An optical sorting sensor wants a wide belt moving fast. A 96-inch belt is also the most awkward wear part in the plant to replace. Remcon built the frame so an endless belt goes on from one side, with nothing holding the conveyor up but itself.
The Problem: The Belt Is the Wear Part, and It Is Eight Feet Wide
This conveyor runs under an optical sorting sensor mounted near the discharge end. Everything awkward about the machine follows from that one line.
A sensor-based sorter reads material piece by piece and fires timed air jets at the discharge. It needs the stream thin, spread across the full width, and separated into individual pieces. Burden depth is not a preference: for a given tonnage it is set by belt width and belt speed, which is why the belt in front of a sorter is normally wider and faster than the conveyors feeding it. The feed presentation guide works through that arithmetic.
Wide and fast is a fine answer until the belt wears out. The belt is a consumable, and on a 96-inch machine it is the most awkward consumable in the building to change. There are three ways to get one on:
- Mechanical lacing. The belt arrives with two ends and is joined in place. Fast in the field, but it leaves a hard joint and metal fasteners in the belt.
- Splice it endless on site. Call a belt company, get a splice press into the building, and make the joint in a dirty plant inside a downtime window.
- Install a factory-spliced endless belt. No ends, and no joint made on site. But an endless loop has to be threaded over the pulleys, which means opening the frame.
The third option is the one worth having and the one wide conveyors usually cannot use, because opening a 96-inch frame normally means holding the non-drive side up with a forklift or hoist for the whole change. So Remcon built a frame that does not need holding up.
What a Quick-Change Frame Actually Is
A quick-change belt conveyor is one whose frame is designed to let an endless belt be installed from one side, instead of requiring the belt to be cut, laced, or spliced in place. Here the sturdy framework lets the non-drive side of the conveyor support itself throughout the belt change, once the removable walls and spacers are taken out. No forklift or hoist has to hold that side up, as some other designs at this width require.
The distinction that makes it work is which parts leave the machine. The walls and spacers are the removable pieces; the structure carrying the load is not. That is what lets belt widths of up to 96 inches use hot-welded endless belts at all, without the hassle and cost of on-site splicing. At 96 inches this is the widest quick-change endless belt conveyor Remcon has built.
Why the Splice Belongs in Somebody Else's Clean Shop
A hot-welded endless splice is made by precision-cutting interlocking fingers into both ends of the belt. The fingers mesh when the ends are brought together, and the joint goes into a press and is heated until it welds into one continuous loop. That work is done by skilled technicians in the belt supplier's clean shop, which is why the splice comes out precise and long-lasting.
A field splice is the same process performed in a plant, in dust, against a clock. The conditions are the variable, not the technique.
What the shop-made splice buys once the belt is running:
- No catch points. The joint is strong and smooth, so the belt is less likely to tear than a mechanically laced one.
- It runs through a metal detector. Mechanical lacing puts metal into the belt; an endless splice does not, so the belt can be used with metal detectors without interfering with sensing.
- Spares can sit on a shelf. With a quick-change conveyor, a spare belt is stored on site, ready for immediate installation and running. Nobody has to call a belt company, get a splice machine into the building, and pay for splice labor during an unplanned stop.
Designed for 500 Feet Per Minute
This conveyor was designed to run at 500 feet per minute. For scale, a Remcon MRF sorting conveyor, where people pick material off the belt by hand, runs 4 to 150 feet per minute. The fastest belt Remcon has built runs at 1200.
Two things follow from that speed at that width. The first is tracking. High-speed optical sorting conveyors are an unusual shape: wide, short, and fast. Remcon developed its own process for bonding belts endlessly on site for conveyors of this class, up to 112 inches wide and only 16 to 20 feet long, and on that geometry alignment is critical for proper tracking, which is why our attention to splicing accuracy typically exceeds that of local belt suppliers.
The second is what the material does at speed. There is a ceiling on a bare belt, and trade guidance for sensor-based sorting puts it around 550 to 600 feet per minute. Above that, light sheet paper and film begin to fly up off the belt and drift, and the published remedy is a wind tunnel blowing air along the belt at belt speed to hold them down. A 500 FPM design speed sits under the ceiling.
Guards That Do Not Fight the Maintenance Crew
Remcon's design philosophy is to provide conveyors that are safe first, with guards at every pinch point and danger area. What is worth explaining is the shape they take: individual guards that give maintenance workers convenient access to the working parts, rather than one hard-to-access box around the whole machine. The reasoning matches the belt change. A conveyor is more likely to stay properly maintained if it is not a hassle to get to.
What That Means for a Wide, Fast Belt of Your Own
Published belt widths across the Remcon line run 12 to 72 inches. Every conveyor is built to order and nothing is stocked, so 96 inches was not selected off a page. It was what the sensor needed, and the frame was designed around getting a belt that wide on and off.
Three questions decide whether a quick-change frame earns its keep on your conveyor:
- Does the belt stop the line? If the machine downstream sits idle whenever the belt is off, the change-out method is worth designing rather than discovering.
- How wide is it? Width is what turns a belt change from a maintenance task into a rigging job.
- Does anything have to see through the belt? Mechanical fasteners are metal. If a detector runs over that belt, the splice type is already decided for you.
Conveyors for computerized optical sorting systems have been Remcon work since 1998, and more than 150 high-speed optical sorting conveyors have gone out since. This one was built for an OEM; the rest of that work is on custom conveyors for OEM manufacturers. Splice types and belt construction are on replacement conveyor belts, and when the change-out is a job for a crew rather than a shelf, see belt replacement and repair.
Everything is designed and welded at our Airway Heights (Spokane), Washington shop, then shipped and installed nationwide by our own crews. To size one, tell us the belt width and speed the sensor wants and the space around the machine. Request a quote or call (509) 244-9439.
Quick-Change Belt Conveyor FAQ
How do you change the belt on a 96-inch conveyor without a forklift?
With a quick-change frame. The removable walls and spacers come out, and the framework is sturdy enough that the non-drive side of the conveyor supports itself for the rest of the change, so an endless belt can be installed from one side. Some other designs at this width require a forklift or hoist to hold the non-drive side up while the belt goes on. Removing that requirement is what lets belts up to 96 inches wide use hot-welded endless belts instead of on-site splicing.
Endless spliced or mechanically laced belt on a high-speed conveyor?
Endless, if the frame will take one. A hot-welded endless splice is strong and smooth with no catch points, so it is less likely to tear than mechanical lacing, and it puts no metal in the belt, so the belt can run past a metal detector without interfering with sensing. Lacing installs faster in the field and lets the belt be opened for maintenance, which is why it stays common on conveyors whose frames cannot accept an endless loop. On a high-speed optical sorting conveyor, where tracking is critical, endless is the usual answer.
What is a hot-welded endless belt splice?
Interlocking fingers are precision-cut into both ends of the belt. The fingers mesh when the ends are brought together, and the joint is put into a press and heated until the two ends weld into one continuous loop. The splice is made by skilled technicians in the belt supplier's clean shop rather than in a plant during downtime, which is what makes it precise and long-lasting.
How fast does the conveyor under an optical sorter run?
Far faster than a hand-picking line. This conveyor was designed for 500 feet per minute, against 4 to 150 feet per minute on a Remcon MRF sorting conveyor; the fastest belt Remcon has built runs at 1200. Speed and width together set burden depth, and a sorter needs the stream thin and separated. Trade guidance puts the bare-belt limit at roughly 550 to 600 feet per minute, above which light paper and film start to lift off the belt unless a wind tunnel holds them down.