There has been a lot of testing with registration problems, registering to the outside plate, registering to the inside plates and moving of the pins. It looks like everyone has done the pin thing, but the general felling is set the pins with a good gauge and snap test and leave them. Do all your registration to the inside plates, NC or FC and then move the out side plates if needed. It seems that most of the registration problems start in the plate room. This is the area that needs the most attention. Check your Lith and benders machines.

Having trouble with clean up after long runs, being down for two hours or so. It seems to relate to heat, while the press is running the water helps keep the press cool and as the press sits the heat is transferred from the frame to rollers which cause the rollers to swell and not transfer the water to the plate. When down for over 45 minutes Contra Costra, Phoenix and Santa Barbara ink the plates up. No problems with plates cleaning up on restart.

Need to use a transition densitometer to measure density of films. Stated it is common for imagesetters to be off. Gray bars need to be read on the negative to make sure they are set right, this should be done weekly?

Ragi Issac from Goss stated that He feels that the main causes of registration errors are:

Bad plates

Bad film

Plate installation

Blankets

Paper

Set up a test page that simulates the degree of color vs. black so that ink and water content are consistent with actual conditions. Perform a test run to establish register pin settings. Once pins are set you never touch them. "pin position is sacred".

Too much ink and water on the sheet, even though in balance, will cause circumferential registration problems

Santa Barbara sets register pins to Goss specs.

SJM has had a Western OPB for some time. Dave Turnipseed stated that still had some registration variations from lane to lane, and they ran even numbered pages down one lane and odds through the other.

SB feels most of their registration issues came from platemaking, ink and water variations, and blanket gaps.

Contra Costa reported having problems with slack before the folder on their bottom sheet. They increased airflow to the formers, and extended the RTF trolleys to get more wrap. This seems to havce adressed the problem.

With a long paster tail proper comp settings are important. If the comp is set too close to the end of it’s travel you get excessive wrap around the roller, which can cause web breaks.

Paper weight. Raises of hands indicated that 40% use 30# or heavier paper, 10% use 27.7#, approximately 25% of the group has used 27.7 and gone baqck to 30#. Many sited the registration problems with lighter weights.

SB uses 30#, 34#, and 50# paper, all with the standard Goss pin settings

SB reported greatly increased paster efficiency with the straight-line paster pattern, particularly on half-rolls.

PM'S: Everyone is working on setting up there PM'S on hourly meters. LA Times is changing blankets at 18,000,000 impressions or every 3 months. At this point they are cobra miking around 79 1/2.

Tie Main Air Header solenoid into Cardox system to isolate header if cardox goes off. Lesson learned from fire at anther press. They had re-flash due to air lines bursting and feeding the fire.

Climate control – neither Santa Barbara nor SJ Mercury News have climate control for their roll storage area or reel room.

Got more positive feedback on the lintbuster system. Contra Costa is using it with great success.

Several papers noted the difficulty in finding local vendors for machine grinding cylinders. According to Contra Costa there are only three vendors they have been able to identify in the country.

50" cut down was a big topic. Goss ran through a quick list of the press components effected by a cut down. They also have this information on their web sight. It was noted that if Goss does the cut down, they maintain a spare parts inventory that may not be available if we do our own.

The Orange County Register is in the process of cutting down to 50". They are contracting the work through Goss, for warranty protection, and they are pleased with the progress.

50" cutdown - OC Register is in the midst of a 50" cutdown. Unlike the LA Times, they have contracted with Goss for engineering, parts, and some labor.

Lubricants - Goss recommends DTE 26 for hydraulic sumps. It is the same viscosity as the Waylube 68 sump oil.

Stripped out driveline clutches. Need to exercise every time you lubricate to get grease down into the splines.

One item that we saw at Rocky Mountain News was a Seal Master bearing with zerk for the ink form roller bearings. The pipe had to be cut but the finished product looked promising.

Unit slitters are for the most part not being re-sharpen. New ones are being put in from A American press parts. ( Tom Sweeny).

SJMN Inspects slitters every day for chips\damage to prevent web breaks at the slitter.

