High speed article unscrambler and aligner

摘要

An article unscrambler and aligner is disclosed which receives articles of different sizes in random order and position, and using plural side-by-side lanes each of which lanes has driven article transport rollers at different speeds, which speeds are uniform for the length of the lane, but are progressively higher in each lane toward one side of the unscrambler in order to provide a lateral linear speed increase. This speed increase causes separation and rotation of the articles and also causes them to arrange in single file along one side of the unscrambler's surface and so discharge them onto a conveyor at the end of the unscrambler remote from that at which the articles were received. One or more lanes are composed of rollers of tapered diameter in order to make the lateral speed increase more uniform.