Method and system for enhanced cutter throughput

A cutting apparatus for transversely cutting a web of printed material into separate sheets in a sheet processing system for processing collations of sheets, wherein the web includes at least two side-by-side sheets printed transversely across a width of the web,

• a web splitter arranged to separate the side-by-side sheets a direction parallel to a length of the web;
• a transverse cutter arranged to cut across the web;
• a cutter controller coupled to the transverse cutter and controlling the operation of the transverse cutter as follows:
• determining that one or more of the sheets in a set belongs to a new collation for which sheets have not previously been cut;
• determining whether sufficient collation parking spots exist to accommodate a new collation;
• if there are no available collation parking spots, and if all of the set of side-by-side sheets belong to the new collation, then delaying transverse cutting until an open collation parking spot becomes available;
• if there are no available collation parking spots, and if a subset of the set of side-by-side sheets belongs to a prior collation for which some sheets have already been cut, then partially transversely cutting the web to separate only the sheet, or sheets, that belong to the prior collation, and delaying a remainder of the transverse cutting until the open collation parking spot becomes available;
• and
• if there is an available collation parking spot, then transversely cutting the entire set of side-by-side sheets.