Comexi, making the most of short runs
The group is up to date with latest flexo industry trends
Nowadays, none is getting surprised by the fact that the flexible packaging sector constantly demands manufacturers of equipment for the sector to improve their processes to reduce manufacturing time, costs and, at the same time, achieve and maintain high quality standards.
Market studies point to a growing reduction in job lengths due to the rapid and constant changes required by end customers, making the reduction of time for job changes increasingly important in order to achieve a high OEE (Overall Equipment Efficiency).
The Comexi F4 is actually the best choice for customers who are focused on making the short runs profitable. This top flexographic machine excels in ergonomics, accessibility and compactness. These three characteristics facilitate all operational tasks, making the changeover of the jobs quick and easy. Besides, the application of multiple SMED concepts (Single-Minute Exchange of Die) in each of the operations of the job changeover, allow making such changes of work in less than 20 minutes.
The minimal repeat and Comexi F4 printing width – from 650 mm (25.6 in) to 850 mm (33.5 in) – allow customers to benefit from the low production costs associated with the smaller dimensions of the photopolymer plates. The shorter the runs of the jobs, the greater benefit can be obtained with this kind of machine.
Additionally, despite their dimensions, all Comexi equipment’s maintain the characteristics of their bigger sisters like Comexi F2 ML or Comexi F2 MP: robustness, precision and efficiency to guarantee an optimum quality at printing speed and a wide range of options and peripherals to meet the needs of the most demanding markets.
With the aim of reducing the changeover times, the group has been leading innovation in this field. Therefore, not only has thought about the structure of the machine, it has also performed developments in the field of peripherals that can provide great advantages in reducing time and ensuring optimal quality and consistency.
The pressure adjustment and registration times are also an important part of the changeover time, not so much because of their duration, but because of their variability, which can suppose, on one hand, a high degree of uncertainty in the total time of change; and on the other hand, a defect of non-quality in printing.
In order to combat this variability, Comexi’s automatic pressure adjustment and registration systems have been designed based on the 100% inspection of the printed sample and comparing it with the pdf file with which the plates were created. The system automatically finds the exact point for optimum print quality with minimal overpressure, ensuring that the waste generated is not only minimal, but also constant and independent of the operator’s ability.
Hiperlink: http://comexi.com/en/product/flexo/f4