Avoiding Wrinkles in Your Folding Machine

When first operating a folding machine, it is common that you may run into a few issues, wrinkles being one of them. A folded sheet of paper may come out of the folding machine with a few wrinkles and while this can be frustrating, luckily it can easily be avoided. Below we provide some tips and tricks for avoiding paper stocks from becoming wrinkled from the folding process. If you’re looking for ways to improve your folding process, use the following best practices.

1. Make sure your folding pressure is set correctly.

If your folded sheet has come out of the folder machine with wrinkles, first identify where the wrinkles are located on the paper. Depending on the location and direction of the wrinkles, you can tell which section of the folding machine needs pressure adjusting. Check and re-set those specific areas of the fold rollers to avoid more wrinkles in your print pieces.

2. Make sure your folder is set up properly.

If your folder has been set up improperly, it is common that wrinkles will appear on the paper that runs through the folder. When a sheet of paper exits the feeder and is about to enter the fold rollers, the paper should be flat. If it doesn’t appear flat at this point and you notice any extra spaces underneath the sheet, this will cause it to wrinkle. So, if the sheet isn’t flat before entering the fold rollers, how do you know what the problem is? It could be a number of things, including: side lay is too skewed, incorrect feeding, incorrect placement of sheet smoothers, incorrect placement of transport belts, or the machine speed could be set too fast. These are not the only issues with folding machine set up, but they are the most common when dealing with wrinkles.

3. Make sure you arrange the pages on the press sheet correctly.

Chances are, the problem could be happening before the paper is running through the folder! For example, if you notice that wrinkles appear along the head of the folding piece, this could be due to imposition. When planning for your print pieces to be folded, ensure that the correct imposition is selected for the paper you plan to fold. To solve this issue, try splitting up the pages to be folded separately and use a thinner stock.

4. Make sure your machine is in good shape.

If your folding machine is not kept up well, the quality of your printing pieces will be affected. A common issue with older folding machines is worn-out fold rollers. Worn-out fold rollers can be bumpy, making it obvious why wrinkles are appearing on the folded sheets. Luckily, at Update Ltd, we carry a range of folder machine replacement parts for different areas of the machine. Simply replacing old parts can improve the performance of your machine and the outcome of your printed sheets. We have a full supply of replacement parts for folding machines.

If you want to avoid wrinkles and other imperfections when folding stocks, make sure you are educated on proper setup and equipped with a machine that is updated and functioning properly.