Małopolskie Voivodship - sorting and packaging process automated!

In April 2020, at a fruit farm located in the picturesque area of Rożnowskie Lake, a 4-lane technological line was launched for sorting and packing apples into cartons. The operation of the machine allows for an automated process from the unloading to packaging of apples in cartons, thus enabling subsequent palletizing of full packaging.

UNLOADING SECTION includes, among others:

• a scissor type unloading robot equipped with a pallet box swinging gripper

• a set of water channels for gentle transport

• conveyor system for apples extracting from water with leaf extraction and 2 service platforms for convenient initial selection

• dryer machine with fruit fan.

SORTING PROCESS

The heart of the installation is a 4-lane cupl sorting machine equipped with a precise vision system for analyzing the diameter and coloring of apples. After measuring the weight, the vision system configures the apples and directs them to the assigned conveyors, which transport them to the packing tables.

PACKING SECTION

We proposed Standard packing tables, each 4 meters long. Each table consists of: 2 belt conveyors with a width of 400 mm (which receive fruit from a sorting machine), a belt conveyor for collecting full packages, a second-class fruit belt conveyor with dropping gutters and a tabletop for the empty packaging.

FULL FLEXIBILITY

To improve and maintain work continuity, the technological line has been equipped with gravitational carton discharges, which systematically deliver empty packaging. The filled cartons are moved to the central packaging collection conveyor or to the packaging slide for manual palletizing.

If a specific sort is not needed at the time of sorting, the fruit can be redirected to conveyors that deliver apples directly to the pallet box bin filler.

FUTURE INVESTMENT

In the second stage of the investment, the process of manual palletizing of cartons will be replaced by a fully automatic palletizing line, which will consist of a palletizer and an automatic banding machine. The technological line will also be supplemented with another bin filling machine and the fourth packing table.

In the third stage, the line will be upgraded with a presorting system with a hydro-vacuum filling machine. This solution will allow to pre-sort apples, divide them into sorts before putting them away in the cold store. Such handling of fruit guarantees better control and management of apples available for sale in the packhouse.

BENEFITS:

• highly efficient water unloading - tilting scissor robot

• gentle transport and packaging

• universal carrier - a cup for spherical fruit with a diameter of 50 to 110 mm

• flexible solutions - reversible packaging tables allow you to choose the packaging method

• precise vision system

• line capacity from 8 to 9 t / hour.