If you’re new to spiral conveyors or would like to narrow the viable options for vertical conveyor solutions quickly, this guide will help you understand Spiral Conveyors, their features and benefits, and how they SpiralConveyor work.
About Spiral Conveyors
Spirals conveyors include a continuous process such as proofing, cooling, or freezing. In its simplest form, a Low Tension spiral consists of an upright motor-driven drum or cage, and a side flex conveyor belt is wrapped around them. The conveyor belt moves either up or down in a spiral path and is supported by continuous belt support rails fixed to the other frame of the conveyor in a helical way.
Factors Need to Consider While Using Spiral Conveyors
When conveyor lines need to change elevations, spiral conveyors address many common factors and challenges when moving products from one level to another. Some of them are:
- The slope can’t be too steep, or a longer conveyor length will be required.
- You must consider the type of product you are conveying.
- Taking the long stretch of a gradually sloped conveyor will help you.
Features & Benefits
- Easy to install
- By conveying the product vertically, you can maximize the floor space.
- effective and more efficient than elevators
- allows you to customize the spirals to fit many applications
Standard Spiral Conveyor Sizes
Special sizes can be manufactured to suit your applications. Standard Spiral Conveyors sizes are:
| Belt Width | Effective Belt Width | Inside Belt Radius | Outside Frame Diameter |
| 254 mm | 234 mm | 381 mm | 1270 mm |
| 305 mm | 285 mm | 458 mm | 1526 mm |
| 406 mm | 386 mm | 609 mm | 2030 mm |
| 508 mm | 488 mm | 762 mm | 2540 mm |
| 610 mm | 590 mm | 915 mm | 3050 mm |
| 660 mm | 640 mm | 990 mm | 3300 mm |
| 762 mm | 742 mm | 1143 mm | 3810 mm |
| 813 mm | 793 mm | 1220 mm | 4066 mm |
| 1016 mm | 996 mm | 1524 mm | 5080 mm |
Pros of Spiral Conveyors
Some attractive set of benefits a business can get while using Spiral Conveyors:
Superior Product Handling
The all-plastic contact surface ensures an excellent product release of unpacked food products such as poultry, meat, and fish. In addition, the open spiral design allows for an extensive open area.
Optimise floor capacity
The Spiral conveyor systems have a compact and space-saving floor design. They optimize your floor capacity with their small footprint and a curve radius of 1.5 x belt width. The tight spiral conveyor fits into almost any plant design.
Long tracks and fewer transfers
Using bearings in the chain ensures a low friction coefficient and helps the spiral managed by just one motor for up to 50 meters of belt length. In addition, long spiral conveyor tracks mean fewer transfers and economical conveyance.
Easy Access for Maintenance
The open design of the spiral conveyor system offers clear access for maintenance and wash-down and helps to reduce maintenance costs and better belt sanitation.
Cons of Spiral Conveyors
Some of the drawbacks of using Spiral Conveyors are:
- Provides limited conveying distance (30m per screw)
- Can degrade the particle and poor conveying of high friction
- Metal-on-metal contact can cause contamination
Spiral Conveyor— How does it work?
Spiral conveyors are also known as vibratory bowl feeders, pot feeders, or vibratory bowl feeders. You can trace these names back to the specific design of the spiral conveyor and its mode of operation: The sorting top of a spiral conveyor is like a pot, a tightly connected cylindrical spiral known as Helix. Concerning the helical conveyor track or the spiral conveyor bowl, it also makes a distinction between cylindrical shape, step shape, and conical shape.
The mode of operation is relatively simple: The conveyor tracks the bowl feeder’s vibration by an electromagnetic oscillating drive. With this vibration, you can move the object in the desired direction and initiate a throwing motion called Micro- throwing. You can also install the sorting element known as baffles manually. However, depending on the design of the spiral conveyor, it is possible to make modifications that allow the baffles to change the transport items.
Changing the conveying speed by changing the vibration strength or vibration frequency is possible. Furthermore, various additional elements can be connected, such as temperature regulation. Apart from spiral coolers, there are also heating spiral conveyors, which ensure that the temperature of the items rises regularly.
