After seeing book production grow rapidly in the last year Peterborough digital book printer Bonacia has invested in a Foliant Taurus 530NG laminator from IFS.
“Demand for books has increased significantly, particularly in softback books where we have seen a 20% to 25% year on year growth,” explains Carl Whitelock Production Manager of the operation that produces a variety of work on two Kodak NexPresses and two Xerox Nuveras.
He continues: “We were using our NexPresses to add a coating but that was creating a bottleneck. We also had an old laminator for our hardback book production but that was laborious to set up. At the start of the year we sat down to look at the best ways to address these issues and increase capacity. That was when we decided a high speed laminator would be the answer.
“We then looked around at what was one the market and liked the Foliant. We liked its ease of operation and set up. Its speed means we can get more jobs out the door faster. We think that in the long term it will save us a couple of days in terms of tunaround times and that will allow us to increase our capacity.”
As for return on investment he states: “We knew we needed to invest in a solution that would streamline our workflow and we are confident that it will.”
The 30 m/min B2+ Foliant Taurus 530 NG features a rising pile back separation stream feeder and a suction paper feed head. Its compact design incorporates feeder, laminator, and a sheet separator in a single construction.
Bonacia’s Foliant Taurus 530NG includes the Foliant Multi-functional Inprinting Unit to give their book covers increased appeal. It makes foiling and spot varnish fast and affordable for short run and personalised print. It transforms output by applying foil or varnish to a pre-printed black toner. The sheet can then be reprinted mono or four colour. It runs a wide range of colours including gold, silver, red and green and a clear gloss for spot varnish.
Adds Whitelock: “We are interested to see what we can do with the foiler. We think it can add a fresh element to what we can produce.”
The new system joins a Horizon BQ-470 four clamp perfect binder and a Horizon SPF-200 booklet maker with HOF-400 digital sheet feeder as well as a Perfecta guillotine.
