Four years ago at the drupa show in Germany, Fujifilm showed Jet Press 720, a prototype of a whole new breed of digital press: a sheetfed colour inkjet model with a B2 format.
Its thunder was only slightly stolen by Screen, which was showing something similar, the Truepress JetSX. Both companies indicated that they’d be delivering to customers within 18 months, but it evidently wasn’t that easy.
The Jet Press 720 was demonstrated running at Ipex 2010, but it wasn’t until last year before Beta sites were set up in commercial printers. There have been five in Japan since the beginning of 2011 and one went to the USA at the end of the year. These are mostly producing photobooks, yearbooks and the like, though some are running general commercial jobs.
Now Fujifilm says the Jet Press 720 is ready for sale and it will be demonstrated at the drupa show in May. Last month Digital Printer’s editor Simon Eccles went to see the drupa press running in Fujifilm’s new Advanced Print Technology Centre in Zaventem, Belgium, where potential customers have already been invited to more than 120 demonstrations since last autumn.
First, the question that everyone asks but Fujifilm has always been vague about in the past: how much will it cost? According to Keith Dalton, Fujifilm Graphic Systems’ divisional director for the UK, it will be 1.5 to 1.6 million Euros, or about £1.3 million. There will be no click charges, just ‘pay as you go’ for ink, primer and head cleaner consumables.
Fujifilm is pitching the Jet Press 720 as a short run alternative to offset, probably running in established offset houses (which Fujifilm knows all about as it sells them plates and pre-press). It has the same format as a B2 offset press, it can use the same grade of papers (reliably on matt and silk coated and some uncoated so far) and the same finishing kit. It also uses the XMF 4.1 front end workflow, similar to Fujifilm’s offset platesetters. What was readily apparent at Zaventem was the excellent image quality coming off the press. Although it is CMYK, the colour gamut and ink densities are excellent (the gamut is well in excess of the Fogra 39L/ ISO Coated v2 standards for all colours except pure blue and red, which it matches). In comparison jobs produced by a Jet Press, an offset press and a Xerox iGen4 digital press, the Jet Press results were definitely superior: blacks are very dense, but the press holds subtle shadows, as well as good highlights. Colours were also notably brighter than the other processes.
With this quality in mind, Mr Dalton is talking about applications such as short run photobooks, art prints, luxury goods brochures, coffee table books, top class property brochures and company reports.
Like a digital proofer, it’s likely that the Jet Press can be made to match offset exactly, by careful colour management. Mr Dalton says that it could be used to provide initial copies for a rush job while the offset press later takes over for the bulk of the run. Alternatively if extra copies are needed later, the Jet Press can provide them, which saves the paper cost of just-in-case run-ons on the offset press.
From the outside the Jet Press 720 looks like an offset press, with standard rising pile sheet feeder (for around 7000 sheets) and delivery while the internal paper path includes grippers and front and side lays. The maximum sheet size is 750 x 530 mm, with 13 mm gripper area and 2 mm non-printable side and tail edges. It handles paper weights from 127 to 300 g/m2. Apart from printing 4-up A4 pages, this size also allows you to print 2 x A4 trifolds or the increasingly popular A4 landscape formats, which can’t be done with SRA3 digital presses. It could also be used with thin card to make A4 document folders and small packs.
In offset terms this is would be a slow press, though it’s good by comparison with most SRA3 toner presses. Its rated speed is 2769 sheets per hour (quoted as 1.3 seconds per sheet), though remember that is single-sided. Using the common speed rating of A4 pages per minute, it can manage about 184 pages per minute: double or triple the throughput of a most SRA3 digital toner colour press.
With no makeready delay, you can probably hit that throughput all through the shift no matter how many job changeovers there are. When we saw the press in early February it was even more offset-like: data handling limitations between the Rip and the head controllers meant it couldn’t handle variable data, or even electronic collation where every sheet is different. There was a significant halt while new page images were uploaded. However, a software upgrade due in March means that problem should be solved by drupa, the company says.
Under the covers it’s very different to offset of course. The four Dimatix Samba inkjet heads are arranged in an arc over a drum that holds the sheet by vacuum and grippers as it rotates under them. The whole head array is retracted sideways when not in use, for capping and maintenance. The company is predicting a three to six month operating lifetime for the heads.
