New digital label entry level press @ Gallus Innovation Days

Gallus Innovation Days was recently held at the headquarters of Gallus to St. Gallen, where 300 visitors came to see the innovations of the Swiss manufacturer of label printing machines. This year, Gallus, a member of the Heidelberg Group, presented how digitization will change the label industry and how Gallus is going to support their customers to manage this drastic industrial paradigm shift.

Gallus Smartfire – Getting started in digital printing made easy What would the Gallus Innovation Days be without a machine premiere? With the Gallus Smartfire, Gallus presented a starter model for digital narrow web label printing. This means, the Swiss full-range supplier is expanding its product portfolio with another digital printing press, which is deliberately positioned as an entry-level model. “With the Gallus Smartfire, we are also focussing on new target groups who are looking for a smart entry into digital label printing,” explains Michael Ring, Head of Digital Solutions at Gallus. “The Memjet technology allows us to offer an inkjet printing press that produces labels with a quality of 1600×1600 dpi while still keeping the investment costs at a low level.

The Gallus Smartfire prints with the well-proven Memjet print heads with water-based inks, which means that these labels are eco-friendly and leave a minimal ecological footprint. The Smartfire uses an ordinary power outlet, needs no exhaust equipment, is extremely compact, and emits no VOC (Volatile Organic Compounds), thus making it the perfect press for any work environment.

“The name says it all, the Smartfire is absolutely easy to operate via a self-explanatory touch panel,” says Michael Ring. With this digital press, only a few prepress skills are required to create professional CMYK 4-color inkjet labels. Just as easy are the replacements of the ink-containers and the exchange of the print head. Furthermore, this machine also delivers finished die cut labels, all produced in one pass and ready for shipping on the reel, just like Gallus customers know it from the other presses. For this purpose, a finishing unit is attached, on which the labels are laminated and cut. This can be either done individually by the integrated cutting plotter or by fast and cost-effective punching with the semi rotary die cutter at the end of the inline finishing unit.

So, one thing is for sure: Proven Memjet print quality matched with profound Gallus label know-how makes the Smartfire the ideal entry-level machine to get started in digital label printing.

Gallus Labelmaster Advanced, the perfect choice

Hot on the heels of the successful debut of the Gallus Labelmaster Advanced during Labelexpo 2017 in Brussels, this machine will now be presented to the public in St Gallen with automatic transverse and longitudinal register control, which further emphasises the ease of use of this press. The process change from flexographic printing unit to screen printing unit is easy to handle, too. With just a few simple steps, the two printing units can be exchanged using a sliding carriage and then be reconnected to the machine base. Equipped with one screen printing unit and eight flexographic printing units, the Labelmaster Advanced presented in the Print Media Center at Gallus impresses with its high final speed and its absolute register accuracy, without any manual readjustment after each job change.

Gallus Labelfire 340 – Digital label printing, now with extended digital and screen inline finishing functions Additional inline finishing functions for the industrial digital label production on the Gallus Labelfire were some of the main topics in the Print Media Center at Gallus Innovation Days. Upstream, this hybrid printing machine is equipped with a fully integrated screen printing unit, which enables a professional opaque white on transparent substrates that can be digitally printed over. Positioned downstream is the new Digital Embellishment Unit (DEU), which is able to carry out inline coating digitally and apply matte, gloss and tactile spot coating effects to the substrate web in various thicknesses as haptic relief effects. What is new is that by using metallic foils, this relief effect can be executed in metallic looks, which was previously not possible on any digital printing machine.

In keeping with the principle: “From the file to the finished label in one pass”, the Gallus Labelfire proves that it is the only digital printing press in the world where almost all inline finishing processes are possible. This means that this press can be used just as reliably and flexibly as any conventional label printing press from the Gallus product portfolio.