In late 2001, Dennis Schmiesing, president of Globus Printing and Packaging, and his brother Tim decided to change the way they did business, in order to enhance their productive capability to keep up with growing market demands.
Founded in 1957, Globus had specialized in short run, black and white jobs printed on mechanically driven printing presses. Now the company needed to increase production and reduce time and waste by improving the make-ready -- that is, press setup -- operation.
This process of transitioning from one print job to another costs printers time and waste, two of the most expensive aspects of printing, especially as the trend continues toward shorter runs. Instead of running 20,000 signatures (packets of pages) per run, 2,000 to 5,000 signatures have become more common. Short runs place strains on printers, who have to accommodate multiple make-readies per day.
The Vision
Schmiesing''s vision was to upgrade from their line-shaft, mechanical drive technology, making improvements that would satisfy existing customers and allow Globus to expand to other parts of the U.S. and Canada.
The solution was a Lithomax ZMR (zero make-ready) heat-set press remanufactured with motion control ac servo drives connected via PROFIBUS to an S7300 PLC and MP270 HMI from Siemens Energy & Automation.
"We''d like to get into other markets and 4-color jobs with this heat-set press," says Schmiesing. "The Lithomax ZMR has allowed us to do both. Initially we were just looking for the black and white on two webs (streams of paper) and 32 pages. The zero make-ready is great. This press is opening up new markets for us."
Putting the Pieces Together
In November 2001, E.R. Smith of Westerly, RI, working with printing press consultants 3P, Inc and with nearby Eagle Electric, won the job of fabricating the line-shaft driven press. Explains company president Frank Andaloro, E.R. Smith specializes in remanufacturing printing equipment by adding state-of-the-art technology.
"Globus'' customers are expecting it to cut make-ready operation because it represents a big percentage of the time it takes to produce a product," Andaloro says. "The industry is looking for fast make-ready and short runs. A long run of 50,000 signatures could take 15 minutes to make-ready. If that is broken up into 10 runs of 5,000, that is 10 make-readies, each still 15 minutes each, so make-ready becomes a huge factor relative to total job cost."
According to Andaloro, the 4-unit, 22 ¾ x 38 in. Lithomax ZMR is geared to produce 30,000 signatures per hour and is the first horizontal, servo-driven press conversion delivering zero make-ready operation.
The heat-set press consists of four printing units capable of simultaneously printing on both sides of the web. Each printing unit is driven by two Siemens motion control servo drives.
"We put two servo drives on each unit so we can plate each unit independently," Schmiesing says. "That is a big asset. We now have operators working on the top and bottom at the same time. If there was just one motor we couldn''t do that."
Using two 36 in. wide rolls of paper, the Lithomax ZMR permits nonstop black printing of 32 pages. Plates are changed on idle units during the printing cycle and, when the target print count is reached, the idle units are clutched in and the active units are shut down to be plated for the next job. In this automatic mode, the press never slows down throughout numerous plate or form changes. Or, with two rolls, the press can be operated to produce 2-color "full stop" printing where the press must be stopped for plate changes. If only one roll of paper is printed, the press can produce 16 pages of 4-color printing. Globus'' diverse client base requires all three modes of production.
"In order to make a zero make-ready press by today''s standards, everything has to be driven independently," Andaloro says. "When the active units are running, an operator can set up or make-ready the idle units. It is important that they can make-ready independently. That eliminates make-ready downtime and much of the paper spoilage normal with press starts."
The Siemens S7300 PLC and servo drives automatically adjust the cylinders, says Andaloro, eliminating operator worries about positioning. The servo drives seek out preprogrammed settings in the S7300 PLC.
A Successful Transition
"Eight servo drives instead of four gave us the flexibility we were looking for," Schmiesing said. "Also, the quality of the register is certainly a lot better than our other mechanically driven web press. The registration doesn''t move. We put on a register system that automatically adjusts the units. Usually, any time you go up or down or up in speed or settings, your register might travel a little off, folds are off, everything is dynamic. Normally it all changes as you go up in speed. Now we lose about 1/10th of the signatures that would normally be lost."
All operations on the Lithomax ZMR are controlled by a Siemens MP270 HMI touchpanel, including water and ink auto sequencing, plates applied to the blankets, and the impressions on the blankets. Operators can also adjust the paper tension, adjust web guides, 4-color registration, and can turn off each unit of the machine separately or together.
"When you print illustrations or ''halftones,'' all you put down on paper are 4000th of an inch diameter dots," Schmiesing says. Salable color printing requires that these dots, printed on paper in successive mechanically independent printing units at up to 1,000 ft per minute, be in exactly the same relationship, cycle after cycle. While the Lithomax ZMR, according to Andaloro, was designed to economically produce low quantity books in black and white, it can also operate effectively producing high quality 2- and 4-color work. In his view, the Schmiesing brothers deserve credit for embracing the new automated printer.
"They had the courage to take a calculated risk and seize an opportunity to go with a new technology -- something bigger companies are sometimes afraid to do," he says.
In June 2002, the Lithomax ZMR press became operational. Now the family-owned business is realizing its goals of satisfying existing customers and expanding into new markets, says Schmiesing.
"We knew Siemens had the technology," he continues. "It is a big company and has the controls expertise. The entire machine is designed with Siemens products and we can certainly see our investment paying off. We would need a machine and a half to produce what this one does."