J.S. McCarthy, based in Augusta, ME, has invested in gluing and inspection technology from W. H. Leary as part of its transition from commercial printing towards folding-carton production.
The company operates three BOBST folder gluers and has been upgrading its production equipment with automated feeding, batch inverters and Bobst CartonPack 4 technology. Following these investments, J.S. McCarthy identified glue application and inspection as potential limitations to further increases in production speed.
“We recognised that the current systems on those machines were not going to take the pace and the speed that these other upgrades were going to afford to us,” said Ryan Smith, Production Manager, J.S. McCarthy.
The company subsequently installed a Leary Array system incorporating four Sempre-i cold glue valves, glue inspection with volume control, barcode verification and Monet operating software.
According to J.S. McCarthy, the combination of CartonPack 4 and the Leary system has enabled the company to double production speeds on one line, with further increases achieved in some applications.
The company also reports that it has experienced no glue failures, customer complaints or quality issues since installing the combined systems.
Leary’s CleanStart technology has reduced the need to purge glue valves following production stoppages, helping to minimise adhesive waste and downtime. The company is monitoring adhesive consumption to quantify the savings.
“We previously relied heavily on manual inspection for quality control,” said Smith. “With the addition of the Leary Glue System and CartonPack 4, we have significantly reduced the reliance on human inspection and now utilise automated inspection technology as intended to ensure consistent quality.”
Following the initial installation, J.S. McCarthy has purchased two additional Leary systems for its existing folder gluers, supporting its continued investment in folding-carton production and automation.
