Commercial Printing Company Invests in Automation with the Speedmaster XL 75
Quality, service, speed – these are the pillars of printing company Offset Friedrich in Ubstadt-Weiher on which the family business has built its success and continues to grow, despite strong competition. “We strive to work profitably and need a high level of automation, which is something the Speedmaster XL 75 can deliver on a permanent basis,” confirms Managing Director Marcus Friedrich. He has been producing on a Speedmaster XL 75 five-color press with the new Prinect Press Center and the Heidelberg Operating System in a field test since mid-2019.
The Push to Stop concept and the Prinect Production Manager provide optimal support for the printer. “What impressed us most about the Speedmaster XL 75, in addition to the new control system, is the increased printing speed of 16,500 sheets per hour, which we consistently and stably use for most substrates. We were also able to reduce waste paper by about two thirds,” summarizes Marcus Friedrich his positive experience.
“We’ve always invested in innovations and state-of-the-art machines,” explains Marcus Friedrich. “So we jumped at the chance to be involved in field testing the new operating system.” The company has up to fifteen employees and also provides apprenticeships. End customers are offered virtually the entire spectrum of classic offset printing, supplemented by toner-based digital printing. Other printing companies are also known to avail of Friedrich’s high quality. Grammages range from 80 g/m2 to 135 g/m2 and up to 250 g/m2 picture paper, which delivers a high level of flexibility. Offset printing is used for 80 percent of production, with digital printing used for shorter runs and personalized orders.
The Speedmaster XL 75 replaced two printing presses from another manufacturer. Marcus Friedrich has been a loyal customer of Heidelberg ever since and greatly values the partnership-based relationship. In prepress, imaging is handled by a Suprasetter while another Heidelberg machine produces the printing plates. In postpress, a Stahlfolder machine and a Polar cutting unit are used. When it comes to consumables, Friedrich uses Saphira Eco inks. “Never change a running system – we do everything at top speed, and the inks optimally coordinated to the machine are completely compatible with this,” confirms Marcus Friedrich. Together with the reduction in paper waste and the environmentally compatible inks, Friedrich’s production is highly sustainable.
With the Speedmaster XL 75 five-color press and the new Speedmaster Operating System, Friedrich now offers its operators a modern, attractive workstation. Intellistart 3, the digital makeready assistant on the Prinect Press Center machine control station, enables a high level of productivity. The 24-inch multi-touchscreen shows the operator the extended job queue, which displays all job data from the digital Prinect print shop workflow in a clear format.
The job queue makes it possible to prepare for job changes using the automatically generated process view while production is still underway. During the job change, Intelliguide simulates the time-optimized sequence live and, if necessary, also includes the steps to be executed manually. For example, Intellirun shows the mask for preparing the next job in good time before the current run is completed. The operator can see at a glance whether anything is missing and can intervene if necessary in a good time. A lot of time losses can be eliminated or at least minimized through timely preparation.
