DOVER, NH - The Columbus Dispatch has announced a plan to enhance postpress operations with shaftless inserting technology from Heidelberg. The Ohio newspaper will add four Heidelberg Magnapak packaging systems with a total of 88 hopper stations over the next 12 months. "Technical features including shaftless technology and the advanced hopper design and the pocket designs are what attracted us to the Magnapak," according to Bill Kohl, director of operations at The Columbus Dispatch. Kohl says the paper is also facing an increasing demand to add zoning capabilities. "With the Magnapaks, we expect to give our customers advanced zoning options and, at the same time, increase our production speeds," he explains. Heidelberg will begin installing the first Magnapak in May. The system will be configured for single or dual delivery with 40 hopper stations. Two more systems with 16 hoppers each will follow in September, and the final 16-station Magnapak will be installed in March, 2004. Each Magnapak will also be equipped with a Heidelberg hopper loader to feed every other hopper station. The Heidelberg Magnapak cycles at up to 30,000 papers per hour. Systems are expandable from 12 to 80 hoppers and accommodate from one to four deliveries. The shaftless design allows independently driven hoppers to be taken in and out of production for automated zoning at full production speed. The Magnapak is also the industry’s only packaging system that can be equipped to insert, collate and wrap, or complete both functions simultaneously. The Columbus Dispatch has a daily circulation of 249,000 and a Sunday circulation of 370,000