“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix
it” is age-old wisdom. However, in the newspaper publishing industry, this
philosophy may not be sound.
Because of the ’round-the-clock
nature of newspaper production at large daily newspapers, replacing worn-out
equipment is somewhat like changing tires on a moving car. To avoid costly
downtime, newspapers must be constantly diligent about keeping their production
equipment updated with the latest technology.
In 1999, the Los Angeles Times
(Monday – Friday, 944,303; Saturday, 1 million; Sunday, 1.37 million) found
itself in such a situation. The newspaper’s proprietary APCS control system
restricted the type of secondary controls that could be added to the presses,
and made it difficult to interface with other plant-wide systems. To meet its
long-term needs, engineers at the Los Angeles Times realized they needed a
flexible and advanced press control solution that could provide a clear
migration path for future press upgrades.
With 25 foreign bureaus and 13
domestic bureaus, the Los Angeles Times is one of the largest news-gathering
operations in the country. Its 16 presses in three separate facilities comprise
one of the largest newspaper printing operations in the nation.
At the heart of the Los Angeles Times’ 16
press control upgrades is Allen-Bradley PrintLogix technology, a comprehensive
control solution designed specifically for newspaper printing applications.
Keeping up with the times
The Los Angeles Times decided to
replace the press controls in 1999 when its own engineers did a web-width
reduction to 50 inches. It was during this project that management’s
perceptions were reaffirmed regarding its outdated press control system.
“Our support vendors could no
longer guarantee service,” said Brad Patterson, production service manager at
the Los Angeles Times. “And our old control system’s proprietary
architecture limited our options to expand.”
After considering a number of
options, The Times decided to work with Rockwell Auto-mation to implement a
PC-based press control system. Patterson had several goals in mind with the
upgrade, including eliminating obsolete control hardware, providing a clear
migration path for future replacement of machine-level controls, and collecting
and reporting from multiple plants to track quality and costs.
The press control upgrade involved
10 Goss Colorliner presses and six Goss Retroliner presses located at the
newspaper’s three production facilities. The first 12 presses — six in Los
Angeles and six in Costa Mesa, Calif. — were completed in 2000. The remaining
four presses in Chatsworth, Calif., were completed in 2001.
Achieving control flexibility
At the heart of all 16 press
control upgrades is Allen-Bradley PrintLogix technology, a comprehensive control
solution designed specifically for newspaper printing applications. The
PrintLogix architecture combines IBM-compatible PC hardware and Windows NT-based
software, with Allen-Bradley programmable controllers and drives. The system
simplifies plant-wide control of each press and integrates prepress and
postpress operations, such as paper roll storage and retrieval, web feed control
and auxiliary control systems. With PrintLogix, The Times has improved print
quality, reduced make-ready waste by 2 percent, and eased system maintenance.
“We needed an automated system
capable of gathering and analyzing press information, as well as generating
reports on waste, press speed, rolls per break and other performance data,”
Patterson said. “Our previous system relied on manual data input which was
unreliable and time-consuming.”
The PrintLogix system controls and
monitors ink, water and print registration on the presses, and includes operator
interface and management information system capabilities to control and monitor
printing functions. Compared to the previous solution, the new system is
designed to improve reliability and simplify future replacement of machine-level
and real-time press controls.
A key advantage of the PrintLogix
system is that it allows operators to execute multiple set-up commands at one
time, greatly speeding press startups. In addition, the PrintLogix compensator
preset program increases the accuracy of ink presets so that operators obtain
reliable ink value data, helping to reduce makeready waste. A 2-percent
reduction in makeready waste was achieved last year. This allows operators to
set registers and ink densities quicker, and generate acceptable copies sooner.
“With our previous system, we
were generating anywhere from 1,800 to 2,200 copies, on average, of cold startup
waste,” Patterson said. “Our goal was to get this number to under 1,200
copies per edition. Since installation, our crews have been able to consistently
hit this number with ease.”
Updating the press drives
The Times replaced its existing DC
analog drives on all 16 presses with Allen-Bradley 1395 digital DC drives. The
Goss presses use one drive to run the line shaft, with 12 drives sharing the
load to generate the 1,100 horsepower needed to power each press.
“Our greatest need was to remedy
outdated drives with the new system,” Patterson said. “The new press
controls provide diagnostics at the operator’s console, unavailable with the
old system, including drive status and ready information, overload conditions,
out of tolerance and other failure alerts.”
The digital DC drives also control
the running belt reelstands, and communicate that information to the operators.
The digital drives can react to web stresses quicker than the old drives,
helping to minimize the risk of web breaks, paper waste, and most importantly,
downtime. The Allen-Bradley digital drives also add to the flexibility of the
control system by processing the control logic to adjust to whatever press
configuration the operators choose.
Tighter press controls
Rockwell Automation and the Los
Angeles Times engineers worked together to replace the existing APCS supervisory
processor with Allen-Bradley PlantView software for supervisor control,
auto-imposition and data acquisition. The PlantView supervisory workstations
provide operators with central job control for multiple presses, allowing
operators to specify product parameters, generate a press imposition
automatically or manually, and create or schedule a job.
Press operator workstations (three
for each press) are equipped with Allen-Bradley PressView software. These
systems allow operators to perform job pre-setting to accelerate set-up times,
resulting in faster press runs and less paper waste. The software also allows
automatic correction of color-to-color registration errors and misadjustments in
ink densities.
“Operators also can use the
PressView consoles as a diagnostic tool to analyze stopped events and identify
the root cause of press problems,” Patterson said. “This makes it easier to
diagnose press breakdowns and track location and frequency. Since the
workstations have been installed, we have consistently met our overall press
uptime goal of 86 percent to 88 percent.”
With the latest in press control
technology, the Los Angeles Times has reduced setup time, improved print
quality, lowered maintenance costs and achieved greater flexibility for future
expansion.
“We knew we needed a
high-performance control solution with the flexibility to expand our production
capacity as needed,” said Patterson. “Rockwell Automation’s press control
solution meets these requirements, plus the advanced diagnostic capabilities
have eased the learning curve for operators. The old proprietary APCS program
was a great system in its day, but lacked the flexibility and functionality to
keep up with the times … or the Times.”
