The grande format printer “Virtu rs 25” has been produced in conformity to European standards and sold in metric configuration to markets in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Africa by Swiss manufacturing company, Spühl AG since the Fall of 2003. Founded more than 125 years ago, Spühl AG is an innovative Swiss equipment manufacturer belonging to the American Leggett & Platt group. The Virtu rs was introduced to the American market by way of Leggett & Platt Digital Technology in 2002.

Multi-talented
The Virtu rs 25 is both a flatbed and a roll-to-roll printer. This multi-talented device can process paper, films, textiles and other substrates from roll to roll, as well as rigid materials of up to 75mm thickness in flatbed mode.

The standard version works with six colours (CMYK, LC, LM) and is optionally available with four colours. The maximum printable width corresponds to 2.5 m.

The printing unit is equipped with 36 piezo printheads manufactured by Spectra, permitting the following output:
* High speed mode: up to 150 sq m in one pass, 300x423 dpi, four colours.
* High quality mode: up to 40 sq m in two passes, 600x423 dpi, six colours.

A version with a width of 3.5 m, the "Virtu rs 35", is planned for the second half of this year.

Printing on sensitive materials
Specially designed and patented technology allows printing on temperature-sensitive materials, as well as sensitive fabrics, synthetics or large-format plates.

Integrated, temperature-regulated heating, in which final drying of the printed textiles subsequently occurs, is standard.

Specially-developed Virtu inks (pigment or dispersion-based) are available for the various applications.

A global cooperation with 3M has been arranged for sales to the graphics industry. 3M has already successfully presented and sold the printer at various trade shows under the “Scotchprint 2500UV” name and the machine was awarded a number of prizes at the recent SGIA show.

Further market segments, such as textiles or cardboard packaging, will be targeted by Spühl AG or LPDT.

The UV-printer can be seen on 3M’s stand 9D26 in hall 9.