This month the family-owned Hamilton-based company has added a Cyrel Digital Imaging Unit which will be integrated with its new thermoprocessor and software system.

Milestone’s managing director, Scott Miller, says that the thermoprocessor, supplied by DuPont Imaging Technologies uses the very latest in heat transfer technology and eliminates the need for solvents in the plate making process.

“Dupont has been into environmental issues for some years now, and this technology has been developed in response to concerns about some of the more aggressive solvents in use in the industry,” he says.

“With the use of heat instead of solvents to make plates, this is another step in a growing solvent-less system. It means we don’t have to hold as many dangerous goods on the premises.”

Scott says the company has invested in the new technology to offer printers a choice in plate making.

Environmental issues aside, the real benefit of the new technology to the end user is in the speed at which Milestone can now produce plates.

“The usual three-hour process has been reduced down to one hour or less, which means that we can produce a plate and dispatch it to the printer while the job is still being printed. With the other process, which we still offer, it takes an hour to make the plate and two hours for it to dry.”

Scott says the new thermal plate process is completely dry and the combination between the two new pieces of equipment means that production output will increase substantially.

“The CDI unit which we bought through Esko-Graphics, will enhance our offering of high quality flexo plates for the label and wide web flexo printing sectors,” he says.

It allows the company to digitally expose plates, producing a quality “consistently in excess of what we have done before.” In this system, the digital highlight dots are also consistently much smaller than possible with a film-based photo tool because of the presence of oxygen during the plate exposure process itself.

Scott says the company, which has just celebrated 30 years in business with a dinner for staff, now has the most up to date technology in the country.

Milestone has a staff of 20 and services the North and South Islands with flexographic plates and supplies. It has four printer liaison staff.

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