The device, which automatically feeds, collates, punches and delivers books offset and ready for subsequent binding, was supplied by Morgana Systems and installed at Banbury, Oxfordshire-based Foremost’s 930sqm premises earlier this month.
The kit is suitable for medium run lengths, filling a gap between short runs where desktop hand-fed equipment is sufficient and runs into the many thousands, where a fully automated system would be essential.
Managing director Lee Woodcock said: “Our jobs might have runs of several hundred or maybe 1,000 copies. We had been taking collated sets from our Ricoh printers, adding a cover, using a manual punch, and then placing that complete document into the comb binder.
“With this new machine the process of hand punching the books is now done automatically while somebody is wiring them, so it’s gone from a two-person operation to a one-person operation, saving us around four hours a day.”
Woodcock, who also praised the Tornado Autopunch’s ease of use, said that when researching the market he found that the machine was the only option that met the company’s requirements.
“We’ve been watching this marketplace for two or three years because of the nature of our work, where accuracy is more important than throughput. All of the other automated punching machines are more aimed at the very large litho runs, things like plain lined notebooks for supermarkets.”
Foremost Print specialises in the production of work for the medical trials industry, which often require multiple different language versions.
“We might need to print only 100 copies, but in each of up to ten different languages. We need to turn these around in just four or five days prior to shipping to destinations across the world, ” said Woodcock.
“The Tornado has allowed us to halve the labour needed for finishing these publications, whilst at the same time providing us with a higher accuracy.”
Foremost Print is part of parent company Foremost Magnets, which employs 15 people and specialises in promotional fridge magnets. With print representing around 40% of the company’s business, it also operates two Ricoh presses – a Pro C7100 and a Pro C901.
