| 摘要 |
<p>Apparatus and method for sorting articles, particularly pieces of scrap metal, fed sequentially onto a conveyor belt (4). The conveyor is provided with spaced transverse bars (6) pivotally mounted at one end for movement between a support and a non-support position. The articles on the belt pass under a detector-counter (8) which produces a signal indicative of the number of bars supporting the bars and hence the length of the article and the position of a selected article from a reference point fixed relative to the conveyor, The articles are then scanned by a scanner (10), such as an X-ray fluorescence scanner, to produce an output signal corresponding to a selected characteristic of the article, such as the chemical composition of a particular metal in a scrap metal piece. A computer control means (62) then selects the appropriate exit flowpath (12, 14, 16, 18, 20) for each article on the basis of the information contained in the output signal and triggers movement of the appropriate number of support bars to the non-support position, depending on the length of the article, when the selected article arrives at the selected exit flowpath.</p> |
