Lotem & PS/M Opinopns
Adam Olson
My company is looking to start doing CTP and we've been offered an
attractive price on a used Lotem 400V and new PS/M RIP w/FAF & Turbo
Screening. Has anyone here worked with either of these? If so, what are your
thoughts? Advantages? Disadvantages? Recurring problems, etc.? Proofer
suggestions?
Info about us if it helps:
We are a small commercial/quick printer. We run mostly 1-2 color work, some
4 color & our presses are all 2-up. Most jobs are customer-supplied, Mac &
PC files from the usual applications. Some jobs are created in-house,
usually w/Quark on the Mac (we're starting to use InDesign as well).
Currently we're outputting film from a Lino 300 via a Xitron/Harlequin 5.5
RIP w/TrapWorks & ITrap. We proof to an Epson 7000 via the same RIP.
Any info would be greatly appreciated.
-Adam
Adam Olson
"Adam Olson" <neck...@wi.rr.com> wrote in message
news:2_J59.6132$Hf.7...@twister.kc.rr.com...
Mike Powell
The Lotem 400v is an excellent machine.
We have very few problems with the Lotem, it basically runs all day every
day without missing a beat. We have had ours for almost 3 years and have
exposed almost 40,000 plates.
If you run Kodak 830A plates, you will need to clean the optics every few
hundred plates due to the way that the plate edge detection system works.
Ask the seller to run a laser calibration at 230mw and give you the
results. This should be a list of lasers from 0-23. each with an associated
calibration value. These values should be fairly even. The higher the
value, the worse the condition of the laser. If one laser has a
particularly high value, this would suggest a new laser has been spliced in
at some time.
Feel free to post or email these values and I will have a look at them for
you.
Ask to check all service vouchers for the machine. Look for any reference
to a plate fly-off or similar, if there are any of these, ask what repairs
were done after the fly-off. Ours has never suffered this fate, but I have
heard of extensive damage being caused to a Lotem 800 from a wayward plate.
Check that the vacuum system is functioning correctly, check that there is
vacuum pressure to all the appropriate holes in the drum. This is critical
to correct focus over the plate surface.
We run the Lotem from a Brisque. I don't know if PS/M will be heavy duty
enough to feed the Lotem plus proofing devices. Try and get a Brisque if
you can.
For proofing, I recommend an HP 5000 plotter as long as your Rip will
support it - Brisque V4 certainly will. We use an Iris 4Print for most of
our colour work. Creo also now have a proofing machine called a Veris which
is faster than the Iris.
Regards
Mike
Lee Blevins
> Info about us if it helps:
> We are a small commercial/quick printer. We run mostly 1-2 color work, some
> 4 color & our presses are all 2-up. Most jobs are customer-supplied, Mac &
> PC files from the usual applications. Some jobs are created in-house,
> usually w/Quark on the Mac (we're starting to use InDesign as well).
> Currently we're outputting film from a Lino 300 via a Xitron/Harlequin 5.5
> RIP w/TrapWorks & ITrap. We proof to an Epson 7000 via the same RIP.
You really should test your 2 color jobs through a PS/M before sealing
the deal.
Spot colors is not the PS/M's strong point.
Adam Olson
-Adam