade Wholesale products World trade Wholesale distributors International trade Foreign trade Wholesale distributor Importers Import export business Sell online Help u sell Global trade How to market a product Online supplier Wholesale product
International market Chinese Importer Wholesale trade Wholesale products World trade Wholesale distributors International trade Foreign trade Wholesale distributor Importers Import export business Sell online Help u sell Global trade How to market a product Online supplier Wholesale product
Feature Products»
Hot Products: A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z | 0-9
-
-
About Us -
Links -
Privacy Policy -
Terms of Use -
Site Map -
Contact Us -
Call Center: 0086-95105561 © 2007 Tootoo.com -
