The Washington, Tyne & Wear-based company has re-equipped its pressroom with three new Heidelberg Speedmaster presses from the manufacturer's SX platform.

Its new line-up comprises a B2 five-colour perfector Speedmaster SX74 with coater and two Speedmaster SX 52 Anicolor machines, a five- and a four-colour, which are both fitted with a dedicated inline coater.

PBL's latest presses have replaced two older Heidelberg models, a SM 74-5 and a four-colour SM 52 Anicolor with coater.

The 40-staff company's latest machines have been installed at PBL Print's new 2,787sqm freehold facility, which is situated eight miles away from its older production site.

According to PBL, its new premises coupled with the comprehensive pressroom expansion will provide it with a 50% increase in capacity and help it grow sales from £3.2m to £5m in the next five years.

PBL Print director Chris Murley added that strong colour management capabilities are as important to the business as its improved press production offering.

He said: "We have the Easy Control spectrophotometer on the SX 74 and Heidelberg is looking at how we can have an inline colour measurement tool on the Anicolors as well.

"Although colour measurement is unnecessary from a production perspective because there is no manual adjustment on the Anicolor, we would like something that would allow us to give customers a print out of the colour levels attained thus proving that their job was run to ISO12647-2 standards."

In addition, the 21-year-old business has added a third guillotine, a Polar 92X Plus, as well as two new automated folders, a TH56 buckle and KH56 combination model. The latter of which is due for installation in the coming weeks.

Murley said: "Having these two folders we have 98% of our folding requirements covered. We like the build and longevity of Stahlfolder technology, which better suit our type of high volume work.

"The automation and touchscreen technology marries up better with the pressroom, taking finishing into the modern world. We have no current plans to become JDF connected in this area but at least these machines are future-proof."

PBL Print, which operates a 24-hour, five-day-a-week service, has client list that includes several NHS Trusts and print management companies such as Communisis and Charterhouse.





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