January 14, 2007 - Fairfax Media Group has placed an order with Goss International for two shaftless double-width Goss Uniliner presses. The new 80,000-copies-per-hour presses will be installed at Rural Press Printing in the Brisbane suburb of Ormiston, Queensland, Australia and at Christchurch Press in New Zealand by the end of 2008.
Anthony Payne, regional manager at Fairfax Media Group commented, "The new Goss Uniliner press will be fast, flexible and a very significant upgrade for us here in Ormiston where we have been running a six-tower single-width Goss Community press. Since our merger with Rural Press last May, we have been running at almost maximum capacity, so it's definitely time for a change."
The two new 4x2 presses will print up to 128 pages tabloid in full color and will be configured as four four-high towers and two 2:5:5 jaw folders with a 578 mm cut-off. Each folder will feature inline stitching, and one will have quarterfolding capability. The four towers and reelstands will be located at 90 degrees to the press line, similar to the configuration of Goss FPS presses, and will have the highest level of automation currently available. Various finishing options will also be supplied to address the current trend towards magazine-style supplements in newspapers.
"The right angle arrangement with webs slit and turned inline with the formers is the solution to the issue of double-width presses running different paper web-widths," commented Payne. "By moving the turner bars, the ribbons are aligned with the formers giving infinite web-width variability between two set points. I think more installations will go this way, as people realize the benefits," he continued. The new press will have the ability to print square and standard tabloid products of varying sizes as well as different broadsheet formats.
The Ormiston plant currently produces a localized edition of the Sydney Sun Herald as well as Trading Post and Australian Financial Review, with heatset sections being outsourced to other contract printers while Christchurch Press prints leading title, The Press, as well as national Sunday title, Star Times, and tabloid title, Christchurch Mail.
The Uniliner press at Christchurch Press will be installed at a new dedicated facility on a Greenfield site on the outskirts of Christchurch and will bring new flexibility and opportunity to The Press' 95,000 circulation six-days a week broadsheet with up to 172 pages on Saturdays.
General manager of The Press, Chris Jagusch, says the new plant will be state-of-the-art in terms of its color capabilities and speed and will comprise specialized publishing equipment to better manage preprinted sections and packaging. "The new production facilities will give The Press the capability to push production boundaries, raise standards, and give readers a better end product, while giving advertisers greater options for promoting their goods and services," he confirms.
Payne concludes, "We believe we have got the best press for the job required. We've been very impressed by what we've seen so far from Goss and if the projects go as smoothly as they have to date we'll be very happy."