KWIK KOPY ORDERS NEW COLORADO M5W
The Miller Street Kwik Kopy store in North Sydney has ordered a new Canon Colorado M5W series roll-to-roll UVgel print system, from distributor Starleaton, as it ramps up its wide-format business.
Franchise owner Daniel McKenzie placed the order at Visual Impact, becoming the second Kwik Kopy store to order Canon’s new flagship wide-format print system, which was launched just last month. The new Colorado for Miller Street will be installed before the end of June.
Kwik Kopy Miller Street has been running wide-format for a while, and is seeing surging growth particularly in SAV. It is now significantly expanding its wide-format business, expanding into the first floor of its building for its cut-sheet work, and using all the ground floor for wide-format.
Its order for the Colorado is a major step up in production power. In addition to printing on its Roland DG it has had for six years, the store has been outsourcing three times that work, that will all now come back in store on the new Colorado M5W. The company will keep the Roland DG, and is also investing in a rollover table.
Daniel McKenzie said, “We evaluated all the options and concluded that for fast turnaround, space requirements, quality and consistency, the Canon Colorado M5 was the printer that would meet our needs. We could have bought three smaller printers, but the Colorado will print ten times the amount of one of those.”
McKenzie has specified the version of the Colorado with white, he said, “We have tended to steer away from white in the past, but the new Colorado uses the same pigment for white as CMYK, the UVgel ink means there are no issues. I was also impressed with the media handling, the UVgel system means there are no heat issues, which means there is no cockling.”
Dale Hawkins, large format manager at Starleaton said, “The new Colorado M5 is a production powerhouse, it will enable Kwik Kopy North Sydney to grow its volumes. It is also capable of handling virtually any type of wide format application, which means the Miller Street store will be able to say yes to every job, and produce them inhouse.”
Canon says the ability to print on an extensive media range is one of the key attributes of the new Colorado M-Series, including the likes of window graphics, labels and wallpapers, as well as printing on heavy structured, transparent, coloured, reflective and magnetic materials.
Available in four versions – the M3, M3W, M5 and M5W – the new printers are modular systems that can be upgraded in the field, and for the first time, have a white option - that’s the W in the names. They are 1.6m roll-to-roll printers, with two speed configurations.
The M5 ranges in output speeds from 40sqm an hour to 159sqm an hour. The new sensory technology has sensors both underneath and over the media path, and will enable production of difficult media, such as wallpapers, textured stock, coloured papers and the like.
The Colorado M5 features Canon’s UVgel ink, which has proved a hit for the company, with its ability to print both matte and gloss, and to stretch as applications require. The company says UVgel technology combines the colour gamut and light fastness of an eco-solvent printer, the fast drying time and odorless prints of a latex printer, and the productivity and low temperature print process of traditional UV technology. UVgel also uses 40 per cent less power and 40 per cent less ink than conventional ink, according to the company.
According to CPP, UVgel’s particular properties also eliminate many of the production, nozzle cleaning and maintenance issues commonly associated with white ink, offering it says, smooth, error-free printing, minimising ink usage and waste, and maximising productivity. Hawkins said, "There is no extra special care that need to be taken with the Canon UVgel white, it is treated just the same as CMYK."