French developer Impika has raised the bar for inkjet web presses to a claimed 375 metres per minute, 50 per cent faster than most existing systems.
It says the new flagship iPrint eXtreme will print full colour up to 711 mm wide, and “monochrome at far higher speeds”.
Aubagne, France, headquartered Impika says the press has been designed to target tabloid and broadsheet newspapers, book and general printing, and direct marketers.
It can be configured for up to six colours and prints at resolutions up to 1200 dpi. Built around ‘scalable modules’ the design allows customers to improve and enhance productivity and printer configurations while monitoring and incorporating inkjet technological developments, the company says.
The 711 mm print width will deliver a range of sizes up to the B1 format (707 x
1000 mm), “including the necessary variations for newspapers production – broadsheet, tabloid and Berliner – as well as format and width requirements for book publication”.
Impika’s piezoelectric technology is credited with unique performance which will permit colour printing of 8000 copies of a 40-page tabloid newspaper an hour, or B2 sheets at 45,000 cph, “according to requested print quality specifications”.
As for all iPrint models, high speed variable data production is managed by a multiformat iController, which Impika says is compatible with most servers on the market.
The system offers a variety of production modes:
• 360x600 dpi for newspaper printing and transactional applications;
• a 600x600 dpi mode intended primarily for direct mail, transactional and transpromo applications;
• a new ‘very high quality’ mode which offers 600x600 dpi with four grey scale levels; and
• an ‘offset quality’ mode with the 1200x1200 dpi native resolution Impika showed at Ipex in 2010.
Water-based pigment or dye inks – including a range of Pantone colours, MICR and special inks – are supported.
Impika says it will introduce a new finishing system at DRUPA, “capable of meeting the new speed standards proposed by the eXtreme”.
It includes specially designed unwinders and rewinders designed to run at up to 500 metres per minute. The company says other high-speed cutting and folding finishing systems are currently in development for newspaper and graphic arts markets.
Impika chief executive Paul Morgavi says the eXtreme represents a milestone in the market development of digital inkjet printing: “We designed and manufactured this product to bridge the gap between traditional and digital printing, not only in terms of performance, but also as essential link between the paper and the full digital approach as figured by its graphic interface,” he says.
“The world is changing very fast and industry requires flexible and scalable solutions to meet the needs of today and, above all, those of tomorrow.”