It naturally starts with the Intellistart Push to Stop systems that check that the plates are in register and Inpress Control to check that colour in terms of spectro analysis is correct.
It also includes Inspection Control. This uses a camera to compare what is printed with the digital artwork supplied to the platemaker. It will thus spot any flaws that have been introduced during platemaking or delivery to the press, a scratch of piece or debris for example, which would not be acceptable to the end user.
The process of register, colour and then content is shown in turn and show via progress bars on the press console, even if the operator is not physically present at the console because this amounts to autonomous operation. But not fully. If the press identifies an error with what is on the plate, there are three levels of response, with the level of sensitivity changing depending on the job or the printer: a pharmaceutical packaging printer for example needs a higher level of accuracy than say an online printer producing ephemeral leaflets.
For this to be really useful, an ejector gate needs to be integrated into the press able to divert sub quality sheets into a waste bin. This was introduced at Drupa last year, though is not a feature of the Micropress machine. It uses tabs in the delivery pile to delineate make ready from good sheets.
It is also using Print Start, the application that manages the flow of plates to the press says Heidelberg product manager Wiebke Stoltenberg.
This takes job data via an API into the Prinect workflow keeping that with the file from prepress when it arrives in the platesetter. The software adds a QR code to the image file so that each plate has the barcode to identify which plate it is and which job it belongs to.
A scanner on the Biel plate bender checks that the 80 plates are loaded to the delivery trolley in the correct sequence for the plate loading system. Thus there is a traceability of which jobs are in each trolley and the press can download job settings ready to apply these as those plates are loaded.
A further check ensures that the machine is receiving the plates it expects, which would not be the case should a company have two trolleys for some reason and loads the wrong one. “If they don’t match then the operator has to intervene,” Stoltenberg says.
Progress data is supplied back to the Micropress MIS via the API.
There is as yet no check to identify that the correct stack of paper has been loaded, though Heidelberg is no doubt working on this.
• This is a panel from the Micropress cover story from the Autumn 2025 issue of Print Business magazine
