Patent Grant
10414152
This application is the U.S. national phase of International Application No. PCT/IB2010/055943, filed 20 Dec. 2010, which designated the U.S. and claims priority to EP Application No. 09180318.9, filed 22 Dec. 2009, the entire contents of each of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
The present invention generally relates to intaglio printing presses. More precisely, the present invention relates to an intaglio printing press comprising:
The present invention further relates to a mobile carriage for an intaglio printing press, which mobile carriage supports an ink-collecting cylinder designed to contact an intaglio printing cylinder which is supported in a stationary machine frame of the intaglio printing machine.
An intaglio printing press and mobile carriage of the above-mentioned types are disclosed in International Application No. WO 03/047862 A1 (which corresponds to U.S. Pat. No. 7,011,020 B2 in the name of the present Applicant) which intaglio printing press is reproduced in
Swiss Patent No. CH 685 380 A5 and European Patent Application No. EP 0 563 007 A1 (which corresponds to U.S. Pat. No. 5,282,417) also disclose an intaglio printing press with first and second mobile carriages. In contrast to the previously-mentioned intaglio printing press, the first mobile carriage exclusively supports the ink-collecting cylinder, the colour-selector cylinders being located in the second mobile carriage together with the associated inking units. This is necessitated by the fact that, according to Swiss Patent No. CH 685 380 A5 and European Patent Application No. EP 0 563 007 A1, the ink-collecting cylinder is adapted to be removed from the press so as to convert the intaglio printing press from a press with indirect inking system to a press with direct inking system, and vice versa. The axes of rotation of the ink-collecting cylinder and of the intaglio printing cylinder are still located in the same horizontal plane and movement of the mobile carriages also takes place along this horizontal plane.
In the context of the intaglio printing presses disclosed in International Application No. WO 03/047862 A1, Swiss Patent No. CH 685 380 A5, and European Patent Application No. EP 0 563 007 A1, it had previously been considered necessary to ensure that the axes of rotation the ink-collecting cylinder and of the intaglio printing cylinder should be aligned with the direction of displacement of the mobile carriage supporting the ink-collecting cylinder (i.e. in a horizontal plane) so as to avoid as much as possible occurrence of circumferential register issues upon separation or joining of the ink-collecting cylinder and of the intaglio printing cylinder. A perfect circumferential register between the ink-collecting cylinder and the intaglio printing cylinder is critical in that this circumferential register determines the preciseness of the inking on the intaglio printing cylinder and therefore affects the printing quality. The horizontal arrangement of the ink-collecting cylinder and of the intaglio printing cylinder however has a negative effect on the machine footprint.
There is therefore a need for an improved intaglio printing press of the above-mentioned type where the ink-collecting cylinder is supported in a mobile carriage.
A general aim of the invention is therefore to provide an improved intaglio printing press of the above-mentioned type where the ink-collecting cylinder is supported in a mobile carriage.
A further aim of the invention is to provide such an intaglio printing press whose machine footprint is reduced and space is optimised.
Yet another aim of the invention is to provide such an intaglio printing press where maintenance operations are facilitated.
These aims are achieved thanks to the intaglio printing press defined in the claims.
There is accordingly provided an intaglio printing press as mentioned in the preamble hereof further wherein the axis of rotation of the ink-collecting cylinder lies below a horizontal plane intersecting the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder, and wherein a plane intersecting the axis of rotation of the ink-collecting cylinder and the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder forms, in the working position of the first mobile carriage, an acute angle with respect to the horizontal plane.
There is further provided a mobile carriage for an intaglio printing press as mentioned in the preamble hereof wherein the axis of rotation of the ink-collecting cylinder lies below a horizontal plane intersecting the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder, and wherein a plane intersecting the axis of rotation of the ink-collecting cylinder and the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder forms, in a working position of the first mobile carriage where the ink-collecting cylinder contacts the intaglio printing cylinder, an acute angle with respect to the horizontal plane.
