"Faster, more efficient and cost-saving - all with better quality"

Direkt Com GmbH from Mertingen, north of Augsburg, reports on its experiences with its new UV drying system, the BLK^®-5 from IST METZ GmbH:

The faster a press can run, the more orders it can manage. Direkt Com GmbH is evidence of how an older model can be helped to reach completely new sprinter qualities with a new UV drying unit. It is essential for this direct mail specialist from Bavaria, a member of the Georg Kohl Group, to achieve a high print rate, but the drying system on its "Goebel Optiplus" rotary machine slowed down production. The problem was solved by the decision to invest in a new development by IST METZ GmbH, the BLK-5, to replace the old drying units. We spoke to Direkt Com's Managing Director Kurt Pohl, Operations Manager Anton Mayr and Printing Engineer Stefan Rembold about their reasons for deciding to produce their quality mailings using the new UV drying system from IST METZ.

Question: Mr Mayr, can you describe the original situation with your Goebel rotary press?

Mayr: We very quickly reached limits at higher speeds; the performance of the UV drying system was simply inadequate from around 220 metres a minute.

Question: So how quickly could the rotary press run in theory? What should it be able to do?

Mayr: The machine can be run at up to 350 metres a minute and drying performance should be able to keep pace until that speed is reached.

Pohl: It's also important to say that we were discussing early the year before last how to make our print room more efficient. We had three rotary machines, some of then from the 1980s, and two of them no longer satisfied performance requirements. These were replaced by one Müller Martini A68. However, the third machine's biggest bottleneck was its poor dryer performance, and this machine was to be upgraded. It would have been a shame to give up this 1991 machine, as it was mechanically fine and had been looked after well. Its interesting formats of 25" and 16 2/3" are also needed by the market. This was how we came to the decision to retrofit the drying system to the existing machine.

Mayr: The original drying equipment of the Goebel machine was state of the art in 1991. Four lamps each of 120 W/cm were fitted downstream of four printing units, and the same UV equipment was fitted again downstream of the ninth printing unit. In addition to drying performance no longer being adequate, there was also the problem of obtaining spare parts. Spare parts were almost impossible to get hold of, so replacing this system with another was the only sensible solution.

Question: What was your approach to solving the issue?

Pohl: To be able to realize the machine speed required, we first assumed that we would have to fit three UV units with a performance of 200 W/cm each to both dryer positions. This approach was the basis for the meetings we started with suppliers of UV systems.

Question: What encouraged you to put your confidence in IST METZ when purchasing your new equipment?

Mayr: We simply decided in favour of the latest technology; this was the BLK^®-5 unit from IST METZ with electronic power supply devices of the ELC^® type. The energy saved favours this product on economic grounds alone. We wanted to manage with far less electricity than other comparable systems.

Question: To what extent have you incorporated the total costs of this system throughout its lifetime in your deliberations?

Pohl: Well, the purchase price of the BLK^®-5 hardly differed from that of other suppliers and their systems, so what tipped the scales were the lower energy costs due to lower power consumption. As mentioned at the outset, three units of 200 W/cm were to be used at two positions. The lamp length is 55 cm. This results in a total power requirement of 66 kW. The performance promised by IST meant that we achieve the same drying performance with just two lots of two BLK^®-5-type units. At 180 W/cm, this means rated output of just 40 KW, 40 per cent less than with another system.

Question: What other benefits did the IST system have?

Mayr: I particularly liked the the FLC^® quick-change lamp system - printers can do it themselves without great difficulty. This was another key issue for us that such things are easy to deal with - it also enables us to use different lamp configurations for different print orders or to perform maintenance jobs such as reflector cleaning or replacing lamps ourselves.

Rembold: We were also impressed by the fact that lamps can be changed without special qualifications. Here, the bulbs are simply unclipped and the new ones inserted. We were so enthusiastic about this feature of the BLK^®-5 on the Goebel machine that we also switched to the quick-change system for the BLK^®-2 used on our 10-colour machine.

Pohl: And there is yet another argument in favour of this quick-change system: our teams of printers change machine from time to time, so it is important that they can quickly familiarize themselves with the components of any new machine. This makes the user-friendliness of the BLK®-5 a forceful argument.

Question: You have now had the BLK^®-5 system fully involved in production for about three months: how has your initial experience been?

Mayr: Before we placed the order, we did have reservations about whether we would manage with just the two lamps per drying unit on the machine in order to achieve the 350 metres a minute printing rate we needed. But it works. It goes without saying that for us, a functioning drying system is extremely important because we have a high degree of finishing work such as personalising mailshots with laser printing. However, we were assured long before we placed the order that we need not worry about ink transfer and the like and evidence was provided by a wide variety of tests. And in the end, we said to ourselves "If IST METZ, a leading UV manufacturer, is supplying a unit with two lamps, then it must work".

Question: Are you able to quantify yet the energy saving from using the BLK®-5 compared to other systems?

Mayr: A conservative estimate assumes a 25 per cent reduction in consumption, calculated on the basis of the lamp output used. We don't have an electricity meter just for the lamps.

Rembold: ... but I'm sure we will be able to see from the annual statements what kind of saving has been achieved.

Pohl: If our initial calculations are right, we ought to save around five per cent of our total energy costs. Of course, fluctuating capacity makes a comparison over several years quite difficult, but we know that UV lamps certainly generate high electricity costs, so every saving is important. From an ecological point of view, too: lower consumption of electricity means lower CO₂ emissions. This is another important factor for us when making new investments. If we can cut costs in the process as well, then obviously that's even better. The deciding factor, however, is always that investments in our systems not only bring greater efficiency, but also serve the quality interests of our customers even better.

Direkt Com GmbH

Direkt Com GmbH, based in Mertingen (Bavaria), is defined as the direct mailing specialist within the Georg Kohl Group. From the end of the seventies the company takes customers from all sectors of business through the process of addressing their customers directly, from consultation regarding the design of mailshots, to printing and processing, up to and including logistics. Print runs of around 50,000 to several million individualized copies are processed. For continuous printing, Direkt Com uses two rotary presses, a Müller-Martini 10-colour press, roll width up to 680 mm, cylinder circumference 18"/24"/25" with 2 varnishing units and IST METZ BLK-2 UV drying units and a Goebel "OptiPlus" 9-colour press with a roll width of up to 520 mm, cylinder circumference 25" and 16 2/3" with two IST METZ BLK-5 UV drying units. The primary products resulting from continuous printing are individualized (i.e. overprinted with the address or personal details of the recipient) by four continuous laser printing systems. The three-stage production process is completed by the web finishing units with options for dispensing labels, gluing, cutting or folding, attaching objects to the printed material, rubberizing or contour-punching.