Trinty Printing Midlands UK's first Baldwin LCM Filtration system
7/12/2007
Trinty Printing Midlands UK's first Baldwin LCM Filtration system
Trinity Printing Midlands has overcome the industry-wide problem of handling the waste water created by spray dampening facilities, following successful trials of the UK’s first Longlife Filtration Cleaning Management (LCM) system from Baldwin Technology. The new Baldwin equipment has been fitted to a 12-unit Goss Colorliner press at the company’s Birmingham plant, which prints titles such as the Mirror, Sunday Mirror, the People and the Birmingham Post & Mail.
“All spray dampening systems create waste water during operation and because this is contaminated with fount solution it has to be removed by specialist waste collection firms,” says operations manager Alex Henderson. “The spray dampening system on our Goss Colorliner creates one litre of waste water per hour of press operation on each couple. With 96 couples, and with the press line in use most of the day, we were generating such significant amounts of waste water that it was costing us more than £20,000 per annum to have it removed.
“In addition, we had the cost of the water in the first place and we also had to replace about 4,000 litres of fount solution additive per year because about two per cent of additive was lost with the spray dampening waste water. On top of this there are obviously environmental issues to take into account, so when we heard of Baldwin’s new LCM technology we were keen to test it. Baldwin fitted the equipment within half a day last September and has worked closely with us to tailor the system and monitor the performance. Since its installation, the waste water from our spray dampening system has been reduced from about 16,500 litres per month to 100 litres.”
The LCM system is a filtration and recycling unit that is available in different sizes and can be linked to any make of fountain solution system connected to a web offset or newspaper press. Conventional filter systems, designed to clean fount solutions, no longer meet the requirements of modern printing machines and the cost management or environmental control that companies seek today. During press operation fount solutions can quickly become contaminated with a variety of substances, from ink residue and paper fibres to dirt, detergent and organic impurities such as bacteria and algae.
Baldwin’s LCM system is a ready-to-connect unit that collects the waste water created during the process of spray dampening and removes contaminates highly effectively and very cost efficiently. This results in a return on investment that can sometimes be only a few months. The system reduces consumables such as dampening solution additive, water, alcohol and the filters required for the cooling and metering stations. The growth of algae is reduced significantly while there is no change to the pH level or conductance values. The stable dampening solution enables consistent, high-quality printing.
“Our Goss Colorliner press line is capable of outputting 70,000 copies an hour of a 96-page tabloid in full colour on four folders, which is obviously a significant press capacity,” says Mr Alex Henderson. “The trial of Baldwin’s LCM unit has been so successful that we now intend to install this technology at the other Trinity Mirror Goss sites in Cardiff and Teeside.”
John Leek, who heads Baldwin’s operation in the UK, is convinced that the new LCM technology will appeal to a wide range of printers. “The average cost for a UK printer to have waste water removed is 15 pence per litre,” says Mr Leek. “As environmental issues become ever more important within the industry the ability to virtually eliminate this problem will become increasingly attractive. The LCM system is easy to install, maintenance is minimal and the return on investment can be seen extremely quickly.”
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