Orders for New and Upgraded, Expanded Wifag Presses

By: E&P Staff Longtime Wifag customer Societa Editrice Corriere del Ticino SA will take delivery of a Wifag evolution 371 press next March.

The company, which also has renovated its mailroom, publishes the daily Corriere del Ticino and Giornale del Popolo and prints others' weeklies and brochures.

The new press replaces a Wifag OF 9.2/370. The configuration of the doublewide, two-page-around, blanket-to-blanket Wifag evolution 371 consists of four four-high towers, four M-type autopasters and one 2:5:5 jaw folder. The press has cutoff- and color-register controls and a folder superstructure that includes stitchers.

Wifag rates the press at more than 95,000 copies per hour for a tabloid of up to 128 four-color pages.

The Swiss press maker also received an order from Suomen Lehtiyhtyma Oy, Tuusula, Finland, that expands and upgrades its OF 370 press. Press controls and drive systems will be upgraded on the eight-couple tower, FA70 jaw folder, and PR2/P reelstand in September. The upgraded electronics and software will largely correspond to the standards of the OF 370 S eight-couple tower and a Wifag autopaster M50 to be added in December, when the turner-bar module will be replaced by a new Wifag autoturn.

This year, Wifag has extended its products and services with retrofits for existing OF 370 and OF 470 presses. The Tuusula project is the first comprehensive OF 370 retrofit.

Wifag's first shaftless OF 370 series presses went into production in 1996. For electronics and software more than 10 years old, it is becoming increasingly difficult to provide spare parts and maintenance, according to Wifag. The retrofit solution -- as a project in three phases or stepwise over several years -- takes advantage of the Wifag Platform Plus, comprising controls, drives, software functions, control cubicles, cabling, press safety, and documentation. A modernized press also may be equipped with Wifag's latest color-register and cutoff register controls.