Visit to CPI Cox & Wyman printers, Cardiff Road
On 4 November 2011 we had a fascinating visit to a long-established local business. Cox & Wyman’s building is over 100 years old, and they have been printing books there for most of that time. These days they only print paperbacks, and their output is around a million books per week (that’s about two books every second!)
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- General Manager Sandy Wieliczko introduces us to the business and the printing process. Cox & Wyman is part of the French-based CPI group, and prints books in two standard sizes, known as A and B formats.
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- The paper is continuously fed into the offset litho machine, which prints from plates of 48 pages. When a roll of paper runs out the next is accelerated to the same speed and spliced in so the machine doesn’t have to stop.
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- The covers are made outside and stored ready for binding.
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- The binding and trimming process is all automated these days.
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- Here you can see the books whizzing through the binding machine – the pages are fixed in the covers using glue at about 170 degrees C.
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- And what’s hot off the press this evening? It’s the latest Dan Brown!