Greg Hrinya, Associate Editor03.11.15
On the first day of Xeikon Cafe Packaging Innovations 2015 at company headquarters in Belgium, visitors had the option of attending multiple technical conferences designed to showcase the advantages of Xeikon digital printing technology.
Xeikon displayed its host of digital presses, including the Cheetah and 3000 series. The Cheetah launched at Labelexpo 2014 in Chicago, IL, USA, and offers 1,200 x 3,600 dpi and substrate widths up to 330 mm, or 13 inches.
Xeikon’s technical conferences highlighted its machines’ capabilities when put into action. The first three conferences touched upon extended content labels, wine labels and general label applications.
Danny Mertens, director of segment marketing, document printing, discussed the various applications for extended content labels. According to a drupa study, production efficiency and additional capacity are two factors currently driving the label industry. Extended content labels can be broken down into several categories, including booklet labels, foldout labels, dry release labels, and peel and reveal labels.
“If you look at the lead times that you make with your customers, they are going down,” said Mertens. “And of course, if you look at the other side, the number of jobs are continuously increasing in those important industrial markets.”
These are offered as solutions to evolving legislation, product information and promotional information. Companies also must deal with changing printing technologies, new finishing techniques and education.
Extended content labels are typically offered on a thinner paperstock. Booklets will feature coated papers while leaflets use uncoated paper. These extended content labels were produced using a Xeikon 9800 digital printing press.
“The bottom line is you need to choose the right paper,” added Mertens. “There are new paper solutions available that are better suited for this kind of production.”
Frank Bahmer, president and CEO of MBO Group America, elaborated on the various finishing options available to converters, including inline and offline finishing with an unwinder UW500.
Filip Weymans, Xeikon’s director of segment marketing, labels and packaging, conducted the following conferences on wine and general labels. Using a Xeikon 3000 series digital printing press, Weymans displayed three wine labels from South Africa, Italy and France.
“The machine is equipped with five printing stations, and the fifth station is using super black,” said Weymans. “Super black is a color that is specifically designed for wine labels and folding cartons. In the wine label business, you see that sometimes you need to really get that high-dense, rich black.”
The wine labels featured substrates from Avery Dennison and UPM Raflatac. The Xeikon 3030, 3030plus and 3300 are the company’s flagship narrow web label presses.
The general labels discussed included those for food, health and beauty, and industrial. Like wine labels, the general labels were printed on a Xeikon 3000 series digital press using two configurations, roll-to-roll and roll-to-converter.
The health and beauty labels utilized a flexible substrate courtesy of Avery Dennison. The label was printed using CMYK + white to give it a no label look.
The recently-launched Xeikon Cheetah operates at top speeds of 98 ft/min (30 m/min). According to the company, additional benefits include full rotary printing, toners that meet FDA regulations for food contact, no VOC emissions, and the ability to integrate third party workflow software and converting/finishing solutions.
“The Cheetah is a new platform that, from our point of view, cannot be upgraded,” said Weymans. “It’s one of the things that we feel like the market has responded very nicely to. The Xeikon Cheetah is the fastest digital label press in the quality league. Maybe there are some that are running faster but certainly not at the quality that we are.”
Xeikon’s digital presses feature a full rotary print and variable repeat lengths. There are five printing stations that operate at 1,200 dpi. Due to the nature of the substrate, Weymans said that Xeikon uses a dry toner. These light fast colors and one-pass opaque white make dry toner the preferable choice.
“Sustainability is also important, and our dry toners don’t contain any solvents like certain liquid toners on the market,” said Mertens. “They don’t contain any VOCs or photoinitiators, and there is no drying time; there’s no water inside. It’s a dry substance. All the inks that we use using the dry toners are fully recyclable using the standard recycling techniques at the moment, which is important.”
Another finishing technique includes ColorMagic, a software plug-in that is an X-800 option. This option is designed for printers working on clear substrates that require a white background to meet a necessary opacity.
Additionally, Weymans discussed laser diecutting and the finishing technique’s perception versus reality. “I think what people are talking about with laser diecutting is the perception that some people have that this is actually still a very slow process. I think with the technhology that Spartanics is using, laser technology is more than just a laser source, it’s also the scanner heads and how do you move the scanner heads inside to translate to the laser beams. They have come up with a really fast system.”
