L.A. Times forms print reproduction quality committee p.

By: Editorial Staff THE LOS ANGELES Times has put together an 11-person steering committee to study the paper's print reproduction quality.
"We think our print quality is very good but we also believe it's always possible to do better," said Times media relations manager Laura Morgan.
The committee, chaired by Keating Rhoads, vice president of operations, brings together members of every department involved with producing the printed product, including advertising, prepress, systems, editorial and the pressroom.
The steering committee, which has outlined a plan for the study, will ask each department to pick seven to 10 employees to explore procedural and practical solutions to problems affecting their area, according to Morgan.
Phase 1 of the project focuses on registration, ink density, newsprint and ink quality, and customer comments and complaints. Phase 2 will concentrate on customer expectations and the third phase will examine page design parameters.
Selected recommendations will be implemented throughout the next year-and-a half, it was reported.
Morgan said the committee also will study how best to maximize the benefits of the Times' new $411 million production expansion project, the largest capital expenditure in the paper's history.
The Times' new Olympic plant has six Goss Colorliner presses, each capable of printing a 96-page newspaper with 24 pages of full color and four pages of spot color at speeds up to 70,000 newspapers an hour.
More than 50,000 gallons of ink can be stored in the facility. Piped directly to the presses are six 6,200-gallon tanks for black ink and eight 1,320-gallon tanks for color ink. The plant uses about 1,000 gallons of ink a day.
Over 80% of the Times is published on recycled newsprint.