Alan Harrison, technical director, IFS
Digital Printer talks to Ray Hillhouse, director of sales and marketing, Morgana Systems and Alan Harrison, technical director, IFS on matters of Folding and creasing
Viewpoint – Alan Harrison, technical director, IFS
Essential when buying new equipment is automation. It ensures set up is quick and accurate for highly productive, efficient and error-free job completion.
However, operators still need to know what a good fold is, understand how substrates work and what a finished product should look like. Fine-tuning is still needed to deliver the perfect product.
An automated buckle folding system also offers advantages for section folding because the scoring wheels don’t need to be continuously changed, making a significant difference in time saved. Experience has shown accuracy and quality of combination folding is surprisingly good. But a big productivity winner is job memory storage that enables short jobs to interrupt longer runs creating an added level of flexibility.
To really add value and build business in niche product areas, more accomplished and ambitious digital print houses are looking at the latest automated versions of systems such as the Petratto Minibat. It features a long infeed table to handle large length sheets up to 900 mm and a very long infeed side register system, enabling sheets to be released from the feeder and registered prior to entry into the creasing station.
The system uses the steel rule and matrix system – the same type of set up found on a die-cutting machine, which is considered to give the best result when creasing heavy board or digitally printed work.
Other features are the ability to hit the crease twice or three times in more than one place for a sharper crease, and two buckle folding plates arranged in unique configuration to allow minimum wrap of the sheet but with maximum drive. Both are ideal for finishing heavier, laminated and digitally printed stocks without cracking or curling.
Viewpoint – Ray Hillhouse, director of sales and marketing, Morgana Systems
What should companies be looking for when purchasing new equipment?
Two key points with regard to producing quality work: accuracy and good stock handling. The nature of digital print can be so creative and innovative that accurate finishing can make the end product, or break it. Finishing is the last part of the process but the first part of the job that the customer notices. It needs to be 100% right. Handling digitally printed stock needs more care then litho printed work. Every sheet carries a click charge. Machines have to be designed to recognise this.
How important is it to invest properly in this type of machinery?
It is absolutely vital to make cost effective investments in the right equipment to produce this work.
With digital, because every sheet has a click charge attached to it, you need to be able to set-up in one or two sheets. You simply can’t do that with traditional finishing equipment. It’s also important to get good value – which is not always the cheapest. Morgana manufacture a high quality range of products which will maintain their accuracy for many, many years – just look at the second hand values of Morgana Creasers.
How can a good folder/creaser help increase your services?
The ability to crease and fold inhouse obviously speeds up a print company’s ability to deliver finished products on time. In today’s climate, customers typically want their work today, and often won’t wait any longer. You need to be able to do that.
Another factor to consider is with the design of the product.Creasing and folding can be used as an enhancement to product creation.
Clever creasing and folding can give a finished product the edge. In addition to regular half and concertina folds, you might want to consider gate folding, closed gate folding, or double parallel folding to give your designers a ‘new idea’ when it comes to creating the finished product – but you need the ability to do all of that well and efficiently, or you’ll just end up creating a bottleneck in the finishing department.
