Apparatus and process for transporting lithographic plates to a press cylinder

Transportation of a lithographic plate uses an indexer to load plates into pods for delivery to a press cylinder via a pod elevator or a pod cart. The plates are imprinted with a bar code, imaged, punched, bent, sheared, corner notched, and registered to a press cylinder. The plates are loaded into the indexer, which moves the loaded plates into a position in alignment with designated pod compartments, and loads the plates into each of the designated pod compartments by indexed movement of an elevator within the indexer. The pod elevator or the pod cart moves the pods proximate to a press cylinder where the plates are unloaded from the pod and loaded onto a press cylinder. A computing device, such as a PLC, directs the process. A vision system senses information from the indexer, pod, pod elevator, and the plate for feedback to a PLC, which initiates all of the foregoing operations.