Larger format landscape book production has been an awkward issue for some time in the finishing area. With print engine manufacturers continuing to expand the capabilities of their products, the post-press equipment suppliers have had to keep pace and find solutions for larger sheet sizes and new applications.
Plockmatic Group and Morgana Systems have been at the forefront of this development. The recent introduction of the Morgana DigiBook 300XL provided for the production of PUR perfect bound publications that stretched to a landscape size of 18-inches x 12-inches, but now these suppliers have gone one step further with the release at this show of the BM5000 booklet maker.
The all new Morgana BM5000 is the latest member of the Plockmatic Group booklet making family, engineered for mid-to-high volume, with the highest quality and functionality. The new BM5035 and BM5050 can handle sheets of up to 24.4 inches in length.
The BM5050 can staple and fold up to 50 sheets of 20lb Bond, to create booklets of up to 200-pages, with the BM5035 handling up to 35 sheets, delivering 140-page booklets.
What all of this means for the print producer is that there is now a choice of finishing methods: perfect bound or booklet style, folded and stapled. Obviously certain publications will dictate a particular finishing method. A “coffee table” book, for example, might well need the certain additional style that perfect binding provides, whereas a photobook or catalogue might well be seen as acceptable in a booklet format.
Customers are demanding more media versatility from digital print, and the BM5000 helps to deliver those extra finishing capabilities that printers are requesting. This latest product has been designed from the ground up to work with today’s coated, uncoated and textured paper stocks, giving the print shop even more options to offer to their customers.
Where a more robust, durable bind is required, the DigiBook 300XLPro PUR binder can produce landscape 12 inch x 18 inch softcover books in up to two inches thick and will also make book blocks for casing into hard cover publications of the same format. These latest developments in bound books can also incorporate bar code reading for variable data book production, meaning that sophisticated personalized publications can be produced.
Perfect binding machines are suited to both traditional and digital printers who require PUR bound books to a professional standard. The innovative DigiBook range of machines from Morgana is equipped with a patented closed gluing system, where the spine and side gluing is applied by a slot applicator for the utmost binding quality and accuracy.
These machines are innovative bookbinding products designed and built for the very latest market requirements. They are easy to use, even by non-specialised personnel, via a touch screen panel with icon graphics, suitable for the programming of all precision operations in just a few seconds. These include both start-up and shutdown and use a new, innovative system that is covered by a number of international patents.
The applicator is direct, and is hermetically sealed, without odour or toxic fume emissions, meaning that no extractor fan is required. This solution allows for the use of polyurethane glue in cartridges of up to 6 lb, all adding up to simple and waste-free binding.