Further advantageous embodiments of the invention form the subject-matter of the dependent claims and are discussed below.
According to an additional aspect of the invention, space is optimised thanks to an advantageous arrangement and configuration of the impression cylinder, intaglio printing cylinder and ink-collecting cylinder.
Features and advantages of the present invention will appear more clearly from reading the following detailed description of embodiments of the invention which are presented solely by way of non-restrictive examples and are illustrated by the attached drawings in which:
Within the scope of the present invention, the expression “intaglio printing cylinder” shall be understood to be designating a cylinder used for intaglio printing (especially for printing security documents such as banknotes) with at least one intaglio printing medium on its circumference. This encompasses either a cylinder with engraved intaglio patterns on its circumference or a plate cylinder carrying at least one intaglio printing plate on its circumference. In the following description, the intaglio printing cylinder is a plate cylinder carrying several intaglio printing plates on its circumference.
Similarly the expression “ink-collecting cylinder” shall be understood as being interchangeable with the expression “Orlof cylinder”, which expression is typically used in the art of intaglio printing. The same applies to the expression “colour-selector cylinder” which shall be understood as being interchangeable with the expression “chablon cylinder”, which latter expression is also used in the art of intaglio printing.
As illustrated, the stationary machine frame 01 further supports a wiping system for wiping the inked surface of the intaglio printing cylinder 07 prior to printing as is typical in the art. In the illustrated example, such wiping system comprises a wiping roller assembly 10 contacting the surface of the intaglio printing cylinder 07, which assembly includes a wiping roller that is caused to rotate in the same direction as the intaglio printing cylinder 07 (i.e. in the counter-clockwise direction in
The intaglio printing press is of the type comprising an inking system having an ink-collecting cylinder 12 (or “Orlof cylinder”) which contacts the intaglio printing cylinder 07 and collects the inks of different colours provided by a plurality of associated inking devices 13, 16 before transferring the resulting multicolour pattern of inks to the circumference of the intaglio printing cylinder 07.
In this preferred example, the intaglio printing press comprises two mobile carriages 11, 14. The first mobile carriage 11 supports the ink-collecting cylinder 12 and a plurality of (at least four, preferably five as illustrated) colour-selector cylinders 13. The second mobile carriage 14 supports a corresponding number of (i.e. five in this example) inking units 16 each cooperating with a corresponding one of the colour-selector cylinders 13 that are supported in the first mobile carriage 11. Both mobile carriages can be moved horizontally and are suspended under suspension rails 04. In this way, both mobile carriages 11, 14 can be moved above the floor part 02 onto which the printing press is installed along a direction indicated by arrow A in
While the preferred embodiment includes two mobile carriages, it should be understood that the present invention is also applicable in the case where the printing press would only comprise one mobile carriage supporting the ink-collecting cylinder 12 and the associated inking devices 13, 16. More than two mobile carriages may also be envisaged.
As mentioned, and illustrated in
In the position illustrated in
Once the first mobile carriage 11 is moved to its retracted position (which could be a position as illustrated in
Once the maintenance operations have been carried out, the first mobile carriage 11 may be moved back towards the stationary machine frame 01 as illustrated by arrow C in
Therefore, before coupling the first mobile carriage 11 with the stationary machine frame 01 (or upon coupling of the first mobile carriage 11 with the stationary machine frame 01), the rotational position of the ink-collecting cylinder 12 is corrected and adjusted with respect to the rotational position of the intaglio printing cylinder 07 to ensure proper circumferential register between the ink-collecting cylinder 12 and the intaglio printing cylinder 07. This is carried out by means of an adequate correcting and adjusting system that will be described hereafter, which system enables the ink-collecting cylinder 12 to be rotated to the appropriate position as illustrated by arrow D in
Once these corrections and adjustments have been carried out, the first mobile carriage 11 can be coupled to the machine frame 01 and interlocked therewith and the second mobile carriage 14 can be moved back towards the first mobile carriage 11 along arrow C as illustrated in
Turning back to
Firstly, it may be appreciated that the axis of rotation of the ink-collecting cylinder 12 lies below a horizontal plane P0 intersecting the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder 07, which configuration allows to reduce the machine footprint as compared for instance to the known configuration disclosed in International Application No. WO 03/047862 A1. More precisely, the first mobile carriage 11 is moveable along the horizontal plane P0 and a plane P2 intersecting the axis of rotation of the ink-collecting cylinder 12 and the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder 07 forms, in the working position, an acute angle β with respect to the horizontal plane P0.
