Hunkeler’s Innovation Days showed that inter-vendor compatibility is here

There were no major surprises in terms of product. On show were HP Indigo’s narrow web 240ppm W7200 engine and new inkjet web press, Xeikon’s 230ppm 8000 engine, Océ’s Colorstream 10000 series, Xerox’s web-fed 490/980 colour line and colour inkjet lines from Kodak. DaiNippon Screen and InfoPrint were also there, together with Nipson, Ricoh and Canon. Hunkeler, of course, had a major presence, highlighting its POPP6 printer online paper processing, snappily branded as ‘Huncolor’.

Buhrs, Neopost, Pitney Bowes and Kern showed their smart integrated mailing lines. Muller Martini showed the flexible Sigma perfect binder and PrintSoft, GMC and Alpha colour also demonstrated their software.

First viewing
The web-fed W7200 is HP Indigo’s new high-quality flagship and this was its first public showing in Europe. It shares a lot of the technology with the established 7000 series, but the web format allows greater productivity potential. It can run in four-colour process at 240 A4 pages per minute (ppm) and in two-colour and in mono at 980ppm.
In colour printing, the web is stopped and backed up when being imaged, as the liquid toner image is built up on the blanket before being transferred to the paper in one pass, rather than the individual colour passes of previous models. There is a pre-print coating station that allows a very wide range of uncoated and coated papers that are available in 330mm wide reels, then two imaging engines with a turner/buffer and optional unload into a sheeter or re-wind station.

The HP inkjet press seen at Drupa is now being tested at O’Neil Data Systems in Los Angeles, initially for books and then moving into transactional/transpromo applications. HP is bullish about the prospects. The other concept at Drupa was Kodak’s Stream inkjet technology, which is continuing to be refined in Dayton, Ohio, with the first UK installations expected by the end of the year. In the meantime, the company is developing its pioneering VersaMark range with the VL2000, 75m per minute four-colour range using the Panasonic head arrangement, with faster models up to 150m per minute available in the spring.

Xerox showed its 490ppm full-colour laser printer and Océ launched the Colorstream 10000 series that offers the capability of 168 A4 ppm process colour, with a fifth unit for spot colours when the speed drops to 136ppm. With the four-colour engine, users have the choice of running at 168ppm in four-colour and switching to a mono version where the speed then jumps to 800ppm on a web of up to 482.6mm print width, which may suit some non-standard sizes. The clever part is that the engine automatically detects black and white pages and will change speeds dynamically.

For all of the web-fed digital presses, either toner or inkjet, mono or colour, there are also slick finishing options from Hunkeler. New at the show was the DC7 drum collator that can collect up to 24 individual sheets and deliver to a folder to create a tabloid or broadsheet full-colour digital newspaper when running inkjet printed sheets up to 660mm wide. This resulted in a long broadsheet sample, but the development of distributed remote newspaper printing is closer to reality with such tools.

Hunkeler also showed refinements to the web-to-sheet cutting solutions and the broad acceptance of a universal de-facto standard – I did not hear the word JDF in two days – was a practical reality with the mix of vendors at the show. I was also taken with the IBM/Ricoh printed apple, but I only saw this as I was leaving after hours, so did not see the apple infeed mechanism.

Sean Smyth is an independent ‘techie’ providing support for organisations looking to apply technology effectively. Smyth can be contacted on sean.smyth@dsl.pipex.com