Fabrizio Radice, Vice President and Head of Global Sales and Marketing at Tomra Sorting Recycling, comments: “We work very closely with our customers to ensure that our products consistently meet their demanding requirements and those of their end customers. Our New generation Autosort system is an incredibly exciting development as its use of versatile sensors and intelligent software will enable it to meet the demands of a whole host of current and future sorting applications.”
Delegates of Tomra’s digital launch event also found out about another new product developed by Tomra – Autosort Speedair – an additional component to Tomra’s Autosort range. Autosort Speedair is a highly customisable system designed to stabilise light materials such as plastic films or paper on a highspeed conveyor, thus generating a higher throughput and enhancing sorting quality.
With industry demand resulting in the need for higher speed conveyor belts, Autosort Speedair incorporates speed-controlled fan-driven air inlets that generate a constant air stream over the conveyor belt to prevent material on the conveyor belt from moving. By doubling the speed of the conveyor belts up to 6 metres per second, throughput is much higher and the output quality is consistently high. Customers benefit from a better return on investment, as well as lower installation and running costs. Additionally, as the first system on the market with no belt cover, access to the unit for maintenance is much faster and the likelihood of a material blockage is much lower compared to conventional high-speed systems in the market, as is the risk of machine downtime.
Looking beyond the launch of the new generation Autosort and Autosort Speedair, the third and final product mentioned at the event was the forthcoming launch of Tomra’s first robot, the Autosort Cybot. The system comprises a new generation Autosort scanner, an electromagnetic sensor and a robot arm. It is the first robot on the market that combines four technologies at once: Near Infrared (NIR) and Visible Light (VIS) spectroscopy, Deep Laiser and if required, induction for ferrous and non-ferrous metals recovery. Autosort Cybot’s robotic arm is capable of simultaneously sorting material into four different streams or fractions depending on the infeed material size, colour and criteria of the target fractions.
With sorting and recycling plants demanding even higher levels of automation than ever before, the Autosort Cybot will available soon and is another value-added component that complements the Autosort range, but can also operate as a standalone unit. Prior to its official launch, material tests can be carried out at Tomra's Test Center to confirm its outstanding capabilities.
Valerio Sama, Vice President and Head of Product Management, adds: “The addition of a robot arm to our Autosort system opens up a wealth of new opportunities for highly automated applications within the sorting process and will deliver an even higher level of quality control of recyclables such as HDPE, PET and PP.”
Tom Eng, SVP and Head of Tomra Sorting Recycling, concludes: “We are delighted with how well the digital launch event went. COVID-19 has enforced new ways of working and communicating and as such we were more than happy to test out a digital launch platform for the first and probably not the last time given its success! The launch provided an opportunity to showcase our range of complementary, connected and perfectly harmonised technologies which together deliver a symphony that is capable of sorting all sorts of waste at unparalleled sorting performances and with impressive throughput and yield. Delegates had the chance to listen to the symphony – the sounds of all our machines – and were captivated by it!”