Tom Sweeny at A-American press parts is selling a tin-coated slitter blade that seems to last longer. (Contra Costa)

LATimes changes their blankets after 18 million impression, or about six months

CC changes their blankets after 800 running hours. They use Nensco NP 40s

To address poor water pick up use Hydrophilic water roller with a durometer of 24-28.

Starting up a hot press that’s been sitting for 45 minutes, problems with toning. Several sites suggested that this was due to heat transferance from the press frame.

Ragi Issac reccomended that the deactivation sequence at 15,000, activation at 5,000 ink on with impressions after five seconds.

In "Supervisory Functions", under "change press parameter", "presets", at the bottom there’s a multiplier/ ink density setting for each press.

We still need to do some checking here to make sure we have ink and water curves set correctly. These are few of the things to check;

Lower Par readings.

Speed up ink curves

Change multiplier

Page pack shuttles, bought replacement shuttles from Ron Somaska at Goss.

Sac Bee is testing Ryco spray bars, they are also removing the doors from the Goss bars. Most sites have now removed air from the old-style Goss bars.

Ink train gear failures were not an issue this year.

LA and the Dow Jones (Seattle) have replaced their spray bars with the new style Ryco, like the ones we are testing. Dow Jones is having some problems with them, the plungers are sticking. Sacramento took the air off their spray bars years ago with no impact . Most everyone has removed the rubber from the spray bar doors and some shops have even removed the doors.

This still seems to be and on going problem. One idea was to put a oil line to the top of the bearing like they did in Phoenix.

LA and Santa Barbara are using Day blankets, no problems. Phoenix is using Nensco NP 40's on C and D and NP 32's on A and B. with good results. We are using NP 40's on all levels, with good results. The most important thing with blankets is it the instillation, make sure you torque them correctly! We are doing a much better job in this area. Would like to see the manufactures come up with a standard on blankets. Example would be a numbering system, a positive feed blanket would be the same from one company to the next.

OC Register removed the side guards from their spray bars, and is experimenting with spraying directly into the ink train for dampening. No conclusions yet.

Using a product called BIO-T 200 breaks up Soy inks. Comes from Manco in Okland.

Phoenix has been doing some testing in cleaning their RO system with Hydrogen Peroxide with very good results. They are using 1oz of a 10% hydrogen peroxide to 80 gallons every 3 days. They have had it tested and it has killed all the algae in their system. This does away with using bleach and vinegar. Bleach is hard on metal parts.

Use a 10% peroxide solution to control biological growth rather than bleach. It is not caustic like bleach, and so the system does not require flushing as with bleach. Simply pour in 1 oz. 3x per week. There are some handling precautions. It may be better to go with a larger dose of a lower % concentrate.

Dampner solution - stated that Goss had done extensive testing on the effects of dampner solution temperature and had found that wide variations had no impact on print quality.

Blanket wash with low VOC’s - Bio T 200A Manufactured by Mamco of Oakland Ca.

Algae growth in fountain solutions - Use 1oz. Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2) per 100 gallon of Water. Discontinue chlorine and vinegar.

Mixed feelings on the use of rollers. A few people are no longer using Bingham due to quality and turn around time. Imperial Rollers were talked about and that person was very happy with them. One shop changes his rollers out on a 3-year bases and does not worry about durometer readings. Everyone else is changing for damage, size and hardness.

Cleaning of rollers, it looks like very few shops are cleaning their rollers, just leave them inked up.

Hydraulic leaks - no one has a good solution. Goss is now stocking sets of steel hydraulic lines for replacement on colorliners. They are sold individually or in sets. There are four diffferent sets. Call Ron for prices and part numbers. No one reported having tried this fix yet.

If having a problem with the former nose put two springs behind the nose.

Santa Barbara reported using "LA Style" nip rings from New England Newspaper supply, which have a lower point profile, and have found they pull better with less marking. They have a 50% flat on the top of the knewnal . The thinking is that the edge of the knewnal does the pulling and not the tip or point.

Problem with papers rolling out of the delivery, Goss as recommend taking 1/16" off of the stripper shoes. High strength ink seems to help because you run with up 20% less ink on your front page.

