Sortation Conveyor

Similar to a Chute Conveyor, Wheel Conveyor, Roller Conveyor, and Chain Conveyor, Slat Conveyor, Flat Belt Conveyor, Magnetic Belt Conveyor, Troughed Belt Conveyor, Bucket Conveyor, Vibrating Conveyor, Screw Conveyor, and Pneumatic Conveyor, Vertical Conveyor, Cart-on-Track Conveyor, Tow Conveyor, and Trolley Conveyor, a Sortation Conveyor or Sortation System is another transport equipment designed to move material efficiently from one location to another.

I have to say that I find Sortation Systems fascinating. When I worked at Amazon.com, their Sortation System handled multiple item orders (multis) very efficiently and was really the heat beat of the fulfillment center. At most warehouse operations, the Picking process is the drum beat of the facility, but at Amazon, the Sortation System dictates the overall throughput of the building.

Below is a video showing what a Sortation Conveyor or Sortation System can do:

In general, a Sortation Conveyor in a Sortation System accomplishes the following:

• Unit + On-Floor/Overhead
• Sortation conveyors are used for merging, identifying, inducting, and separating products to be conveyed to specific destinations
• Stationary or movable arms that deflect, push, or pull a product to desired destination
• Since they do not come in contact with the conveyor, they can be used with almost any flat surface conveyor
• Usually hydraulically or pneumatically operated, but also can be motor driven
• Simple and low cost
• One or more rows of powered rollers or wheels or chains that pop up above surface of conveyor to lift product and guide it off conveyor at an angle; wheels are lowered when products not required to be diverted
• Only capable of sorting flat-bottomed items
• Pop-up rollers are generally faster than pop-up wheels
• Sliding shoe sorter (a.k.a. moving slat sorter) uses series of diverter slats that slide across the horizontal surface to engage product and guide it off conveyor
• Slats move from side to side as product flows in order to divert the product to either side
• Gentle and gradual handling of products
• Trays or slats provide combined sorting mechanism and product transporter
• Can accommodate elevation changes
• Tilt tray sorters usually designed in continuous loops with a compact layout and recirculation of products not sorted the first time
• Tilt slat sorters carry products on flat-surface slat conveyor and can handle wider variety of products compared to tilt tray
• Either continuous loop, where individual carriages are linked together to form an endless loop, or train style (asynchronous), where a small number of carriers tied together with potential for several trains running track simultaneously
• Each carriage equipped with small belt conveyor, called the cell, that is mounted perpendicular to direction of travel of loop and discharges product at appropriate destination
• Automatically separates single line of products into multiple in-line discharge lines