Doorhangers?

[tngcas]

So what finishing equipment are you using for doorhangers?
My boss wants to see about doing short-run doorhangers in-house. We are a small digital print shop.

We don't want to buy blanks - just need to figure out how to add the hole and slit.

 

[keith1]

Heidelberg Platen.

 

[Ynot_UK]

For short-runs, the recently introduced small format cutting tables are perfect. We have the Vivid Veloblade. There is also the Duplo PFi Blade - they're both the same machine with different badges on.

 

[pippip]

This is probably the most entry level of the digital diecutters but I've seen it in action and I was impressed.

Definitely not the fasted but reasonably priced and for your volume would be ok suited.

If you have the room you can't beat a Heidelberg Platen and in our area they actually come up regularly and cheaply priced.

 

[Inkscape Print]

Duplo Digital Die Cutter. It is not high speed but is quick to set up and doesn't take dies.

DPC-400 Digital Die Cutter | Duplo USA

www.duplousa.com

 

[tngcas]

Duplo Digital Die Cutter. It is not high speed but is quick to set up and doesn't take dies.

DPC-400 Digital Die Cutter | Duplo USA

www.duplousa.com

Any idea on the price range of the duplo digital die cutter? That looks amazing.

 

[Ynot_UK]

Not sure of the difference between the Duplo DPC400 and the PFi Blade, perhaps it’s just a naming convention US vs EU?
That machine in the link is the same as the Veloblade we have.
In terms of speed, if you printed the door hangers 3 up, it would load the substrate, cut the three door hangers and eject them with the weed in less than a minute. You would produce circa 200 hangers per hour and the machine works unattended. Pricing wise, I would imagine you may get some change from $20k

 

[tngcas]

Not sure of the difference between the Duplo DPC400 and the PFi Blade, perhaps it’s just a naming convention US vs EU?
That machine in the link is the same as the Veloblade we have.
In terms of speed, if you printed the door hangers 3 up, it would load the substrate, cut the three door hangers and eject them with the weed in less than a minute. You would produce circa 200 hangers per hour and the machine works unattended. Pricing wise, I would imagine you may get some change from $20k

What are you using your machine for? Do you use it for business cards or is it too slow for that kind of thing? It would obviously open doors for short-run packaging but depending on speed I'm not sure how practical it might be for other applications (doorhangers not withstanding)

 

[Ynot_UK]

We mostly use it for kiss cutting stickers printed on laser film and for die cutting simple shapes on 250GSM board, e.g.cards with curved tops. We did one business card job on it, because rounded corners were required.

 

[BigSi]

Hi there, Do your numbers! In this part of the world (New Zealand) you can pick up an old Heidelberg platen for around $500.00. Most dies cost between $70.00-$140.00. So even with the di cost it may work out a lot cheaper to go
down this path. On the minus side they take up a lot more room on the plus side you can do a lot more than just di cutting with them. Hope this helps. ta Simon

 

[Ynot_UK]

Sure @BigSi - an old Heidelberg Platen is the right tool for long runs, especially those that will be repeated. We will continue to sub out those jobs to a finishing house.

However, nowadays with more small runs, these entry level flatbed die-less cutters are the perfect solution. We can cut 500 curved top cards in a couple of hours, as opposed to sending the job out, waiting for the finishing house to turn around the job, hoping they do it properly and waiting for it to come back, which can take up to a week. That's a no-brainer for us. Even if the cutter ran at a quarter of the speed it does, it would still be viable as you just set it up and let it run.

The other considerable benefit we can see, although the Veloblade is still very new to us, is the ability to experiment and quickly tweak designs based on customer feedback. You can't do that when you commit to a physical die being made.

 

[pippip]

@Ynot_UK they look like a deadly machine. How many hours a week roughly would you have it running? I love something like that but does sound like roi would be tough? No doubt the flexibilty it provides is great. I notice the term making prototypes used alot in the advertising so i assume speed is limited as you describe.

 

[Ynot_UK]

@Ynot_UK they look like a deadly machine. How many hours a week roughly would you have it running? I love something like that but does sound like roi would be tough? No doubt the flexibilty it provides is great. I notice the term making prototypes used alot in the advertising so i assume speed is limited as you describe.

Ours is still very new, we've only had it a couple of months and so far have put a dozen or so jobs through it. In terms of hours, perhaps only four hours per week as an average.
We have three significant jobs lined up for it over the next few months, both kiss cutting and die cutting, which between them will cover the year one depreciation and some.
In the short period we've owned it, we have been able to turn around a couple of urgent kiss cutting jobs in a couple of days, which we couldn't have done by subbing out the finishing. We have also been able to add value to some long standing projects by being able to produce trial versions of the finished article the same day, which would not have been economical before and impossible to achieve the turnaround time.
The ability to experiment with concepts is the most exciting aspect, as previously we've had to firm up designs and set in stone before paying for dies to be made.
IMO pretty much any digital printing operation with a decent roll laminator should be able to work a combination of upselling and developing new ideas to make one of these machines pay. Less than £100 additional profit per week will wash its face on the ROI, (assuming you're VAT registered and depreciate assets at 25% residual balance per annum). Give it a few years and I reckon these small cutting tables will be as common as that roll laminator.

 

[tngcas]

Ours is still very new, we've only had it a couple of months and so far have put a dozen or so jobs through it.

Thank you for being willing to respond to our questions, first-hand experience like what you have is SO helpful.

We have linear room which makes the Veloblade halfway decent for us but the Heidelberg would take up too much footprint.
I like the setup and walk away thing but then I realized you still can only set it up for one job otherwise the output would mix up all the cards at the end? Is that the case or is there some sort of stacking option that would keep mixed-jobs from being just a pile of cards?

 

[Ynot_UK]

I like the setup and walk away thing but then I realized you still can only set it up for one job otherwise the output would mix up all the cards at the end? Is that the case or is there some sort of stacking option that would keep mixed-jobs from being just a pile of cards?

When die cutting, you do end up with a mixed pile of cards and weed on the output tray, although in practice this is not a problem, as the weed is easily separated and you spend no more than a couple of minutes gathering and stacking several hundred cards.
Obviously this is not the case with kiss cutting, where you end up with a neat stack in reverse order of how it was on the load table.
There's no stacking option I'm aware of. You can use barcode recognition to autoload different .PLT files for multiple jobs, however as you state the output will need sorting.

 

[jwheeler]

We use the Blanks USA sheets for short run door hangers. They introduced a new technology called Lift-Off. It used to be that the door hangers were die cut with perforated edges and you had to manually punch/tear them out. Now they have a liner on the back that you simply peel off and all the door hangers fall right now with clean edges. You can also print full bleed. They show how it works in this video with another of their die-cut products.

 

[Inkscape Print]

Any idea on the price range of the duplo digital die cutter? That looks amazing.

The Duplo model is around 25k.

 

[tngcas]

The Duplo model is around 25k.

That's the price I got from my sales rep. I don't know why I thought there would be an easier way. I was imagining a paper drill that did 1.5in holes and then a punch (like a corner rounder) for the straight edge. It doesn't look like that exists though.

 

[Craig]

We use this 1500 Die Cutting Press W/ Stand, Air Accumulator, And Two Hand no Tie Down
We have a 3 up die that is designed to accept trimmed cards and stack 30 at a time (10 per slot) and cut. Not the fastest but just about anyone with 5 minutes of training can use it.