Milwaukee, Wis. & Maldon, U.K. – Innovation comes in many forms with the solutions becoming available for the sign & display industry. Interestingly, cutting technology that we take for granted, when coupled with grand format printing, can still see major innovations taking place. Such is the case with the VersaTech2, being shown at FESPA 2018. It is a full platform that includes capabilities not found anywhere else in the market. Come see the VersaTech2 at Blackman & White’s Stand: 2.2 D28.

VersaTech2 incorporates:
1. A unique patent-pending (Europe and U.S.) dual laser and traditional cutting belt technology that allows a single system to be utilized for laser cutting and etching of rigid materials, laser cutting and sealing of fabric/textiles and all of the routing and cutting features normally found on such cutters. Changeover is in minutes and requires no extraordinary actions by employees.

2. It accomplishes this with full conveying for both rigid and flexible/rolled materials while reaching speeds of 78” per second and 1.25G acceleration with full accuracy.

3. Updated oscillating and driven wheel tools have been added to increase throughput by a factor of 2-3 times.

4. A new Horizontally mounted laser is being demonstrated and delivered that allows for a 30% improvement in the cutting speed for textiles while still allowing for cutting and etching of rigid materials.

5. Inclusion of a new 5 kW router that allows the system to accomplish routing at more than twice the speed of its earlier systems, while allowing for larger bits (8mm vs. 6mm) and may be ordered with a 6 bit tool changer, significantly improving throughput when there are multiple router bits required for a single job.

6. Full integration with a heavy duty motorized fabric roll-off capability matched to the conveying speed of the table. This means that there is virtually no possibility of stretch, which causes inaccurate cutting of the fabric, especially for those fabrics that are not laserable, and are better cut by a driven wheel or knife.

7. System lengths from 1.6M to 3.2M to 4.8M with full conveying for both laser and mechanical cutting, plus flatbed capabilities to 9.6M or even larger.
8. Full integration with TigerVision™, developed by the same team that developed i-cut®. TigerVision incorporates the simplest and most innovative graphical user interface in the marketplace.

Looking at the competitive marketplace, there is no other solution for flatbed cutting that can handle and cut virtually any material that can be printed (although it can only etch ceramic, stainless steel and rocks) at industry expected speeds and accuracies. The VersaTech2’s breadth includes full automation capability, integration with the industry’s standard RIPS including QR code integration for automatic job recognition, true shape nesting, parametric modeling software for packaging and POP displays plus true Cut Estimating software that can handle estimates for quoting where the actual job image is not yet available, or for production costing and scheduling from the job PDF.