Xeikon and Italy-based MOSS announced the joint development of a patented Digital Decorating System that will enable decoration of round, conical, rectangular and square pails and containers, even in very short runs. “We have worked closely with MOSS over the past couple of years to develop and test this breakthrough solution,” said Brian Heegaard, Xeikon’s Business development manager of Specialty Printing.  “It enables decoration of pails and containers of various shapes in two easy steps.  First, one the Xeikon web presses is used to print the exact number of transfers required for the decorating effort. Then the roll of printed transfers is fed into the MOSS Digital Decorating System to perfectly apply transfers to pails or containers using a heat transfer process. It is as simple as that, and the result is a very high quality digitally printed and applied decoration that passes all of the typical tests, including scratching, tape, water and others. Opacity and image quality is superior to what direct offset printing is capable of producing. For applications requiring even more durability, an inline varnishing unit can be incorporated in the MOSS transfer machine”. The MOSS Digital Decorating System comes in two models for ultimate flexibility. Both DIGICON (for round and conical pails) and DIGIFLEX (for rectangular and square containers) deliver an application of the pre-printed images on the plastic pails or containers and are cost effective in runs as small as 500. This system eliminates the need to create complicated graphic jobs, or prepare screens or plates, as well as the chemistry associated with these conventional methods.  Machine set-up time is fast on the Xeikon presses, eliminating long machine make ready times required by traditional methods and reducing the high fixed costs associated with conventional setups that make short runs unaffordable.  With the Xeikon presses, the cost per image remains at the same affordable level regardless of the quality produced. The Digital Decorating System allows for production of approximately 18 ppm with a round 10 L pail , giving the same output as a traditional direct offset printing press.