Not many printers could say they began their career in pop music, but Welsh magazine printer Pensord Press is well qualified to make such a boast: it was founded in 1969 by the Billboard Company of America to produce a weekly magazine for the music trade, Record Retailer, which later became Music Week.

Fast forward more than 40 years and that single title has been joined on the Pensord press roster by more than 380 other publications, and clients now number more than 220 publishers. Turnover is around the £12m mark and the fleet of kit at the Blackwood, South Wales plant is an impressive array of modern technology.

"We have a fully integrated periodical magazine plant which includes two eight-colour Heidelberg SM 102s, a Heidelberg five-colour CD 74, six folders including three Stahls, two saddle-stitching lines, a perfect binder, two Polywrap and Inkjet Mailing Lines and a pre-press area which includes two brand new Screen platesetting devices installed this year," explains Darren Coxon, Pensord managing director.

As of last February, the company now also has a Heidelberg XL 105-8-P, with full InPress Control. Pensord had been looking for a way to make itself more automated and therefore more efficient and the XL 105 fit the bill, but it didn’t have a clear run as the press of choice. Coxon says the other similar-spec machines on the market were also seriously considered.

Karl Gater, operations director at the company, says that the company was searching for a machine that would be "able to cope with our growth projections and to up capacity without taking up too much room".

Tough choices
In the end, it came down to just two machines that fit the bill, a battle in which the XL 105 just about edged ahead thanks to what Gater felt were Heidelberg’s superior service levels.

"Both presses gave us the automation we were after, with automatic plate loading especially exciting for us as we mostly do short-run work," he explains. "What swung it to the Heidelberg was partly a ‘better the devil you know’ situation – we have existing Heidelberg kit. Also, the service side was important. For us to have jumped ship and gone to the other manufacturer would have been a massive statement to make as, although the technology of that machine was proven, there aren’t as many of those machines around in this country compared to XL 105s and we believed the support base was less extensive than with the Heidelberg machine."

The relationship with Heidelberg enabled Pensord to negotiate an extension of their existing service package. Gater says that, though Pensord has its own team of engineers, it was important that Heidelberg would be there to fall back on and he reveals remote diagnosis is in place on the machine to aid this.

"Every second the press is down costs us money so we have to ensure the right service package is in place," he says.
The XL 105 replaced an existing SM 102 press, but it wasn’t just a matter of switching one out and putting the other in its place. Before the XL 105 could be installed, the floor needed a new concrete base. This was to be completed during the Christmas period while the company was in full production. On paper, a massively dusty excavation and rebuild doesn’t go overly well with a manufacturing process where a speck of dust can cause havoc.

"Fortunately, we got a very good company in to do the work. They came in, dug out the floor, reconcreted it, then we had to wait seven days before we could start building," says Gater. "It is a messy business, but the company were so clean. They put up sheeting all the way around up to the ceiling. They were noisy, but not one speck of dust escaped."

The floor work did risk putting Pensord behind schedule by a week, but Gater says that Heidelberg managed to speed up the installation time to the point where they made back the week’s delay. As such, the press was up and running in full production straight away from the first week in February.

"It went straight into full production," explains Gater. "Instead of the normal teething issues, it just seemed to be at home straight away."

At first, as is often the case when new technology is installed, the staff at Pensord were a little uneasy as to how their jobs would change because of the new press. However, five staff requested training to build on the knowledge they already had with the SM 102s and were duly sent off to Heidelberg’s now closed Tamworth facility. Since then, the rest of the staff have been brought up to speed and the machine is proving very popular.

"It’s hard to get them off it now," says Gater. "If you say they have to go back onto the SM 102s, they screw their faces up!"
The higher echelons of the company are just as taken by the machine. Coxon reveals that he budgeted that the XL 105 would bring a 30% improvement over the press it replaced, expecting it to be nearer 40%. In the seven months since installation, he says the press has actually been 70% more effective hour to hour than the previous press. "And it’s done that from day one," he adds.

Performance jump
Heidelberg UK B1 product manager Gernot Keller explains that this improvement in performance from the SM 102 to the XL 105 is a common experience of customers that have made the switch.

"We have had lots of feedback telling us that the peak performance platform XL 105 is able to replace two similar Speedmaster SM 102s or competitor presses," he explains. "In Pensord’s case, the 70% figure was reached partly because the SM 102 press it replaced did not have Intellistart or Inpress Control, which have the most important impact on makeready times.

"I like to think that a 2011 generation SM 102 with Inpress Control and Intellistart and other functions might have made a 30% performance advantage to Pensord, which demonstrates the impact of modern makeready software and inline colour and register control."

The specifications of the Pensord XL 105 machine also includes Press Center, Autoplate XL (simultaneous plate change), kit for alcohol-free printing and dampening filtration (FilterStar Compact), PowderStar (for double-sided powder application) and CleanStar (delivery process air extraction).

"This whole control of the printing has meant the quality has improved too," explains Coxon.

Indeed, Gater describes the quality as "excellent" and puts much of this down to the Inpress Control, which automatically measures and controls colour at any speed, and is integrated directly into the press.

It also cuts makeready time and, for Pensord, this was more important than the actual running speed of the press. Producing numerous short-run jobs rather than long-run work meant that it was in the makeready times and not the press speed where the efficiencies of production would be made.

"Our type of work is short runs so it is all about makereadies," says Gater. "For us, speed is not an issue. The XL 105 has more than fulfilled our ambition as it has meant our makereadies have more than halved."

While Gater is extremely happy with the machine, there is one tongue in cheek request if Heidelberg could arrange it for newer editions.

"If it could fold at the end, then that would be the ultimate dream of a sheetfed printer," says Gater. "But, no, it does what it says on the tin and it really is brilliant. We couldn’t improve it in any way."

Coxon concurs, explaining that he would happily recommend it to other printers and that he would consider buying another one if the need arose.

Judging by the rapid growth since that first printed magazine back in the days of The Beatles and The Beach Boys, that need for extra capacity is likely to come sooner rather than later.

SPECIFICATIONS
Max speed
15,000 sheets (in straight and perfecting modes)
Max substrate width
1,050mm
(750x1,050mm)
Max substrate thickness
0.6mm (0.03-0.6mm)
Price
XL 105-2-P: from £900k
XL 105-8-P: from £2.5m
Contact
Heidelberg UK
0844 892 2010 www.uk.heidelberg.com

COMPANY PROFILE
Pensord Press was founded in 1969 by the Billboard Company of America to produce a weekly music industry magazine, Record Retailer, which later became Music Week. It now prints more than 380 publications and clients number more than 220 publishing companies. Turnover is around the £12m mark and its equipment line-up includes two eight-colour Heidelberg SM 102’s, a Heidelberg five-colour CD 74, six folders including three Stahls, two saddle-stitching lines, a perfect binder, two Polywrap and Inkjet Mailing Lines and a pre-press area in which two brand new Screen platesetting devices installed this year take pride of place. The company is based in Blackwood, South Wales.

Why I bought it…
Operations director Karl Gater explains that the company was looking to improve its overall efficiency and productivity and for a new press that would be "able to cope with our growth projections and to increase capacity without taking up too much floorspace in the pressroom".

How it has performed…
"The XL 105 has more than fulfilled our ambition as it has meant our makeready times have more than halved," says Gater. He reveals that the machine was up to speed at full production straight away and that the quality was also of an extremely high standard.