Al-Jazirah Corporation of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia has chosen to partner with Goss International on an ambitious press upgrade, refurbishment and relocation venture. Scheduled to be in full print production by the end of the second quarter 2013, the project involves reconfiguring a total of 88 Goss Universal single-wide press units.
The initial phase focused on relocating a 2x1 Goss Universal press comprising 13 four-high towers, two folders and 15 reelstands from north-eastern France to Riyadh. This press will be installed into a modified press hall, refurbished in situ, and configured as two press lines: one of seven towers and one of six towers. The press units will be enhanced with shaftless drive controls.
The next element of the project involves transferring two four-high towers from an existing Goss Universal press installed in the Riyadh plant in 1994 to another later-generation Universal press system. As part of this process,
the drive system of the two towers will be converted to footprint shaftless and the units will be upgraded to match those of the second press. Three heatset gas dryers will be integrated with the press lines, and a ‘bay window’ turner bar arrangement will also be introduced to enable full hybrid production, mixing heatset pages within the publisher’s flagship broadsheet daily, Al-Jazirah.
The investment by Al-Jazirah Corporation has been driven by a need to increase production capacity out of its Riyadh center, and in particular to enhance color flexibility and semi-commercial/heatset capabilities. “Middle Eastern newspapers were years ahead of the global hybrid trend and we have been installing press systems with heatset capabilities into Saudi press halls for many years,” comments Stéphane Jaunasse, Goss International Customer Service manager.