Initiative
Shree Refrigerations offers
Swedish spray dampening system


A known supplier of fountain solution chillers to the newspaper industry, Shree Refrigerations (P) Ltd, has brought the spray dampening system ‘DuoSpray’ to India in collaboration with Inventor Graphic Sweden AB. By installing this Swedish technology, DNA and Ushodaya Publications have witnessed its advantages, and Deccan Chronicle is in process to do so.
Reinhold Berntsson of Inventor Graphic Sweden AB and RG Shende of Shree Refrigerations (P) Ltd sharing a technical discussion.
The new system christened as DuoSpray from Inventor Graphic Sweden is unique in terms of its technology that offers: ability to spray fountain solution and blanket wash chemical thro’ the same nozzle, which makes it a built-in blanket washing system at no extra cost; closed tank system that prepares only 17 liters of fountain solution with its PC controlled auto dosing system thereby avoiding bactria/algae growth and wastage of hundreds of liters of fountain solution due to contamination commonly found in open tank systems; virtually power-free system that never circulates fountain solution that is not sprayed (The system is driven by static pneumatic pressure and does not use a pump, which eliminates heating up of fountain solution and thereby does not require a chiller. The only pump used in the system in the pump to fill water in the pressure tank and some small power for the PC and electronic valves and controls. The system consumes only one kilo-watt-hour for a six-tower press.); and very accurate control over the delivery of fountain solution to the plate based on CIP data, colour, speed, location, tower wise, etc. This is said to be the only system available in the market where the tank unit is controlled from and communicates to the PC console for operation, fault and alarm management. This generated excellent Management–Information-System (MIS) of all events related to operation of spray dampening system, faults and alarms, corrective actions taken and not taken, consumption of water and fountain solution, etc.

RG Shende, managing director of Shree Refrigerations (P) Ltd said, “We were looking at the beginning of use of spray dampening system in India and were impressed by the technology used by Inventor Graphic, Sweden in the design of DuoSpray spray dampening system. The use of high frequency (50 cycles / second) dual liquid solenoid valves, closed tank system & least power consumption (chiller-free operation even in high temperature ambient due to mist cooling effect) were unique amongst the comparable systems sold in India by foreign companies. Shree decided to offer this unique technology to Indian customers with in-India manufacturing and support. This created a blue ocean market for a highly advanced technology being offered at local price and with local installation and after-sales-service.”

Shree thus made its first installation on a 8 X 4-Hi tower Manugraph Hiline press at DNA’s Mahape facility. The advantage of this location for first installation was obvious. DNA and Bhaskar Group are well known for their ‘environment conservation’ initiative and all the GREEN advantages offered by DuoSpray would be well appreciated by DNA. Also, DNA offered a one-to-one comparison between conventional brush dampening system and DuoSpray.

The installation was completed in March 2011 and a comparative study was made for measuring actual on-the-job saving in the consumption of five major inputs namely water, fountain, ink, paper and power. All the consumptions were carefully measured and mapped by a team comprising of DNA-Shree-Inventor Graphic. And the results were highly encouraging. Over 98 percent saving in Power, 40 percent saving in fountain solution, 10 percent in water, average 4-5 percent in ink and 33 percent in start-up wastage were logged along with significant improvement in quality, ease of operation and maintenance.

As per RD Bhatnagar, chief technology officer of the Dainik Bhaskar group and DNA, “The DuoSpray is the most eco-friendly spray dampening system. Due to its unique closed tank design with no unwanted circulation of fountain solution and no return fountain contamination, DuoSpray uses the least power of all spray dampening systems. More importantly it works without the need of a chiller and that is a great cost saver. The system is working satisfactorily on our press for almost five months. We have been able to achieve savings on all consumables. The system is user-friendly and we did not face any major breakdowns or operational problems. The quality improvement is significant in terms of consistent colour density at all speeds.”

The DNA’s success was immediately duplicated in Ushodaya Publications. Ushodaya Publications (Eenadu) has installed double width DuoSpray spray bars on their Hamada make double width - double circumference satellite press on anti set-off spray on the common impression cylinder (CIC). Four such units were installed in Eenadu’s Hyderabad facility. DuoSpray was able to reduce image deposition on common impression cylinder from 1.0 mm to 0.2 mm. This deposition caused 350 to 400 copies waste due to problems like doubling, set-off, ghosting. On installing DuoSpray, Eenadu was able to save up to 90 percent on waste copies. According to PS Rao of Ushodaya Publications (Eenadu), “DuoSpray is a very energy efficient system offering us a very fine control over the fountain solution sprayed on the common impression cylinder. We were thus able to reduce paper waste and avoid stopping the press to clean the CIC. This created immense savings. The communication between the tank unit and PC offers useful MIS.”

The third installation of this system is underway at Deccan Chronicle to replace existing Turbo dampening system on a manroland Uniset double circumference press.

The Inventor Graphic has a range of products in their stable for offering to Indian newspaper industry such as slitters, and gluing systems. These systems will also be manufactured in the coming days at Shree Refrigerations’ state-of-the-art manufacturing facility with CNC sheet metal shop with computerized design (3-D Modeling) and manufacturing.

‘‘Inventor Graphic has a great technologically advanced product range only enjoyed by European and American customers so far. Shree Refrigeration now plans to make these products available to Indian customers at attractive prices due to local manufacturing (in a Sweden approved facility and process), with Sweden trained local manpower for manufacturing, installation and after-sales-support,” concluded Shende.

nnn

  Main Stories Index ›› Top