In the illustrated example, the intaglio printing cylinder 07 is a three-segment plate cylinder carrying three intaglio printing plates. The corresponding cylinder pits on the intaglio printing cylinder (shown in
The wiping roller assembly 10 is preferably located in a similar way with respect to the intaglio printing cylinder 07, namely in such a way that a plane P3 intersecting the axis of rotation of the wiping roller assembly 10 and the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder 07 forms an obtuse angle γ of 120° with respect to the plane P1 intersecting the axis of rotation of the impression cylinder 06 and the axis of rotation of the intaglio printing cylinder 07.
Preferably, in this configuration, the acute angle β with respect to the horizontal plane P0 is selected to be lower or equal to 30° , even more preferably comprised between 10° and 25° . With such angles, an optimum configuration is achieved in terms of compactness (i.e. minimum height and minimum machine footprint).
One may further appreciate that the ink-collecting cylinder 12, the impression cylinder 06 and the intaglio printing cylinder 07 all advantageously have the same diameter (and are therefore triple-sized cylinders), meaning that the same sections of cylinders 06, 07, 12 always cooperate with one another.
One may also note that, in the preferred embodiment shown in
The above configuration ensures that space is used in an optimized way to integrate as many inking devices as possible and provide suitable access to every component of the printing press without compromising ease of maintenance and machine footprint. This configuration furthermore leads to an intaglio printing press having as much as possible a compact configuration.
In the example of
Assuming that the colour-selector cylinders 13 are driven into rotation together with the ink-collecting cylinder 12, rotation of the colour-selector cylinder 13 during maintenance operations may be carried out using the same auxiliary drive 110. One may however envisage providing one or more additional auxiliary drive(s) to drive the colour-selector cylinders 13 into rotation during maintenance operations.
In the example of
As the first and second mobile carriages 11, 14 are moved in an independent manner, two separate carriage drives 40, 45 are provided to drive the carriages 11, 14, respectively, along the suspension rails 04.
A possible variant of the driving principle of
Once again, assuming that the colour-selector cylinders 13 are driven into rotation together with the ink-collecting cylinder 12, rotation of the colour-selector cylinder 13 during maintenance operations may be carried out using the same independent drive 115. One may however envisage providing one or more additional independent drive(s) to drive the colour-selector cylinders 13 into rotation during maintenance operations.
In the example of
Yet another variant of the driving principles of
In this way, no disconnectable gear arrangement is necessary between the first mobile carriage 11 and the stationary machine frame 01 or between the second mobile carriage 14 and the first mobile carriage 11.
Various types of motors may be used as auxiliary drives or independent drives in the examples of
A possible configuration of the correcting and adjusting system is illustrated in
A suitable user interface 20 coupled to the processing unit 30 is provided to enable a human operator to control operations of the printing press, especially movement of the carriages 11, 14 towards and/or away from the stationary machine frame 01. The processing unit 30 is coupled to the carriage drive 40 and the auxiliary drive(s) 110 of the first carriage 11 and, whenever necessary or appropriate, to the main drive 100 as well. While this is not specifically illustrated in
A human operator may switch the printing press into a maintenance mode by using the user interface 20 and first causing the processing unit 30 to stop the main drive 100. Once the printing press is stopped, the processing unit 30 may read the current rotational position of the intaglio printing cylinder 07 and store it in a suitable memory (not illustrated) for the subsequent correction and adjustment process.
