Goss Magnapak Inserting in St. Louis

Goss International announced that a 30-station Magnapak inserter was taken into production late last year for processing highly zoned packages of the Sunday edition and non-subscriber products at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which in 2004 handled a weekly average of more than 20 million preprints -- a 20% increase in two years.

The Magnapak's dual-delivery option permits the Post-Dispatch to simultaneously run the Sunday and non-subscriber packages or either of those products and the daily paper, according to Packaging Manager Norm Loraine, who cited the machine's capacity, automated zoning, and servo drives, as well as its hoppers' simple set-up.

The servo technology allows the capacity to be used to achieve a high level of zoning while preserving a high rate of throughput. And when the set-up of an individual hopper must be changed, it can be accomplished "while the rest of the machine is running," said Loraine.

Goss also said it is installing a common control capability for the Post-Dispatch's Magnapak and its four older Heidelberg inserters.