The company chose a Vutek GS3250LX 3.2m flatbed and roll-fed machine with LED curing because it was impressed not only with the environmental benefits of moving away from mercury arc lamps, but also with the new inks, which offer greater elasticity and improved white ink opacity.
“We were thinking about upgrading and looked at other machines on the market, but we are familiar with Vutek printers and Fiery XF RIP software and we wanted the benefits of the company's 'cool cure' LED technology,” said operations manager Nicole Spencer.
The new machine replaced one of the older Vuteks, a QS3250, and cost under £400,000.
“At the demo they showed us fancy pictures, but I wanted to see pink, green and orange in block colour,” said Spencer. “Colour on the new machine is really good and the LED curing is also great. It produces a 3x2m panel in seven minutes.”
She added: “We need to match colour across all our devices and this is simple with our Vutek machines. LED curing means we can print direct to materials we haven't been able to consider before because the heat of the conventional lamps could cause buckling and surface damage.”
RMC Digital specialises in multi-layered graphics as well as general wide-format displays for which the white ink plays a key role. It also produces wallpapers, floor graphics, scaffold wraps and canvas prints for clients across the UK.
The 15-staff company has a turnover of around £1.5m and other kit includes a Mimaki 1300 and 1600 JV33 as well as a Zünd cutting machine. The new Vutek was bought to trim lead times rather than push the company into new markets.
“One of the problems we were having was there weren't enough hours in the day to do what we needed and we were having to give longer lead times. Most lead times are two to three days, but we were starting to push them over a week. This investment has reversed that problem.”
The latest kit buy follows the original decision by the Hull company to invest in EFI’s Vutek technology when it was first formed in 2010, the first machine being a Vutek QS 3250 followed by Vutek GS 5000r printer.
