Oosterhout, February 2017
- QIPC – EAE Americas wins Civitas Media as a retrofit customer
U.S. media company
Civitas Media has chosen QIPC – EAE Americas to modernize the press controls at
its newspaper print shop in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. In the future, yet
another new QIPC – EAE Americas customer will reap the benefits of innovative
EAE control technology.
Civitas Media,
headquartered in Davidson, North Carolina, is a dynamic, multi-channel, local
information company with strong roots in traditional community newspaper
publishing, producing more than a hundred different titles across twelve
states. The facility in Wilkes-Barre is responsible for the Times Leader, the primary daily
newspaper for the entire Wyoming Valley area, as well as a number of other
regional publications including a weekly entertainment guide Weekender and a substantial commercial
portfolio. They are printed on a manroland Geoman web press with five reel
stands, three four-high towers, and a folder. It went into operation in 1996,
making it the first press of this type anywhere in the U.S. The retrofit order
now placed with QIPC – EAE Americas includes the replacement of the existing
PECOM system with an EAE solution and the installation of state-of-the-art
control consoles.
Detailed analysis in
preparation for the retrofit
The new retrofit
project was launched as the outcome of detailed, intensive studies. The
fundamental question confronting Civitas Media was whether it actually made
economic and technical sense to maintain their own production facilities in
Wilkes-Barre. The answer was an emphatic ‘yes’, and since it could be assumed that
the press would continue to deliver high quality newspaper products with very
low waste in the future, the decision to have it upgraded and modernized was a
logical step.
“We’re obviously aware of the strengths and weaknesses of our press, and we’d
known for a while that replacing the existing press controls would be a wise
move. However, recent and ever-increasing malfunctions made dealing with all of
this a high priority,” says Peter Fleming, Regional Director of Operations at
Civitas Media. When asked why the retrofit order was awarded to QIPC – EAE
Americas, he replies: “QIPC – EAE were recommended to us by Jim Gore of
Pressline Services, a well-respected industry source. He was using them to
engineer their Boston Globe relocation project – a massive undertaking. I spoke
to the QIPC – EAE engineers there and was able to get some ‘hands-on’ time with
their consoles to get an idea of the system capabilities. It was a most
impressive visit. Later I toured EAE’s production site and had extensive, detailed
meetings with their management, design engineers, and technicians. I also
visited several newspaper production facilities that housed manroland presses
and was able to interact with peers in order to gain their perspectives. One of
these sites was even undergoing a retrofit at the time I was there, so it was
possible to judge for myself the quality of the workmanship involved. The
combination of these experiences gave us the confidence to propose QIPC – EAE
as our best choice for the project.”
Migration to modern
control consoles and press controls
The upcoming retrofit
will comprise the installation of two EAE Baltic Star control consoles, EAE IPC
controls for the printing units and the folder, and various PCs for remote
maintenance, network communications, and section control. The press will also
be equipped with an EAE Info reporting and logging system as well as an EAE
Print production planning and preset system. The Interbus network (wiring and
hardware modules) for one of the three towers will also be replaced at the same
time.
Mr. Fleming describes
what he and his team at the newspaper production facility expect from the
retrofit: “Top of the list is definitely reliability. Aside from that, we’re
also anticipating a supportable platform, a more user friendly setup, greatly
improved and friendlier support, and – last but not least – better and much
more detailed diagnostic functions, which happen to be the key to the operation
of this press.”
Ronald Reedijk,
Managing Director of QIPC – EAE Americas, comments: “We’re delighted that
Civitas Media have trusted us with this project. Retrofitting third-party
systems is always an exciting challenge. I firmly believe that, with our rich
experience in this field and our innovative and powerful systems, we're
optimally placed to implement a solution within a very short time that keeps
newspaper production at the Wilkes-Barre site running smoothly and economically
with a consistently high level of quality.”
The on-site retrofit work is due to be executed in the first quarter of 2017.
Peter Fleming is ready and eager: “Sometimes I get handed project management
jobs that I really look forward to, and this is certainly one of them.”
