Replacing a 10-year-old Ryobi 755, the machine came into Raiseprint’s 1,200sqm Keighley, West Yorkshire premises in late September and was up and running earlier this month, following the building of a 110sqm extension.
It has been purchased in order to handle higher volumes of carton work, which now accounts for around 75% of Raiseprint’s overall litho work, and it is the fourth Komori machine the 45-staff printer has taken.
Director Steve Bell said that with faster running speeds and makereadies, the investment could add an extra 50% to production capacity.
“The three Komori presses we’ve had have been fantastic” said Bell, whose outfit took its first in 1996.
“The speed, the quality and the offload controls are great and you can see exactly what you’re doing. Keeping the colour consistent for short runs of 1,000 you only need to blink and the job is finished."
The B2 Komori runs at 16,500sph maximum speed and is highly automated, with fully automatic plate changing, KHS-AI makereadies, PCD-SG density control and KID information display. Raiseprint considered low-energy UV but decided against it due to the extra cost of the inks.
Bell added: “We looked at H-UV but because of the nature of the work we do, short-run for the candle markets, we could have six to eight different cartons and they could have three or four different Pantones so we could be doing 24 to 30 spot colours. The ink on the UV is three or four times the price so we just couldn’t do it.”
In anticipation of the machine hitting full capacity, Raiseprint has recruited a new sales team member in order to “resurrect accounts that we may have lost”, according to Bell, in the commercial print market.
“People are falling over themselves to do it at the cheapest price but we can now produce a lot quicker than we used to,” added Bell.
£4.5m-turnover Raiseprint also has a digital arm, running a Ricoh digital press along with finishing kit, and handles work for the Original Metal Sign Company, which it calls the UK’s largest manufacturer and exporter of metal wall art.
