Real Potential, or Not?

Lightweight gravure printing sleeves are trying to make headway in a market of printers leery of abandoning large inventories of traditional gravure cylinder bases.

WHEN IT COMES to what real potential lightweight printing sleeves have in the gravure process, Randy Ferguson, director of sales at CNW Inc., sums up the general industry feeling in one sentence. "Sleeves will be an amazing thing for gravure, after a few minor speed bumps are smoothed out," he said.

Save for a few printshops that have successfully transitioned to sleeves from cylinder bases in their gravure operations, most North American printers today are apprehensive about the technology and its implications on an age-old printing process. While some of this foreboding is warranted—considering the on-going development of the technology—there is evidence that sleeves can be a profitable venture for gravure printers.

At the Packaging and Label Gravure Association Global (PLGA) conference, held in Miami at the beginning of March, a panel consisting of printers, an engraver, and suppliers presented their experiences with, and cases for, the use of sleeves in gravure. The session addressed many issues including costs, dependability of the technology, and transitioning to sleeves—all which have kept many gravure printers away from sleeves.

Pete Byam, technical sales representative for Stork Prints America, Inc.—a manufacturer of lightweight gravure printing sleeves—was part of that panel at the PLGA conference. During his presentation, Byam dispelled several myths that continue to plague the technology, including:

• Sleeves creep at high speeds and high pressures. Byam says sleeves have been run at 1,200 fpm and 110 psi with no slippage.

• Payback with sleeves is not fast enough. ROI is generally less than four months, Byam said.

Sleeve technology is evolving so quickly that today's sleeves are much more advanced forms of the sleeves from only three years ago. However, in spite of first-hand testimonials that sleeves offer several advantages over cylinder bases, including monetarily, printers are still leery of the transition to sleeves.

Cost is key

As with most emerging technologies, much of whether gravure printing sleeves become accepted industry-wide will be based on the bottom line. How much does it cost to implement the technology? What are the continuing costs associated with engraving sleeves? How about maintaining and storing the sleeves? For the most part, the answers to those questions are favorable toward gravure printing sleeves. But there are some exceptions.

Repeats: The number of repeats a printer uses, said Mark Froehlich, operations manager at DI-NA-CAL® Label Group—a division of Smurfit-Stone Container Corp.—will determine how expensive a move to sleeves will be. "More repeats mean higher tooling costs for the printer," he said. "If a printer uses a wide variety of repeats, an across-the-board conversion to sleeves is probably not a smart business decision."

There are ways, however, of approaching the issue of repeats with an eye on expenditures. One of the first things a printer needs to do when considering a transition to sleeves is to analyze its cylinder stock, the various repeats, and the turnaround of each job, said Frank Passarelli, Bobst Group USA Inc. product manager—Printing, Coating and Laminating. "You will find families of the same repeat and ways to rationalize those which are close to each family," Passarelli explained. "You will find jobs that should not be considered in your sleeve evaluation. Basically, you are doing an 80/20 percent evaluation, and here, standardization is the key."

Passarelli added that while wall covering, wood grain imitation, and gift wrap are markets which use the most sleeves and have standard dimensions, flexible packaging also has standardization—just look at the packaging used for pasta, he said.

Life expectancy: According to Ferguson, traditional gravure cylinder bases can last the lifetime of a press, and can be remade again and again and again. That's not necessarily the case with gravure printing sleeves.

Stork Prints America reported a 60 to 70 percent success rate at remaking their sleeves once, Ferguson said. But, he added, "We have a 100 percent success rate remaking traditional gravure cylinders."

Froehlich added, "Sleeves cannot always be re-engraved, driving costs up vs. traditional steel bases that can be re-engraved indefinitely."

How well sleeves can be remade depends a lot on the engraver, too, Byam said. While some tradehouses have a success rate upwards of 85 percent, others can only successfully re-engrave sleeves 60 percent of the time, he said.

Material costs: There are financial upsides to gravure printing sleeves, too. The rising price of steel has made the cost of a traditional gravure printing cylinder base about 33 to 50 percent more expensive than the cost of a similar sleeve, Froehlich said. Modern sleeves consist of layers of chrome and copper; or chrome, copper and nickel, all moderately priced in comparison to today's steel.

Other costs: In addition to material costs, traditional gravure cylinder bases come with standard costs that also affect the price of sleeves, but on a much smaller scale. As examples, Passarelli names base price; transport logistics back and forth to the engraver; cost of the cylinder preparation process—cleaning, de-chrome, re-copper, polish, engrave, re-chrome, final polish; and the cost of warehouse and handling at the printer's site.

Where using sleeves can save a printer money is with handling, safety, storage, and shipping of the sleeves. "Sleeves require less storage space and don't need heavy-duty racking systems designed to hold lots of weight," Ferguson said. "Sleeves weigh about 7 to 10 lbs. compared to cylinders that weigh upwards of 250 lbs.—sleeves are significantly safer for operators to handle. Sleeves also require less equipment and not-as-sophisticated equipment when it comes to handling and mounting them on and off the press."

As for storage, according to Byam, printers can save up to 55 percent more square feet in storage space with sleeves compared to cylinder bases. More significantly, Byam said, sleeves can save up to 78 percent of cubic feet of space for printers. With sleeves, the walls of large, heavy cylinder bases which require a racking system are replaced by walls of drawers that hold many more sleeves per square foot compared to cylinder bases.

Furthermore, the cost of shipping to and from the engraver is also significantly less with sleeves and affords flexibility that cylinders can't. Sleeves, given their lightweight nature, can be shipped by next-day air, while cylinders are often shipped via truck and can take days to reach their destination.

With the ability to ship in a matter of hours, print jobs can be shipped between a printer's multiple facilities to help balance capacity issues, Byam said. In addition, due to ease of shipping, printers can "shop around" for the best-priced and most able engraver to engrave their sleeves—they don't have to stay regional when it comes to engravers.

Engravers: Major players in sleeves

The importance of engravers in the future adoption of sleeves in the gravure market cannot be underestimated, Froehlich said. "Sleeves have the potential to solve a number of issues with gravure—freight cost, base handling issues, and interoperability," he said. "Widespread adoption of this technology is contingent on two factors:

• "Engravers must embrace the technology. The processes and procedures to engrave sleeves have not been mastered except for a handful of engravers. As more engravers gain experience with sleeves they will become more common in the industry.

• "The problem of multiple repeats has to be addressed. Without its resolution, this will always be a niche technology."

Froehlich further explained the significant role that engravers have: "If it seems I'm concentrating on the engraver's role in a successful implementation, it's because that has been where we've seen the vast majority of problems develop in our own sleeve experience," he said. "All of the issues we've encountered as printers have been about employees reluctant to embrace a new technology. Our engraver, on the other hand, has faced significant process issues that have caused them at times to struggle."

But, for the most part, it's just a matter of time until gravure printers gain confidence in sleeve technology and its benefits, and feel comfortable sending their thousands of cylinder bases to the recycling center, Byam said. "Sleeves aren't necessarily for every printer out there," he said. "It's a technology that's kind of new and most don't want to be the first kid on the block to use it. But sleeves are gaining interest and will continue to do so as more companies with an entrepreneurial spirit try them out and experience all the benefits."

By Kate Sharon

Associate Editor