Most sites are now using one-piece folder knives.

Too much drag on the top sheet coming out of the fly shaft. Relieve 1/3 of the face of the stripper shoes by milling a grove down the face.

LA Times and Santa Barbara are using a under cut nip collar from Nensco, this helps reduce the marking on the sheet and wrinkling of the bottom sheet. There seems to be some concern on how long they last. Matt said that he replaced his every 6 months.

SB undercuts 30% of the surface area of their stripper shoes to reduce drag, with no negative results

Stripped cutting cylinder bolts. No one else has had the problem with stripping the bolt out on the cutting cylinder when changing the knife from straight to collect.

E stops, rolls running ahead, Andre from electrical shop got some good ideas on what the problem maybe. Jack Scheckel says the paper is stretching!!!!!

When having a problem with belt tension fluctuating, (with 3/4 and 1/2 rolls) check to make sure the lock lever is back on and the switch is on.

Matt Armstrong from Santa Barbara has now been using straight line paster patterns for the last year with very good success, around 80 to 90 rolls per break. Everyone else is still using the Goss W pattern. One thing most shops have done to help with web breaks is gone back to 30lb paper.

Once the dancer hits the top the press thinks there’s a web out and shuts down.

Check for the UPS modification in the RTP panel (two position switch). If it’s not present it’s approximately $1k per panel to add. UPS power required is approximately 10 amps of 120v, single phase per unit.

Dan Vogel on RTP Slip Ring maintenance "Too much will not hurt the RTP, but you risk introducing a problem"

Dan Vogel stated that, on the Warner brake controller, there is a frequency adjustment on the bottom. It should be turned completely clock-wise.

LA Times put a pointer and scale on the dancer to ease diagnosis of RTP problems.

Over run and bagging on fast stop. Too much water according to John Schekell. It can stretch 12-to 14 inches.

How to tell if you are pulling too much from the folder. Load cell installed on the pipe roller bearings indicates the tension on the sheet. Manufactured by "Dover, Montavo, Kidder."

OCR reported that, On half-rolls, gauge pressure will bounce\fluctuate, that you need to return the air switch to the "on" position after removing the belts. It’s in the Goss manual under "removing belt".

Power failure (bump) drops out the RTP drives. Modification available to CT-RTP UPS allows longer dwell.

Some of the slip ring not reading well during pasters.

Check that the slip ring is square. (running true, This in not the housing shim check.

A way to cut down ink build up on common cylinder is to put a light coat of silicon on it.

No such thing as a 6" rail. Rails should be sharp at the edge, this does help some with the ink rolling off the rail. Craig and Gary talked to Goss and explained how to do this.

Someone brought up the idea of quick disconnects on the page pack hoses.

Would like to be able to put an adjustment on the guide rollers like the ones on the Colorliner.

Source for Spiral Brush motors: Joe at Associated motors (714) 630-2055 (don’t quote me on that number)

Goss says that alternate replacement for the Pacific Science motors are Baldor 3phase AC motor and we can get the upgrade kit from Goss to convert the single phase ac to 3 phase motors. John Scheckel recommendation.

Poor speed match on paster (Metroliner). Drive belt may be worn too thin and the surface dimension of the belt is under size.

A 10% Hydrogen peroxide solution is being added to fountain solution to prevent bacteria growth in dampeners. It has proven effective without the corrosive properties of bleach.

Contra Costa has elected to buy all new slitters, rather than recondition old. They feel there is a savings buying new, when compared to the time it takes to make old ones usable and then resetting the undersized slitters to function. They buy tin-coated slitters from A-American.

Several papers have taken to grooving the stripper shoe to reduce the surface drag without losing hold down control.

There was considerable interest in the availability of split nip rings (cracked rather than cut). I was pretty sure we are already using these, but wasn’t positive. If we are then several papers would appreciate that info on the user sight.

Several people were having trouble with nip bounce. Some of the possible causes were identified as nips out of round, bent nip shafts, springs in need of changing, worn bearing on nip shaft causing shaft play and paper dust restricting spring function.

