Hawaii metro the Honolulu Star-Advertiser is to upgrade its 13-year-old manroland Regioman presses under a phased programme.

The electronics hardware and software upgrades cover printing units, one folder and related systems, and start next year with the planning system and control desks. Retrofits to the unit controllers, folder, and turner bar nests will follow "over time" with other items such as the Interbus Loop communications, as a part of an orchestrated plan to minimise downtime.

Bill Reiser, consultant for manroland web systems in North America says the retrofits will "breathe efficiency" into printing operations, and also allow the publisher to improve diagnostic capabilities to reduce downtime."

A tailor-made retrofit plan for the site eliminates system obsolescence, and increases production efficiencies such as quality and waste management through the server system, control desks and PECOM-X software.

Production vice president Marty Black says the main reason for the upgrades was to minimise the problem of obsolescence. "There are a number of parts which were identified as no longer being commercially available, so we needed to develop a plan on a phased replacement. manroland web systems was the only company that could provide all the parts and services we needed in a phased approach," he says.

"We expect the presses to run as well as they did when they were new."

Part of Black Press's Oahu Publications, the newspaper is the largest daily in Hawaii, with the site also producing about 25 other publications and commercial products a week for the Hawaiian Islands.

Pictured: Marty Black (right) with pressroom manager Kenn Kato, manroland service manager Thomas Glöttner, maintenance manager Sean Mounthongdy, Bill Reiserand manroland master engineer Matthias Heissler