Xeikon displayed its host of digital presses, including the Cheetah and 3000 series. The Cheetah launched at Labelexpo 2014 in Chicago, IL, USA, and offers 1,200 x 3,600 dpi and substrate widths up to 330 mm, or 13 inches.
Xeikon’s technical conferences highlighted its machines’ capabilities when put into action. The first three conferences touched upon extended content labels, wine labels and general label applications.
Danny Mertens, director of segment marketing, document printing, discussed the various applications for extended content labels. According to a drupa study, production efficiency and additional capacity are two factors currently driving the label industry. Extended content labels can be broken down into several categories, including booklet labels, foldout labels, dry release labels, and peel and reveal labels.
“If you look at the lead times that you make with your customers, they are going down,” said Mertens. “And of course, if you look at the other side, the number of jobs are continuously increasing in those important industrial markets.”
These are offered as solutions to evolving legislation, product information and promotional information. Companies also must deal with changing printing technologies, new finishing techniques and education.
Extended content labels are typically offered on a thinner paperstock. Booklets will feature coated papers while leaflets use uncoated paper. These extended content labels were produced using a Xeikon 9800 digital printing press.
“The bottom line is you need to choose the right paper,” added Mertens. “There are new paper solutions available that are better suited for this kind of production.”
Frank Bahmer, president and CEO of MBO Group America, elaborated on the various finishing options available to converters, including inline and offline finishing with an unwinder UW500.
Filip Weymans, Xeikon’s director of segment marketing, labels and packaging, conducted the following conferences on wine and general labels. Using a Xeikon 3000 series digital printing press, Weymans displayed three wine labels from South Africa, Italy and France.
“The machine is equipped with five printing stations, and the fifth station is using super black,” said Weymans. “Super black is a color that is specifically designed for wine labels and folding cartons. In the wine label business, you see that sometimes you need to really get that high-dense, rich black.”
The wine labels featured substrates from Avery Dennison and UPM Raflatac. The Xeikon 3030, 3030plus and 3300 are the company’s flagship narrow web label presses.
The general labels discussed included those for food, health and beauty, and industrial. Like wine labels, the general labels were printed on a Xeikon 3000 series digital press using two configurations, roll-to-roll and roll-to-converter.
The health and beauty labels utilized a flexible substrate courtesy of Avery Dennison. The label was printed using CMYK + white to give it a no label look.
The recently-launched Xeikon Cheetah operates at top speeds of 98 ft/min (30 m/min). According to the company, additional benefits include full rotary printing, toners that meet FDA regulations for food contact, no VOC emissions, and the ability to integrate third party workflow software and converting/finishing solutions.
“The Cheetah is a new platform that, from our point of view, cannot be upgraded,” said Weymans. “It’s one of the things that we feel like the market has responded very nicely to. The Xeikon Cheetah is the fastest digital label press in the quality league. Maybe there are some that are running faster but certainly not at the quality that we are.”
Xeikon’s digital presses feature a full rotary print and variable repeat lengths. There are five printing stations that operate at 1,200 dpi. Due to the nature of the substrate, Weymans said that Xeikon uses a dry toner. These light fast colors and one-pass opaque white make dry toner the preferable choice.
“Sustainability is also important, and our dry toners don’t contain any solvents like certain liquid toners on the market,” said Mertens. “They don’t contain any VOCs or photoinitiators, and there is no drying time; there’s no water inside. It’s a dry substance. All the inks that we use using the dry toners are fully recyclable using the standard recycling techniques at the moment, which is important.”
Another finishing technique includes ColorMagic, a software plug-in that is an X-800 option. This option is designed for printers working on clear substrates that require a white background to meet a necessary opacity.
Additionally, Weymans discussed laser diecutting and the finishing technique’s perception versus reality. “I think what people are talking about with laser diecutting is the perception that some people have that this is actually still a very slow process. I think with the technhology that Spartanics is using, laser technology is more than just a laser source, it’s also the scanner heads and how do you move the scanner heads inside to translate to the laser beams. They have come up with a really fast system.”