Tighter lead times and increasing production demands have led Indiana based The Papers to look for new efficiencies.

Located in Milford, the family owned and operated business - founded in 1939 when Arch Baumgartner took over the reins of The Milford Mail - has evolved into a diverse combination of newspaper and magazine publishing and commercial printing. It is now headed by Arch's son Ron Baumgartner who joined the company in 1966.

Substantial production capacity is centred around a four-tower manroland Cromoman press, supported by 17 units of Goss Community, and Heidelberg and Shinohara sheetfed.

Now DCOS Automation Sweden has upgraded press automation upgrade with automatic register, ink density and cut-off controls, replacing an older registration system. The installation completed in February includes eight CRC4 closed-loop density/register control cameras, plus four PCT4 cut-off cameras, with DCOS integrating the system the existing manroland remote ink system.

Plant manager Todd Clark says the project followed positive feedback from a number of users, including one in Norway.

"The Norway site visits really demonstrated the savings the systems can provide," he says. "The startup waste numbers were amazingly low."

Press control upgrades were another area of interest, a "future option in keeping ahead of electronic obsolescence".

After only a few weeks, The Papers is already seeing improved waste reduction, as well as compliments from customers about print quality.

For DCOS Americas sales director Ron Ehrhardt, the order has an interesting "second generation" link: "In 1968 my dad sold Arch and Ron Baumgartner a three-unit Goss Community press, and 50 years later I was able to sell Ron this automation upgrade.

"I think that's pretty cool."

Pictured: Plant manager Todd Clark with the Cromoman press (from a company video)