With more than 2,100 Goss Autoplate units now running worldwide while enabling technology that competes with sheetfed and gravure, leading U.S.-based press manufacturer Goss International is honouring a key milestone in its successful history of offset printing innovations. With reductions in makeready time, labour and costs, Goss’ Autoplate innovation “has extended the web-offset advantage and created opportunities across a wide range of sectors and applications,” said the OEM. Goss Autoplate automatic plate-changing was first introduced on its M-600 Press in 1995, offering the ability to plate up an entire press in less than three minutes due to a simple, precision-engineered sequence. Plates were placed into cassettes on the printing units while the press was running or idle. Then, at the push of a button, old plates were automatically rotated off the cylinders and replaced by the new ones. All or any combination of plates could be changed in this way.
According to Goss Product Manager, Jean-Pierre Moioli, despite initial skepticism, live demonstrations at trade shows and open houses together with hands-on field experience, rapidly established Autoplate technology as the ‘flag-bearer’ for web-press automation. “The beauty of the system was – and is – the simplicity of its operation made possible through precision engineering, without requiring extra cleaning or maintenance,” said Moioli. “With the realization that the shorter the run, the greater the benefit, came a freedom to explore run lengths beyond those traditionally associated with web offset – and even to compete with sheetfed!”
Today, more than 2,100 Goss Autoplate units are in operation on a range of commercial and newspaper presses worldwide, including on the M-600, Sunday 2000, 4000 and 5000 presses, and Colorliner CPS Press Systems. In addition, its development has directly influenced a range of additional Goss innovations in industrialized print production. These include:
- The ‘96-page’ web-offset press, creating new economies for high-volume commercial printing and directly challenging the lower-volume gravure industry.
- Non-Stop Edition Change (NSEC) that ensures further time, energy and waste savings in makeready, particularly for high-volume versioning.
- Automatic Transfer (AT) printing for on-the-run edition changes, eliminating conventional makeready requirements in some applications.
“Our M-600 experience made the wider press format possible with the same design, creating more opportunities for printers – and the larger the plate, the greater the benefits,” Moioli added. “One of the main goals achieved is reliability, proven by field experience, with close to 100% plate-change success.”
Most recently, as the single most significant enabling technology of its Magnum Compact Press, Goss Autoplate expertise has led to “a new era for newspaper printers and publishers,” said the company. In reducing makeready time by as much as 90%, the Magnum Compact lowers the break-even point of economical newspaper production. Combined with additional features such as consistent high quality, wide substrate flexibility, heatset options and a versioning tool, this development provides the means to reach into new markets – particularly for those that currently produce small to medium-circulation publications.
“Through our decades of experience with Autoplate technology, we were able to develop a simple, cost-effective system entirely unique to this sector,” said Eric Bell, Director of Marketing at Goss International. “In providing the ability to change plates in 30 seconds and to complete a full job changeover in less than five minutes, printers can fill the press with work even in the shortest production window. The breakthrough with the Magnum Compact Press is a perfect example of the legacy of Autoplate technology in general. I can’t honestly claim that our product designers, back in 1995, could foresee the level of competition that we know today. However, bit by bit, as margins have become tighter and harder-won right across the board, the crucial advantages of Autoplate have been unlocking new potential.”
