Finishing & Screen Printing
AUTOBOND ANNOUNCES UV ADDITION TO LAMINATOR RANGE AT DRUPA
Tuesday 20. May 2008 - Visitors to Autobonds stand at Drupa will be able to hear about the widest range of new products to be launched by the company in its 30-year history. These will include a new UV coater/laminator, a combination encapsulator/laminator, a combination laminator/embossing machine as well as additional laminators, including models for the digital print sector.
“Our research and development team has carried out a significant amount of work during the last year to extend the functionality of our sheet-fed laminators to encompass other processes such as UV coating, encapsulation and magnet lamination,” says managing director John Gilmore. “This has led to some very exciting breakthroughs, which we will be showing customers at Drupa.
“All of the launches have been in response to customer requests and we expect that the flexibility of having a laminator that offers more than one process will be a big attraction to many customers. For most companies the cost of investing in, for instance, a dedicated encapsulation machine would not be feasible for the normal volumes of that type of work. However, to be able to offer it as part of a laminator would be very appealing to a lot of print finishers.”
During March Autobond shipped its first B1 UV coater/laminator to a finisher in South Africa and its first embossing/laminator to a printer in Poland. “During trials of the embossing facility Ive seen some fantastic results of old master type work that has been produced on a digital press then laminated with a thick film that is subsequently embossed in-line with a linen texture. The final effect is a top quality colour reproduction that looks as though it has been printed on to canvas. The embossing rollers can be made with various designs so there are a significant number of opportunities for special effects.”
Amongst the machines on Autobonds Drupa stand will be a Mini 105 TPHS – a thermal, perfecting laminator with a Heidelberg feedhead and stacker – and a Mini 76 TPM, which will be shown for the first time at Drupa. The new Mini 76 TPM, which will be demonstrated with a CC76 cross-cutter, is a perfecting laminator with the ability to apply magnetic film on one side of the print and normal film on the other. An ideal application would be the creation of fridge magnets, which could effectively be produced in one pass on the laminator, before guillotining or die cutting.
Autobond laminators are available in a variety of formats, including B3, B2 and B1 sizes in either straight or perfecting mode. The range includes water-based and thermal models, which can be landscape or portrait, and a selection of stackers, joggers etc. At the end of 2007 the company introduced another world first with the addition to all new Autobond laminators of a wireless webcam and Skype phone facility, which took the concept of remote diagnostics to new levels within the industry.
“New Autobond laminators are supplied with a wireless Panasonic Network Camera, which is simply clipped on to the side of the machine when not in use,” says John Gilmore. “When required, the operator can pick up and move the camera around as instructed by the Autobond engineer over the Skype telephone, which provides free unlimited telephone calls over the Internet.
“This means that if a customer is experiencing difficulties, he can call Autobond on the Skype telephone and be put straight through to a highly experienced engineer. Even if the engineer is away from the Derbyshire factory, he would be able to view on his monitor every part of the laminator and instruct the operator to carry out certain procedures, including removing covers etc to see inside the machine. The system also has a built-in microphone and this means that the engineer can listen to the sounds of the various parts of the laminator.”
Autobond is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of sheet-fed film laminators, both thermal and water-based, and is a major supplier of thermal and water-based films and manufacturer of adhesives, which can be used on most makes of laminator. The company has customers in more than 145 countries.