Then, the processing unit 30 may control the first carriage drive 40 (and the second carriage drive 45 not illustrated in
The human operator may then further interact with the user interface 20 to cause the processing unit 30 to control the auxiliary drive(s) 110 and rotate the ink-collecting cylinder 12 during maintenance operations (for instance in order to exchange the blankets) as illustrated in
Once the maintenance operations have been carried out, the human operator may again interact with the user interface 20 to cause the first mobile carriage 11 to be moved back to its working position as illustrated in
A variant of the correcting and adjusting system 80 is illustrated in
In the above-described embodiments of the invention, the auxiliary drive 110 or independent drive 115 or 116 that is used to rotate the ink-collecting cylinder 12 can advantageously further act as a means to rotate the ink-collecting cylinder 12 during cleaning operations. Such cleaning operations could be carried out manually by an operator while the ink-collecting cylinder 12 is rotated or automatically. In particular, the intaglio printing press can further comprise an automatic washing device 19 (shown in
An alternative to the use of an auxiliary drive to carry out the correction and adjustment procedure as discussed above may consist in providing the correcting and adjusting system with a sensor, such as a rotary encoder, for measuring the actual rotational position of the ink-collecting cylinder 12 and in adapting the correcting and adjusting system to cause the intaglio printing cylinder 07 to rotate (e.g. by operating the main drive 100) while the ink-collecting cylinder 12 is still retracted away from the intaglio printing cylinder 07 and properly position the intaglio printing cylinder 07 with respect to the ink-collecting cylinder 12 on the basis of the rotational position measured by the sensor before coupling the first mobile carriage 11 to the stationary frame 01. Therefore, in contrast to the previous embodiments, the intaglio printing cylinder 07 is rotated to achieve the proper circumferential register with respect to the ink-collecting cylinder 12 and the main drive 100 is exploited as a means to perform the necessary correction and adjustment.
Yet another alternative to the use of an auxiliary drive to carry out the correction and adjustment procedure as discussed above may consist in providing one or more reference markers on the ink-collecting cylinder 12 (each reference marker indicating a predefined rotational position of the ink-collecting cylinder 12) and in adapting the correcting and adjusting system to (i) temporarily couple the first mobile carriage 11 to the stationary frame 01, (ii) cause the ink-collecting cylinder 12 to rotate (e.g. by operating the main drive 100) to the rotational position indicated by the reference marker, (iii) decouple the first mobile carriage 11 from the stationary frame 01, and (iv) cause the intaglio printing cylinder 07 to rotate (e.g. by operating the main drive 100) while the ink-collecting cylinder 12 is retracted away from the intaglio printing cylinder 07 to a rotational position corresponding to the rotational position of the ink-collecting cylinder 12 defined by the reference marker before finally coupling the first mobile carriage 11 to the stationary frame 01. In this latter case, the main drive 100 is exploited to achieve the proper circumferential register between the intaglio printing cylinder 07 and the ink-collecting cylinder 12 by rotating both cylinders 07, 12.
Various modifications and/or improvements may be made to the above-described embodiments without departing from the scope of the invention as defined by the annexed claims. For instance, various adaptations to the configuration and operation of the correcting and adjusting system 80 may be made as long as the system is designed to perform its essential purpose, namely to correct and adjust a rotational position of the ink-collecting cylinder 12 with respect to a rotational position of the intaglio printing cylinder 07 to ensure proper circumferential register between the ink-collecting cylinder 12 and the intaglio printing cylinder 07. Furthermore, the actual configuration of the correcting and adjusting system 80 will depend on the actual driving principle being used, especially whether the ink-collecting cylinder is normally driven into rotation, during printing operations, by the main drive (thus necessitating an auxiliary drive for the maintenance operations as well as the correcting/adjusting operations) or whether the ink-collecting cylinder is driven into rotation, during printing operations, by an independent drive (in which case this same independent drive may be used during the maintenance operations as well as the correcting/adjusting operations).
