September 7, 2005 The Mitsubishi DIAMONDSTAR is the world's fastest double width newspaper offset press – it is as tall as a four story building with a printing speed of 90,000 full colour, 96-page broadsheet copies per hour. And who could possibly use a press that produced so many newspapers? Well, newspapers like the Yomiuri Shimbun which is the only newspaper in the world with a daily audited circulation greater than 10 million copies, a feat it first achieved in 1994 – its current audited circulation is 10,075,479 and a full page advert costs JPY47,910,000 yen, (US$437, 770) which is very reasonable when you consider the cost per thousand figure calcs to just US$42.34.
The Yomiuri Shimbun bought four DIAMONDSTAR presses and can produce 100 full colour newspapers a second at full capacity. And Mitsubishi sold eight of the machines last year, so at least four others are lurking elsewhere, probably in Asia given this list of the world’s 100 largest newspapers.
Note that this list credits the Yomiuri Shimbun (Japan) with a circulation of 14,532,694 but the newspaper itself comes in at the lesser figure.
The new press offers significant improvements in plant productivity and readily delivers high-quality products throughout high-speed production runs. By maintaining consistent ink density across the entire width of the web, vibrant photographs and vivid advertisements - essential elements of any newspaper - can be printed in splendid colours. The higher production speed also enables delivery of the latest news to even more readers in a much shorter amount of time.
The DIAMONDSTAR 90 achieves stable, high-speed operations by reducing the overall load on the press through use of unique low-friction type cylinder bearings, the drive motor (shaft-less drive) system, and a folder built to match the high-speed press performance.
Vibration has been suppressed through the adoption of highly rigid side frames, and the same renowned printing quality of former Mitsubishi newspaper presses has been retained, though at much higher speeds, by employing a new ink roller configuration. In comparison to conventional presses, Mitsubishi claims the DIAMONDSTAR realises a productivity gain of about 30% as a result of the higher printing speed.
Originally via The Red Ferret Journal