The 3000 D, which will be launched at Fespa next year, is a highly-customisable, multi-pass UV inkjet, wide-format printer based on a combination of Thieme's screen printing technology and Konica Minolta's KM1024 printheads.
Thieme has designed the press as a modular system that can operate as a standalone digital press or be integrated into an existing manufacturing line for industrial printing applications.
According to Thieme, the design flexibility, which includes the possibility to have a hybrid press that combines digital printing with a screen printing station, means that 14m variations are theoretically possible.
These include the size of the press, material handling through the press (including everything from the way the material enters and exits the press to rotations and alignment adjustments within the press), as well as printing and drying options.
The press offers a maximum eight ink channels, with a number of configurations possible from the available ink set (CMYK, Lc, Lm, Lk, White), in addition to an optional primer and topcoat.
At present, the maximum number of printheads the 3000 D can be fitted with is 24 (three rows of eight colours), although Thieme printing systems manager Armin Gerland said that this was expected to increase once the press moves beyond the beta stage.
The 3000 D is the first digital press to carry the Thieme brand. However, it is not the first digital device Thieme has manufactured; the German firm supplied the chassis and material handling technology for the co-developed Agfa M-Press, which was launched in 2005 and mothballed in April of this year.
Gerland was keen to stress that where the M-Press was aimed at the graphic arts market, the 3000 D is primarily targeted at industrial printing applications, although he admitted there was scope for the new press to be used for graphic applications.
In fact, one of the four beta sites, all of which are based in the German-speaking DACH region (Germany, Austria and Switzerland), will use its machine for both industrial and graphic arts printing applications.
While Thieme has claimed that the 3000 D can be specified in a "nearly unlimited" number of printing formats, from "matchbox" to the "facade of a house", it has given a number of example print formats and output speeds (see bottom).
Gerland said: "Standard sizes are available but it will not be limited to this - it can be customised from a very small to a very huge product. The biggest screen press Thieme has sold was in 2012 and that was 7,200mm x 3,300mm; digital can go bigger."
Pricing for the standard 3000 D formats is expected to be in the six-digit range, although highly customised and larger systems could run into seven figures.
Gerland added that the digital 3000 D was intended to complement screen printing and that Thieme did not expect to see any cannibalisation of its screen printing revenues by its new digital range.
Thieme 3000 D example formats
Thieme 3020: maximum print size 750mm x 1,050mm; maximum print speed 115m2/hr (draft mode), 53m2/hr (basis mode), 40m2/hr (quality mode), 28m2/hr (high-end mode).
Thieme 3060: maximum print size 1,550mm x 2,100mm; maximum print speed 280m2/hr (draft mode), 95m2/hr (basis mode), 68m2/hr (quality mode), 46m2/hr (high-end mode).
Thieme 3095: maximum print size 2,000mm x 3,300mm; maximum print speed 380m2/hr (draft mode), 124m2/hr (basis mode), 84m2/hr (quality mode), 56m2/hr (high-end mode).
