With the most visible product launch of NEXPO'95, GMA displayed two new machines and promised inserter nirvana. So how are GMA's SLS2000 and Alphaliner actually stacking, er, measuring up?
The Boston Globe's Billerica facility snagged the very first SLS2000, an experimental model. "For a prototype machine, I'd give it an A," says Neil Jackson, assistant production director. The Globe is testing the SLS2000 as an on-line inserter for The New York Times regional edition. Jackson says the Globe has run as many as 24,000 copies per hour on the system. He finds it faster and quieter than the SLS1000 and 1000a, and likes its new PC-based control system. He says the machine still can't perform center-opening nonlap insertions, but GMA is working on the problem.
Harry Weckerly, distribution-center director for Calkins Newspaper group in Levittown, Pa., says of the SLS2000 system, "We get lots of flexibility. We do collating for three dailies and some on Sunday, and have the capability of going on line or press-to-pocket, or to double out and go twice as fast as normal."
Says Sam Jenkins, production director at the Burlington (N.C.) Times-News, "I wouldn't have graded it high in October, but right now, I'd give it an A-minus, and I think the grade will improve." The Times-News was a beta site for the SLS2000.
Globe Specialty Products may replace its eight inserters with three Alphaliners, tripling speed to about 13,000 copies per hour, says Plant Manager Chuck Hourvitz, if all goes well. Hourvitz expects nearly $30,000 in energy savings per year and significant savings in labor. Favorite feature: its front-end planner software. Globe will evaluate the first Alphaliner between April 15 and May 15, says Hourvitz.
L. Carol Christopher is president of Christopher Communications in Berkeley, Calif. E-mail, cchristo@weber.ucsd.edu; phone, (510) 444-7841.
©1997 Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved.