Peripheral Conveyor Speed Tracking During Sorter Acceleration
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current sorter systems experience inefficiencies due to speed mismatches between sortation conveyors and peripheral conveyors, leading to article collisions and flipping during acceleration and deceleration.
Innovation Solution
A speed control system that utilizes a sensor to measure sorter current speed and adjusts peripheral conveyor speeds based on sorter acceleration or deceleration, setting commanded speeds to match or track the sorter's speed to minimize differentials.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If peripheral conveyors operate at fixed speeds independent of sorter speed changes, then conveyor operation is simple, but article collisions and flipping occur during sorter acceleration and deceleration
Solution Approach 1:
The speed controller continuously receives feedback about sorter speed from sensors and automatically adjusts peripheral conveyor speeds to match. This closed-loop feedback system eliminates article collisions by ensuring speed synchronization without requiring complex manual intervention or overly complicated control mechanisms.
Solution Approach 2:
The peripheral conveyors automatically adjust their own speeds based on sorter speed changes through the speed controller. The system self-regulates to prevent collisions and flipping during acceleration and deceleration phases without external intervention, maintaining reliability while keeping the control architecture manageable.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If peripheral conveyor speeds are continuously adjusted to match sorter speed, then article collisions are reduced, but control system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The speed controller proactively adjusts peripheral conveyor speeds before and during sorter acceleration and deceleration events. By anticipating speed mismatches and correcting them in advance, the system prevents article collisions and flipping without requiring overly complex real-time reaction mechanisms.
3Productivity
If peripheral conveyors operate independently without speed coordination, then system operation is straightforward, but sortation efficiency decreases due to speed mismatches
Solution Approach 1:
The speed controller merges the speed control of multiple peripheral conveyors with the sorter speed profile. By coordinating all conveyor speeds to follow the sorter's acceleration and deceleration patterns, the system achieves smooth article transitions and maximizes sortation efficiency without creating unnecessarily complex individual control systems for each conveyor.
Data Source
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AI summary
A speed control system for sorters (e.g. sliding shoe sorters) comprises a sensor for measuring a sorter current speed of a sorter and a speed controller for setting peripheral conveyor commanded speeds for peripheral conveyors in communication with the sorter. During acceleration or deceleration of the sorter (e.g., in response to start or stop events of the sorter, or from one operating speed to another operating speed), the speed controller sets the peripheral conveyor commanded speeds to match or track the sorter current speed in order to ramp up or ramp down speeds of the peripheral conveyors with that of the sorter, which accelerates or decelerates more slowly than the peripheral conveyors. The speed controller may control the speed of different types of peripheral conveyors (e.g., upstream, intermediate, downstream) in various ways based on the type of the peripheral conveyors and/or based on user-configurable exception settings.