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New Features in HELL Gravure Systems PremiumFlexo

HELL Gravure Systems is focused on the development, manufacturing, sales and support of system solutions for digital print form production. HELL has been a market leader in gravure form manufacture for over 40 years. This reflects the company’s high level of commitment to innovation, which has also seen it setting technological trends in flexographic print form manufacture for the past eight years. The primary focus is the direct laser engraving machine for flexographic print forms and the engraving machine for gravure forms as well as the image processing systems for controlling these.
High-Quality Print Forms
Since more than three years PremiumFlexo brings together three components in one unbeatable solution for direct engraving of Flexo print forms– the PremiumSetter, elastomer printing forms and the digital shaping in the PremiumProfiler.
Thanks to the high-resolution laser’s ultra-fine recording beam, sleeves are engraved directly to an unprecedented quality standard with the PremiumSetter S1600. The fiber laser uses laser diodes as a pump source, with the high-energy diode beam being injected into a special fiber. The fiber acts as a resonator and produces a stable, uniform laser beam. It also serves as a means for transferring the light to the processing location. The benefits of this laser principle are its simple design and compact size, the high efficiency and the outstanding beam quality with a large focal range.
The digitally controlled shaping of screen dots in the PremiumProfiler ensures optimum print results in the highlights and extends the service life of printing forms significantly.
Engraving is performed on elastomer materials that have been specially adapted for PremiumFlexo. Elastomers are resistant to solvents and are therefore suitable for inks containing solvents but also for UV and water-based inks. They ensure excellent ink transfer and a long service life, even in the highlights. Last but not least the PremiumLine automation environment developed by HELL enables unmanned flexographic printing form manufacture.
Addition to the PremiumFlexo Family
The key component of the PremiumFlexo is the PremiumSetter. Therefore the new PremiumSetter S1300 completes the PremiumFlexo family. It is based on the experience of the PremiumSetter S1600 but designed for manual operation. Equipped with a manual rotatable hood and bearing blocks for manual cylinder loading the Premiumsetter S1300 can laser elastomer forms with face width up to 1350 mm and a maximum circumference of 950 mm.
The functional characteristics of the S1600, as the high-resolution fibre laser and the PremiumProfiler for 3D-shaping, are assigned to the PremiumSetter S1300 to realise the excellent quality of Premium-Flexo.
Increased Productivity
Users of Laser-Ablation-Mask-Systems (LAMS) for photopolymer print forms may know the principle of FastForward. Now it increases the productivity of HELL’s PremiumSetters.
FastForward includes two sub-functions:
  1. PassiveFastForward skips solid areas of a printing form. The PremiumSetter performs a fast crossfeed in these areas during which the laser does not operate – similar to an LAMS-laser.
  2. The brand-new ActiveFastForward controls the mechanical processing of non-printing areas of a printing form. Before laser engraving the definable areas at the edges as well as the non-printing areas of the form are processed using a fixed cutting tool. The cutter is advanced automatically and strips the form’s unlasered material surface to a relief depth of 1 mm with the sleeve rotating.
FastForward results in an average time saving of more than 20 percent and it is even possible to achieve savings of up to 80 percent with appropriate forms.

Source: http://www.hell-gravure-systems.com

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