AutoCreaser Pro XL for Richardson & Son, Hawick

Finishing Solutions

Richardson & Son, based in Hawick in the Scottish Borders, has invested in a Morgana AutoCreaser Pro XL, purchased through Morgana dealer CLC.

Commenting on the need for the AutoCreaser Pro XL, Jamie Richardson, co-director, said: ‘We do a lot of creasing and perforating on our Thomson platen machines, but it takes quite a bit of skill and time to makeready those machines. a lot of the jobs we do are small runs, like sock bands and swing tags, for example, so makeready was taking longer than the time to actually produce the work.

‘One of the team had seen something about more automated creasing products online, so we made enquiries to three of our print finishing equipment suppliers. All of them came back with the same answer – that the Morgana AutoCreaser Pro XL would be able to handle our needs. We knew the Morgana team, as we have a few other Morgana machines on-site, so then, because of our location, we needed to find the best service solution as well as the best price. Although pricing was pretty close between them all, CLC offered an on-site demo.’

Would this new arrival make the existing trusty platen products redundant? ‘No, we have kept the platens, and our Titan cylinder. Although the Titan will probably never run again, we are not really short of space, and it is an impressive bit of kit – also I guess we could be a little sentimental. The platens though are still used for die-cutting, and creasing heavier stock on a regular basis,’ added Jamie.

The Morgana AutoCreaser Pro XL paper creasing system is an easy to use product with a highly efficient vacuum top feeder. The creasing rule in the AutoCreaser Pro XL eliminates paper tearing and, therefore, cracking. The Pro XL runs at a maximum of 8500 A4 sheets per hour, with no loss of accuracy.

The product is Morgana’s most productive creaser to date, complete with the ability to handle longer sheets. The new AutoCreaser Pro XL takes a sheet size of up to 385 x 1300 mm with the table extension. Its feeder boasts an ultrasonic double sheet detection, an in line rotary perforation system with the capacity for up to five perforations at the same time, as well as the option of a cross perforation unit.

‘The AutoCreaser Pro XL can be loaded with up to 200 mm of stock, meaning we can set the job up, check it is correct, then walk away and let the machine do its thing. Being a small team, we need that level of automation so that we can keep our production output high. We also liked the capacity to store a large number of job pre-sets in the on screen menu, meaning that complex jobs that come back to us frequently can be set-up with just the touch of a button,’ added Jamie.

‘The machine has done a lot of varied tasks. It perforates our raffle tickets, creases menus, order of service sheets, greeting cards, sock bands, swing tickets, and many more. The biggest plus, of course, is the makeready time between jobs – it is just so quick and simple. The machine runs every day, doing a variety of different jobs, and has definitely helped us increase our productivity.’