Our retail display sector is the fastest growing division here at Rainier, and we need our printers to be able to keep up! In spring 2012, we added a Rhotex 320 to our growing fleet of Durst printers.

The Durst Rhotex 320 is the state of the art digital printer for printing directly to fabric and textile media. At 10.5 feet wide, Rhotex 320 uses water-based dispersed dye inks and onboard hot-air dryers to produce big format “soft signage.” It operates at production speeds, increases our capacity, is designed specifically for fabric printing – and it’s remarkably cost-efficient to run compared to the previous generation of dye sublimation printers.

It delivers POP quality output at 775 square feet/hour and its robust design means that it can run 24 hours/day. If you do the math – that’s 18,600 square feet of top quality printing in a single day! (We’ve yet to work our Rhotex 320 quite that hard, but challenge us with a big project!)

“It’s fast, sharp, and has great color saturation. What’s not to like?” says Mark Hanich, Rainier Project Manager.

And the Durst Rhotex dyes also comply with the Blue Wool scale 5-6, meaning that they’ll last for up to two years in an outdoor application, making your signage a better investment for you. We call that win-win.

Using the Rhotex 320 with its water-based inks means that fabric signage produced by Rainier is environmentally-friendly, recyclable and disposable – even after it’s been printed on. Any technology that helps Rainier meet its zero-waste goal is a welcome addition to our production floor.

“Whether it’s for flags, banners, billboards, wall coverings, POP displays, trade show exhibits or other ‘soft signage’ applications, market researchers predict this segment [digital printing on fabric] will grow by more than 50 percent, year-on-year, between now and 2014,” Durst reported in 2011.

We plan on keeping up. If you need fabric signage, there’s no better printer than the Durst Rhotex 320 – and there’s no better place than Rainier, where we can not only print but custom-finish your signs in our fabric, wood, paint, and metal shops.

The colors begin to pop as these fabric banners go through the heat activation process.

Rainier Print Operator Jason Campbell waits for the results of a color test on the Rhotex 320.

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We added a Zünd G3 3XL-3200 to our shop floor in April.

With a cut width of 10.5 feet, the Zünd is our biggest and most efficient automated cutter.

It has an “integrated, compact color camera” that reads reference marks, a material transport bar for processing roll- and sheet materials longer than the cutter, and a “cut queue” for automated workflow and reporting.

The Zünd cut center is efficient: it minimizes set-up times, eliminates mistakes, and makes sure the cutter runs at maximum productivity levels at all times. All the operator has to do is input the design and verify that the right cutting tool is being used. Our operators can set the project up, push go, and get other things done while the Zünd finishes the job.

We often work with unusual materials – so we need a machine that can do the same. The Zünd fills the bill – it can cut acrylic, aluminum, canvas, diabond, Sintra®, mesh, PVC, and a host of others. Plus, it’s capable of cutting through material up to 2 inches thick!

As an added benefit, the Zünd G3 was designed to reach new standards in safety and environmental consciousness. Its variable vacuum system keeps cost & energy use to a minimum (so it meets Rainier’s sustainability goals!).

Here’s a quick-and-dirty video of the Zünd in action on our shop floor this morning, cutting through brushed aluminum (trophy case nameplates) and vinyl (banners).

We’re always expanding our capabilities and upgrading to state-of-the-art technology at Rainier. With the right equipment, we control quality and keep costs down.

And those are savings and quality results that we pass on to you.

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