Problem:
The packaging department of this Michigan manufacturer was printing high resolution product information, expiry dates and bar codes on two or four sides of generic cartons. The case coding equipment used sealed printheads which were not repairable once contaminated with carton dust and angel hair from the gluing systems. The contamination and “bad channels” caused poor print quality and hourly printhead priming and cleaning. The replacement of the unrepairable heads was costing the company over $10,000 per month, and they were forced to keep a half dozen spare printheads in inventory at all times to avoid inevitable downtime due to the unrepairable printheads.
The nature of the manufacturing process caused the production floor temperatures to be consistently over 90 degrees Fahrenheit. The inkjet controllers were often overheated, forcing the customer to install supplemental cooling fans for the circuit boards and electronic components.
Solution:
PIN Distributor, MarkPack, Inc., sold this customer a thermal inkjet system which utilizes HP inkjet cartridge technology. The switch completely eliminated the print engine replacement costs. The low maintenance HP cartridges no longer required hourly maintenance, allowing the maintenance personnel to concentrate their efforts on other parts of production.
Key Benefits:
Additional savings in ink costs were realized by using the print resolution and dot density control, unique features of this thermal inkjet system. These programmable settings allow the user to adjust the amount of ink used while still providing outstanding print quality with the highest bar code read rates. The customer is thrilled with the overall cost savings and uptime associated with this solution.
