Venlo, The Netherlands, 9 October 2008 – Océ expands its range with the new Océ Arizona® 350 GT UV curable flatbed printer, which includes support for white ink printing and high production print speeds. The Océ Arizona 350 GT will be on display at several industry trade shows worldwide including Specialty Graphic Imaging Association (SGIA), October 15-18, Atlanta; Graph Expo, October 26-29, Chicago; Viscom Germany, October 30-November 1, Frankfurt; Viscom Italy, November 13-15, Milan; and FESPA Asia Pacific, November 28-30, Bangkok.
The Océ Arizona 350 GT is the next generation model in the award-winning Océ Arizona printer line. It uses UV curable inks and Océ VariaDot imaging technology to deliver near-photographic image quality for nearly any application. Designed as a true flatbed system it can print on a wide variety of rigid substrates and features a Roll Media Option for printing onto flexible media.
White ink expands capabilities
The Océ Arizona 350 GT includes a White Ink Option that can be added at the factory or in the field. The White Ink Option enables under-printing for non-white media or objects, over-printing for backlit applications on transparent media and/or printing white as a spot color. Under-printing white ink provides a base for non-white surfaces upon which color can be added, giving users the ability to expand their range of offerings to include specialty applications. Over-printing white ink provides a diffusion layer for backlit applications that will be viewed from the unprinted side, enabling users to produce high quality backlit images for point-of-purchase applications. The ability to also print white ink as a spot color enables white features of images to be highlighted for greater effect.
Production print speeds
The Océ Arizona 350 GT features production print speeds up to 22.2 square meters (239 ft2) per hour on rigid media and up to 17.5 square meters (188 ft2) per hour using the Roll Media Option. This enables users to print nearly sixty 1.25 x 2.5 m (4’ x 8’) boards in a single eight-hour shift, or more than 150 square meters (1615 ft2) of flexible media.
Printer basics
The Océ Arizona 350 GT combines a true flatbed design with a separate, dedicated roll-to-roll system. It can print onto rigid media up to 1.25 m wide x 2.5 m long x 48 mm thick (49” wide x 98” long x 1.89” thick). With the Roll Media Option installed, users can print onto flexible media up to 2.2 m (87”) wide. It uses four-color (CMYK) plus White UV curable inks and Océ VariaDot imaging technology with near-photographic image quality.
The Océ Arizona 350 GT joins the popular Océ Arizona family of UV curable, flatbed printers at the top of the range. The Océ Arizona 250 GT uses four-color (CMYK) ink and prints at speeds of up to 16 square meters (172 ft2) per hour. The Océ Arizona 200 GT also uses four-color (CMYK) ink and prints at speeds of up to 9.3 square meters (101 ft2) per hour. All share the same robust architecture and deliberate design that offer the Océ values of quality, reliability, productivity and user-friendliness.
Outstanding image quality, designed for productivity
The Océ Arizona 350 GT uses Océ VariaDot imaging technology that enables a printhead to produce dots of variable size versus printheads using fixed-droplet technology. Océ VariaDot technology creates these variable dots by dispensing ink droplets that vary in size from six to 42 picoliters. The ability to vary the drop size to as little as 6 picoliters produces sharp images with smoother gradients and quarter-tones. The ability to jet larger droplets up to 42 picoliters produces dense, uniform solids. The result is near-photographic image quality with sharpness only before seen at resolutions of 1,440 dpi or higher.
Océ VariaDot imaging technology uses significantly less ink
In addition to superior image quality, Océ VariaDot imaging technology with four color inks uses significantly less ink compared to six color printers with fixed-droplet inkjet technology. This lower ink consumption results in ink savings of up to 50 percent over fixed-droplet, six color printers.
The Océ Arizona 350 GT is a true flatbed design that uses a vacuum system to hold media stationary on a flat surface, ensuring accurate registration even on multiple imaging passes. Full bleeds can be printed, saving time and labor costs in finishing. No minimum print size means just the necessary materials are used with no substrate waste. Unlike all other flatbed or rigid-capable printers, the Océ Arizona 350 GT prints along the long axis of rigid media to optimize throughput – the fewer the number of printing passes over the media, the higher the average productivity.
Opportunities for applications that command premium prices
The Océ Arizona 350 GT can print on irregularly shaped or non-square items, heavy substrates such as glass, or materials that have an uneven surface such as wood. This is an advantage over competitive rigid-capable printers that use belt or friction-based media feed systems, as they can only print on square-cornered, lightweight materials of uniform thickness. The Océ Arizona 350 GT, along with the White Ink Option, opens the printing possibilities to more exotic applications that command premium prices.
A Roll Media Option can be added in the factory or in the field, giving customers the ability to print onto flexible media including vinyl, self-adhesive vinyl, scrim banner, paper and blue backed paper without compromising the rigid printing workflow. Once a rigid print is finished, the printhead assembly is positioned over the roll module and begins printing on flexible media, while the rigid material is swapped out and the new board is placed on the vacuum table and prepared for printing. When the flexible media printing is completed, the printhead assembly moves back to the table to resume printing on the rigid media. The media roll can be unloaded at any time without interrupting rigid printing, and there is no down time to reconfigure the system to change from one print mode to the other.
Beyond display graphics applications
The Océ Arizona 350 GT is ideal for producing a wide variety of display graphics such as event graphics, point-of-purchase displays, limited-term signage, banners, backlit and reflective rigid displays, transit advertising, and directional signage. But because of its ability to print on a range of materials not predetermined simply by “square, flat and thin” and its support of white ink, the Océ Arizona 350 GT can produce applications beyond the norm including custom furniture, glasswork, fixture enhancement, fine art, or nearly anything that the imagination can conceive.
Availability
Contact your local Océ office for availability in your area. For more information, visit the corporate website.
About Océ
Océ is one of the world's leading providers of document management and printing for professionals. The broad Océ offering includes office printing and copying systems, high speed digital production printers and wide format printing systems for both technical documentation and color display graphics. Océ is also a foremost supplier of document management outsourcing. Many of the world’s Fortune 500 companies and leading commercial printers are Océ customers. The company was founded in 1877. With headquarters in Venlo, The Netherlands, Océ is active in over 90 countries and employs some 24,000 people worldwide. Total revenues in 2007 amounted to € 3.1 billion. Océ is listed on Euronext in Amsterdam. For more information on Océ, visit the corporate website.
For further information contact:
Océ-Technologies B.V.
Nick Gale Manager
Media Relations
Tel. +31 77 359 5628
E-mail nick.gale@oce.com
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