Although the embodiment of the intaglio printing press which has been described in reference to the Figures comprises two mobile carriages, the concept of the invention remains valid for any other printing press configuration comprising at least one mobile carriage, as long as the ink-collecting cylinder is supported by the said at least one mobile carriage.
The intaglio printing press that has been discussed with reference to the Figures exhibits a cylinder configuration wherein the ink-collecting cylinder 12, the intaglio printing cylinder 07 and impression cylinder 06 are all triple-sized cylinder which form an angle of 120° . Any other cylinder configuration can however be envisaged, with cylinders of different sizes and/or different cylinder configurations and orientations.
01 machine frame (stationary)
02 floor
03 upright
04 suspension rails
06 impression cylinder (three-segment cylinder)
07 intaglio printing cylinder/plate cylinder (three-segment cylinder)
08 sheet grippers
09 endless chain gripper system
10 wiping roller assembly
11 first mobile carriage
12 ink-collecting cylinder/Orlof cylinder (three-segment cylinder)
13 colour-selector cylinders/chablon cylinders (one-segment cylinder)
14 second mobile carriage
16 inking units
17 first working space (between first and second mobile carriages 11, 14)
18 second working space (between first mobile carriage 11 and machine frame 01)
19 automatic washing device
20 user interface/central console
30 processing unit for circumferential register control and adjustment
40 carriage drive (first mobile carriage 11)
45 carriage drive (second mobile carriage 14)
50 disconnectable gears (between ink-collecting cylinder 12 and intaglio printing cylinder 07)
55 disconnectable gears (between ink-collecting cylinder 12, colour-selector cylinders 13 and inking units 16)
80 correcting and adjusting system
100 main drive
110 auxiliary drive(s) for ink-collecting cylinder 12 and colour-selector cylinders 13
115 independent drive(s) for ink-collecting cylinder 12 and colour-selector cylinders 13
116 independent drive for ink-collecting cylinder 12
117 independent drives for colour-selector cylinders 13
140 auxiliary drive(s) for inking units 16
145 independent drive(s) for inking units 16
P0 horizontal plane intersecting axis of intaglio printing cylinder 07
P1 plane intersecting axis of rotation of impression cylinder 06 and axis of rotation of intaglio printing cylinder 07
P2 plane intersecting axis of rotation of ink-collecting cylinder 12 and axis of rotation of intaglio printing cylinder 07
P3 plane intersecting axis of rotation of intaglio printing cylinder 07 and axis of rotation of wiping roller assembly 10
α obtuse angle between planes P1 and P2
β acute angle between planes P0 and P2
γ obtuse angle between planes P1 and P3
A displacement of mobile carriages 12, 14 from working position to retracted position (
B rotation of ink-collecting cylinder 12 during maintenance operations (
C displacement of mobile carriages 12, 14 from retracted position to working position (
D rotation of ink-collecting cylinder 12 during circumferential register correction and adjustment (
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 09180318 | Dec 2009 | EP | regional |
| Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind | 371c Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PCT/IB2010/055943 | 12/20/2010 | WO | 00 | 8/10/2012 |
| Publishing Document | Publishing Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| WO2011/077351 | 6/30/2011 | WO | A |
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| 685 380 | Jun 1995 | CH |
| 100 27 022 | Jan 2002 | DE |
| 100 27 023 | Jan 2002 | DE |
| 0 563 007 | Sep 1993 | EP |
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| 2 253 468 | Nov 2010 | EP |
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| International Search Report for PCT/IB2010/055943, dated Mar. 22, 2011. |
| Written Opinion of the International Searching Authority for PCT/IB2010/055943, dated Mar. 22, 2011. |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20120312180 A1 | Dec 2012 | US |