What with the head retraction bay plus electronics cabinets and walkways the press is 3.6 metres wide, roughly twice that of an equivalent B2 offset machine. It’s 7.2 metres long.
Print resolution is 1200 x 1200 dpi, with 4 grey levels per droplet, and a minimum droplet size of 2 picolitres. A special halftone screen is used, similar to FM, which it’s claimed avoids moiré while giving decent flat tints. Nozzle indicator stripes are printed outside the job area and these are optically monitored by inline sensors, in conjunction with built-in nozzle sensors that detect non-firing. Any blocked nozzles can be compensated for by neighbouring nozzles until the job end, when they can be unblocked (by ultrasonics). There are routinely a few blocked nozzles at any time, according to European product manager Wieland Schwarz.
The ability to print on standard offset papers is thanks to newly developed inks in combination with a primer fluid called Rapid Coagulation Primer, applied inline by an anilox roller and dried before the paper reaches the print heads. The primer essentially helps to stop the inks running on the paper surface before they have a chance to dry. This keeps the dot edges sharp. Fujifilm also claims high lightfastness for the inks.
Mr Dalton says that unlike HP with its Indigos, Fujifilm will not officially qualify papers to work with the press. This is because the mills’ quality control is not perfect and there may be variability,’ he said. ‘But basically we can handle any offset matt or silk coated paper in principle. We have printed on high gloss papers too. Some are quite good, some are not so good.’ After printing the sheet is dried by hot air and infra red at 60 degrees C and emerges ‘almost dry.’ Sheets can be finished or turned for second-side printing right away. The primer and coagulation process also make the paper easier to de-ink at the recycling stage, the company says. Unlike ‘conventional’ water based inks, Jet Press inks don’t dissolve in the recycling water to stain the pulp, but they float off like offset inks.
One big issue that won’t go away is that the press is single-sided only. As many jobs will be double-sided, this means work-and-turn. This is supported well by the press control software, which includes a menu for changing the size of the second side’s image to achieve front-to-back registration in the case of the sheet distorting.
It’s less clear what to do if sheets get damaged between passes. This is not a problem for offset where all sheets are the same, but it could be an issue for digital sets printed in collated order and/or personalised. All sheet fed toner presses are auto-duplexing, so if a sheet is lost due to a jam, you can carry on printing where it left off in the sequence. It won’t be that simple with work-and-turn.
Screen, whose B2 format Truepress JetSX is otherwise broadly similar to the Fujifilm press, evidently takes a similar view: while its 2008 prototype was simplex, it redesigned it for auto-duplexing.
It’s hard to assess the prospects for this press. The big stumbling block for most printers will be that initial price of £1.3 million or so: that would buy a respectably specified perfecting B2 offset press, or maybe three or four decent SRA3 toner presses with inline finishing (which the Jet Press can’t offer), or a much faster if lower quality 52 cm wide inkjet web press from the likes of Océ or Ricoh/InfoPrint. But, maybe it will be more economical in the long run?
Viewed as an alternative to offset, the Jet Press saves because there are no plates and associated chemistry, no blankets, and very little paper waste. According to Fujifilm’s figures, an offset press running 20 jobs per day might waste 300 sheets per job, or 6000 in total. A Jet Press running 20 jobs might waste 10 sheets per job, for 200 in total. So paper savings would be significant over a year.
Mr Dalton says that costs per copy are being worked out with customers. ‘We’re sitting down with them to do cost analysis versus offset, using their real values.’ Mr Schwarz added: ‘A lot of offset printers do not actually know their costs per copy accurately and make assumptions for ink, paper, washups etc. We can calculate our costs down to individual ink droplets.’
The next big stage for the Jet Press 720 will be its drupa appearance, followed by the first European commercial installations. Screen’s European marketing manager Tim Taylor says that the Truepress JetSX will also go on sale at drupa and will be priced ‘a little less’ than the Jet Press 720.
However, March will see HP announce its plans for its Indigo presses at drupa, and there’s a persistent rumour that there will be a B2 format press announced. Depending on pricing, this would certainly be a strong competitor for the Fujifilm and Screen inkjets.
So, will B2 sheet fed inkjets attract the market? It’s still much too early to call. If you visit drupa, be sure to see for yourself.
Contact: www.fujifilm.co.uk/gs
