Printer for double sided workflow? Need perfect registration

[Swanedog]

Looking for a printer that I can run card stock through and print double sided with perfect registration. I want to be able to take the printed card stock to my SUMMA flatbed to cut out. Products would include custom game cards that would have information on both sides.
Seems like most people do this with laminated one side to the other. I was hoping to avoid this. Any ideas?
I've seen things like the HP Latex 365, but I'm not sure it can handle card stock or just rolls.

 

[victor bogdanov]

Do you have a flatbed printer? Flatbed would be the way to go.

If no flatbed then print on vinyl and apply to cardstock, flatbed application table very useful for this.

"Perfect registration" will take some practice

or see if it might be better to just outsource instead of figuring out how to do it inhouse

Custom Playing Cards Printing Game Design Company

 

[BigNate]

how many cards are you printing? a good Heidelberg will give dot-for-dot registration, and will allow for guide switching so that when perfecting you can keep the guide and gripper edges common.

 

[Boudica]

Are you looking for a printing service, or looking to buy your own printer to produce these?
Second question... Is this a specific project, or are you trying to become a niche printer for board games?

 

[netsol]

how many cards are you printing? a good Heidelberg will give dot-for-dot registration, and will allow for guide switching so that when perfecting you can keep the guide and gripper edges common.

you are a wise man, nate.
heidelberg is exactly what i was thinking...

 

[netsol]

the heidelberg press, not the heidelberg scar...

 

[Swanedog]

Are you looking for a printing service, or looking to buy your own printer to produce these?
Second question... Is this a specific project, or are you trying to become a niche printer for board games?

Looking to purchase a printer.

 

[Swanedog]

Do you have a flatbed printer? Flatbed would be the way to go.

If no flatbed then print on vinyl and apply to cardstock, flatbed application table very useful for this.

"Perfect registration" will take some practice

or see if it might be better to just outsource instead of figuring out how to do it inhouse

Custom Playing Cards Printing Game Design Company

I have a couple Mimaki flatbeds. But was hoping to have it be a self feeding setup.

 

[Swanedog]

how many cards are you printing? a good Heidelberg will give dot-for-dot registration, and will allow for guide switching so that when perfecting you can keep the guide and gripper edges common.

Heidelberg machines look amazing but won’t need to scale that high.

Thinking more like 5,000 cards per month, not per minute.

 

[Superior_Adam]

To get self feeding you will need to get a digital press like a Konica Minolta or Ricoh. Don't know that 5,000 per month would be worth it though as any digital press would print that in less than a day.

 

[bcxprint420]

Looking for a printer that I can run card stock through and print double sided with perfect registration. I want to be able to take the printed card stock to my SUMMA flatbed to cut out. Products would include custom game cards that would have information on both sides.
Seems like most people do this with laminated one side to the other. I was hoping to avoid this. Any ideas?
I've seen things like the HP Latex 365, but I'm not sure it can handle card stock or just rolls.

You need a press an offset press not a printer and its nothing you can just buy and run. In this world we live in there are very few options when talking about “perfect” as in registration.

 

[Troy Lesher]

the Trufire series can certainly handle the dead nutz registration front to back. and specially on card stock. you should look into it. there are many on this forum who can validate this.

 

[BigNate]

the Trufire series can certainly handle the dead nutz registration front to back. and specially on card stock. you should look into it. there are many on this forum who can validate this.

these look interesting... they claim 1 micron accuracy. Is there provision to swap a side for registration purposes when flipping the substrate? I have never seen packaged sheets of anything be accurate to within a micron sheet to sheet, so when duplexing you would would still need to keep "guide and gripper" edges common. (I have no good data - has anyone here ever printed a sheet, completely removed it from the printer, placed it back in and printed the same image again? this is the quick-n-dirty way to check registration. on a good offset or letter-press you should not see any dots elongating into ovals...)

 

[Troy Lesher]

these look interesting... they claim 1 micron accuracy. Is there provision to swap a side for registration purposes when flipping the substrate? I have never seen packaged sheets of anything be accurate to within a micron sheet to sheet, so when duplexing ,you would would still need to keep "guide and gripper" edges common. (I have no good data - has anyone here ever printed a sheet, completely removed it from the printer, placed it back in and printed the same image again? this is the quick-n-dirty way to check registration. on a good offset or letter-press you should not see any dots elongating into ovals...)

the 1 micron accuracy is correct but that is X and Y axis for Dot placement and print quality, not front to back . and yes you are absolutely correct on the substrate size, typically all of one pallet of material like styrene, ultraboard, card stock will be consistent in cut size through the pallet, to make sure your front to back registration stays on target you have to measure the first sheet and accurately tell the printer what that measurement is. Coro is a little different, because it is cut by a drunk monkey and often times has a bow in it, so part of keeping front/back is to double check the measurements about half pallet. and then a little "trick" to accommodate the long edge bow that often comes with coro is to disable the pop up pins in the middle so that the apex of the bow/concave does not become the point of registration on that stuff. the final Key to front back registration even on the best of printers requires a competent operator.

 

[MacD]

Yes need to be skilled to run a 4 color Heidelberg.
Small flatbed like Xante you could have the card already cut and run them that way or single sheet and then cut. This is the way to go if you want them done in-house.

 

[WolvenPrintWrap]

It's not worth the price in machinery and help to do it in house. At those numbers, just make an account with 4over or something and ship to your customers with your branding on the package.

Ive got years in prepress and unless your looking to make a major investment and expand business in that category, in house is tough. Doing this on large format machinery will only give you more headaches. It's not that It can't be done, but not commercially. You can make like 5-20 pieces that are good enough for a customer the large format way. No way in hell you're getting 5K pieces that are all identical that way. Too many moving parts that are controlled by humans, on machinery that has centimeter-inch playroom. When for small hand held cards, you need machinery with single digit micron playroom. Prepress machines and guillotine cutters have non moving edges for allignment, or load trays. Large format has laser alignment to make up for slightly moving materials during loading. When the machine has to constantly make adjustments for human error, the ability for small identical prints and cuts, goes out the window.