Aligned pasting of a new roll of substrate to an expiring roll of substrate in a printing press

摘要

Systems and methods for aligning preprinted images on a roll of substrate to the moving components of a web press are disclosed. A method in accordance with one embodiment includes determining the speed of the moving components of the press, determining the speed of the web of preprinted images and adjusting the speed of the web of preprinted image to match the speed of the web. In particular embodiments, a press which produces rolls of preprinted material can be modified to change the equivalent cutoff length of the press. In further embodiments, a method of pasting new rolls of material to expiring rolls of material is accomplished by modulating the drive speed of the new roll of material to match the expiring roll of material while at the same time aligning the images on the new roll with the expiring roll.

主权项

1. A printing press comprising:
an expiring roll of high quality preprinted substrate comprising:
preprinted images with an equivalent cutoff; andexpiring roll timing marks indicating a position of each preprinted image; and a web created by threading said expiring roll into the press; and a new roll of high quality preprinted substrate comprising:
preprinted images with the equivalent cutoff; andnew roll timing marks indicating a position of each preprinted image; anda new roll paste mark indicating a new roll leading edge position; and an Aligned Paste System (APS) installed in the printing press for controlling a pasting operation, the APS comprising:
a sensor suite comprising:
an expiring roll timing mark sensor; anda new roll leading edge sensor; anda new roll belt drive encoder; anda press pulse generator; anda computing device which receives signals from the expiring roll timing mark sensor and the press pulse generator calculates expiring roll image speed and position; andsaid computing device receives signals from the new roll leading edge sensor and the new roll belt drive encoder and calculates new roll leading edge speed and position; andsaid computing device modulates the new roll speed to match the expiring roll speed; andsaid computing device modulates the new roll leading edge position so that when a pasting of the new roll to the expiring roll occurs, the new roll preprinted images are in alignment with the expiring roll preprinted images.