22   Sign Update      ISSUE 190 MARCH 2020

    PRODUCT   Choice

Hybrid UV LED press proves itself invaluable to large format business

Super-Wide Digital (SWD) has added Agfa’s Jeti Tauro H3300 LED press to its stable of superwide format machines. Installed in September 2019, the company says it underestimated the benefits it has brought to their established print business. Founded in 2000, SWD specialises in volume large format work and consistently invest in new equipment and technology to ensure they offer their customers the very latest innovations. So, when they decided to invest in an Agfa branded engine for the first time it was a compliment indeed to the Agfa business and product offer. “We visited Agfa at the global launch of the Jeti Tauro H3300 LED in 2018 and were impressed at the resolution and output of the machine in the demonstrations,” says business development manager Luke Drogan. “When we installed the Jeti Tauro and put it through initial testing it performed even better than we had anticipated, which was a great bonus to us. Immediate benefits included the impressive level of quality at high speed, the coverage capability of its high speed white ink and the primer feature which allows us to print on materials that are usually difficult for inks to adhere to. The Jeti Tauro was a press that we hadn’t

desperately needed as a business but is now one that we definitely can’t do without.” The Jeti Tauro H3300 LED is a hybrid UV LED wide format press that allows manual, continuous and automated feeding of both rigid and flexible materials. It includes 60 fast-firing Ricoh Gen 5 print heads, each with four nozzle rows offering two colours per head. The optional Master Roll-to-Roll system, of which the UK’s first is installed at SWD, allows for jumbo rolls of up to 750kg per roll in both single and dual lane print modes. Just three months on, they have already created a number of new products by experimenting with the new Agfa machine. They’ve mastered double-sided self-cling window graphics printed colour-white- black-white-colour which means graphics can be printed in one-pass and read correctly both ways without show-through. For brands that require very accurate colour representation of their corporate identity, they’ve tested printing directly to powder-coated metal sheets using the Tauro’s abilities to print with a primer and a strong white underprint. Pushing the boundaries with these solutions helps SWD   stay ahead and in particular assist creative clients within the markets they serve.

Primarily a trade print supplier that produce huge volumes of work with all finishing processes completed in house, in addition to their new Agfa Jeti Tauro H3300 LED, SWD has 1.6m and 3.2m latex roll-to-roll, two dye sublimation, two additional 3.2m hybrids and four 5m roll- to-roll machines on site. This capacity gives them very impressive contingency; should a machine fail, there is always another on the shop floor that can pick up the work and that offers reassurance for many of their customers, especially with tight lead times. With the speed of their machines and capacity to complete higher volumes of work than most 24-hour printers, SWD ensures their clients’ work is done quickly with the minimal fuss and when extra large print requirements arise, it does not negatively affect their day-to- day business.   “There is no doubt that Agfa’s Jeti Tauro H3300 LED has made a great initial impression on the team,” concludes Luke. “Our experienced print manager Tristan Haslam would choose to put all work through it and that’s a compliment indeed to the Agfa technology, service and support.”

From left: Luke Drogan; Bobby Grauf, sales manager, Agfa; and Tristan Haslam