There was a lot of interest in the Goss "Speedy Sleeve" for sealing the tucker blade shafts. Several users were unaware these were available.

Wall Street Journal and The Rocky Mountain News, after changing to air bags rather than springs have been experiencing an increase in broken pins. It was admitted that this might be operator learning, rather than an inherent defect in the system. In conjunction, they have seen an increase in offset, but they believe there may be less bounce with the air bags.

Many papers are using a silicone application system to reduce drag on the fly pockets. Most have made them in-house. They were split down the middle as far as using straight silicone or diluted mixes.

Some possible causes of cutting rubber wear were listed;

1. Knife height adjustment.
2. Backlash settings. Target of 0.002"-0.004" will vary higher at different positions.
3. Rubber resins degenerate at different rates.
4. Bad knives.

San Diego cited problems with a loss of registration during paster transition. Dan Vogel gave the following recommendations.

1. Floating roller should be at the middle during transition. If not, it is off-balance.
2. Measure speed at pilot controller and volume booster.
3. Attach a scale (fish type) to the cloth strap and pull on the scale. The cloth strap should start to collapse at about 60lbs. All straps should break within 5lbs of each other.
4. Sticking volume booster. Turn air handle on then off. Pull the copper strap. It should release within 5-seconds. Otherwise, it is sticking.

Upgrade kits available for surface sensors from current to Banners. Several levels of upgrades from Goss available. Roll Positioning and IR surface sensing costs about $500 conversion for one, we can copy the other conversions from the first and save money.

$18,000 to $20,000 per reel to convert to full electronic paster system. Remove almost all components from panel to perform (for D-6 and D-8). Contact Don Stephen at Goss

Must reduce air pressure settings proportionally for the cut down sheet (50") when calibrating conoflow system (60" web == 44#, 50" web == 40# References Field Service Guide ~411 from Goss (brought up by Dan Vogel)

Brought up that the slip rings need to be 30 thousandths or less. Verified with a dial indicator.

There was a lot of discussion about lubricants (following the change to Vactra 2). While most papers are using Waylube 68, few are happy about it. Phoenix is using a custom formula (606 Almisol from Lubrication Engineers) it has a high tackifier and holds up well over time. Some are considering Mobil Vactra 1409, which is being touted (by Mobil) as better than the Waylube 68. Goss is still unwilling to endorse that product.

San Diego has been frustrated by fluctuation in their oil pressure gauges. They identified that high oil pressure does not necessarily coincide with sufficient oil flow. In many cases, high oil pressure was symptomatic of a flow restriction. It was recommended that they consider flow sensors rather than oil pressure gauges, since the lubrication system itself is not pressurized, but instead depends on a sufficient flow of lubricant.

Several papers identified fountain solution infiltrating the oil as cause of slime mold in the oil sump. Some have passive oil/water separators built into their circulation systems.

San Diego is in the process of stacking mono on mono units. Those who have done it before identified problems with the lubrication system needing to be reconfigured or upgraded to accommodate the upper unit.

Someone brought up adding extensions to ink rails to prevent roll over of ink into the sump. Everyone showed interest, but no one seemed to know whether it worked or not.

Worming. Research is being done on HO variable speed ink drums. There are textured rollers designed to replace slow VSI. Also a new slow speed inker is available.

A lot of discussion about copper versus ebonite ink drums. Many are flame spraying in house. Spokane is using nylon and Oregon is spraying copper (They estimate a cost of $500/drum for copper). Tacoma has been using bearing grade nylon for about $450/drum at the rail position and has seen no negative effect. Contra Costa had switched to ebonite, but is switching back to copper.

Ceramic ink drums have been tried, but no one had a notable opinion one way or the other with the exception of Orange County who has used ceramic for 14 years on their water metering unit, in place of chrome, with good success.

• Iron Clad on the back of blankets. Eliminated rust on blanket cylinder.
• One piece knife blades. Great rusults
• Cutting rubbers at 90-92 durometer.
• Trying airless spraybars. Ryco.
• At FV using 10% mineral oil in ink to reduce sticking.
• Better procedures for the installation of blankets.