HP has added to its line of PageWide inkjet web presses with the Advantage 2200, which has been designed to bring greater uptime, improved quality and wider substrate and application flexibility in publishing, direct mail and commercial print.
Designed in response to existing PageWide user feedback, the new model features a compact ‘single-arch’ duplexing print engine configuration that simplifies access for maintenance tasks, including the swapping of the 12 printbar assemblies, reduced from 24 in earlier models. HP’s 2400dpi HDNA thermal printheads are used throughout and offer 8x nozzle redundancy in black and 4x in cyan, magenta and yellow, to allow printing to continue despite blockages.
Like the existing T250HD model, the Advantage 2200 handles media up to 560mm wide (printable width 520mm) and uses HP’s Optimiser jetted primer for media flexibility and HP Brilliant Inks for wider colour gamut. It also runs at 150m/min but achieves 101m/min in Quality mode, which is said by HP to be 33% faster than previous models; it also has a black-only mode that hits 244m/min. It is capable of printing up to 90 million US letter-sized images per month, on papers between 40 and 300gsm.
Scalability is a key attribute of the new press, with the options for passive or active web cooling according to paper surface and weight. It is also possible to configure one, two or three drying units to cope with coated silk or gloss stocks and/or heavier coverage work. The drying units are claimed to be more energy efficient, recirculating up to 80% of the hot air used. The Advantage 2200 can be used with a variety of third-party suppliers’ equipment for unwinding/rewinding, post-print coating or other inline finishing processes and HP indicated a willingness to accommodate whatever customers wanted in this respect.
‘This new PageWide Advantage platform is a game-changer for the commercial print industry,’ said Annette Friskopp, global head and general manager at HP PageWide. ‘HP has listened to our customers, and we realise ease-of-use and uptime are critical success factors. This new press offers configurations to enable customers to optimise the press for their quality, productivity, versatility, and economics to grow their digital production businesses.’
Commercial availability of the PageWide Advantage 2200 is scheduled for October 2022, with installations expected in the first half of 2023. It will be demonstrated at Printing United in Las Vegas, USA, in October. Two US beta sites were revealed, SG360 and O’Neil Digital Solutions, both of which reported successful installations.
