Birkhäuser + GBC AG, a subsidiary of Schelling AG, has successfully passed a field test a short time after the Gallus Labelfire was installed with low migration equipment.

The company has been able to print a variety of labels and flexible packaging in accordance with low migration requirements since July 2020. The native print resolution of 1200 dpi and the flexibility of the hybrid label printing press have been a boon for the company. This is the second Gallus Labelfire for Birkhäuser.

Marcel Häsler, COO at Birkhäuser, states, “The new Gallus Labelfire 340 with low migration equipment is the perfect machine for us. This digital printing press is the ideal addition not only to the flexo printing presses in this segment but also to our first Labelfire. Now we can offer the whole range of applications for the food sector, which meet all relevant low migration requirements – from flexible packaging and labels, paper bags and folding cartons to self-adhesive labels with cold foil finishing or lacquer effects.”

With a successful field test, this press is the second of its kind in the subsidiary in Reinach, Switzerland. Four years ago, Birkhäuser was one of the first printers on the market to invest in a Gallus Labelfire 340 . Quite a few improvements have been made since then, not only in terms of low migration compatibility, but also in terms of speed, “white line compensation” and Prinect workflow integration.

The Gallus Labelfire includes a pinning after each print head row. This first drying step ensures that the inks do not run into each other, the foundation for very small fonts or fine lines. The Digital Print Unit (DPU) is followed by UV boosters from GEW to produce applications with low migration compliance even at high speeds. Migration tests were done on the Gallus Labelfire at Heidelberger Druckmaschinen in Wiesloch, Germany. The low migration compliance was confirmed by the Swiss laboratory service provider SQTS (Swiss Quality Testing Services). 

“The system is just great and runs extremely stable,” explains Häsler. “It is still the only digital printing press that can reproduce 1-point fonts, thus, is able to print such small font sizes.”

According to Schelling AG, fonts in this size are common standard requirements for pharmaceutical customers and are needed for segments like product traceability. Häsler adds, “I don’t know any other machine that is able to do this. This is beyond comparison.”