Legend has it that on Super Bowl weekend in January 1986, a group of engineers and executives first got the ball rolling for a machine that wasn't officially unveiled until April 1992.
Named in honour of that Super Bowl Sunday, the Goss Sunday is a press designed to deliver improvements in print quality, productivity and waste reduction for long-run magazine and catalogue printing. It's proved to be a popular machine, with around 1,860 units sold worldwide.
What set the machine apart from its rivals was gapless technology. Removing the gaps eliminated vibrations and associated print defects such as bump streaking, doubling and web flutter.
Gapless advantage
"With no gaps, print quality was taken to a higher level, one that could be maintained at higher speeds and on wider webs," explains Greg Norris, marketing and communications manager at Goss International. "Gapless blankets also last longer and can be changed faster than flat blankets, with no packing required."
Since its launch, Goss has revamped the press. In 1998, it introduced the Sunday 4000, which had a double-
circumference and provided higher paginations than its predecessor. The Sunday 2000 followed in 1999, offering smaller cylinder configurations. It was designed for high-quality short- and medium-run commercial web printing. The latest addition to the Sunday family was the 5000, a monster 96pp press unveiled in 2007.
As well as introducing newer models to the market, automation levels were also beefed up. Autoplate was added in 1995 and Automatic Transfer technology was launched in 2003. With Autoplate, plates for the next job are placed into cassettes on the printing units and, at the end of the run, the operator simply pushes a button to initiate the plate changing sequence. Automatic Transfer allows operators to bring one or more units on impression, while simultaneously taking another unit or group of units off impression. Closed-loop control and presetting capabilities were also added to the press.
The long list of fully automated functions the machine could perform can extend from roll loading and webbing up to plate changing, colour and register control, web catching and folder changeovers.
"Virtually every step in the printing process can be controlled and monitored by a single operator," says Norris.
Goss doesn't sell used equipment directly, but will help printers sell on their old models. The manufacturer has a used equipment section on its website where customers can advertise used and surplus Goss equipment. At the time of writing, a 1997 Sunday 3000 five-unit heatset press with PFF-2 former folder and high-speed Vits sheeter was available, priced at £620,712 ($950,000). Prices for a new Sunday press start from £2.9m ($4.5m).
SPECIFICATIONS
Sunday 2000
Up to 82,000iph
From 16- 24pp application
From 2x4 to 2x6 cylinder configuration
Sunday 3000
Up to 100,000iph
From 24-32pp application
From 2x6 to 2x8 cylinder configuration
Sunday 4000
Up to 60,000iph
From 32 -80pp application in long- or short-grain applications
From to 4x4 to 4x10 cylinder configuration
Sunday 5000
Up to 40,000iph
96pp press
4x12 cylinder configuration
Footprint
Sunday 2000: 1.6x2.4m
Sunday 5000: 2.1x6m
Weight
Sunday 2000: 9 tonnes
Sunday 5000: 32 tonnes
Price
New: from £2.9m
1997 Sunday 3000: £620,712
What to look for
Press audit
Service history
