At Pack Expo booth S-3547, Key Technology will debut its reversible Zephyr conveyor. Zephyr gently moves the product with a minimal bounce to protect the product quality and reduce noise, achieving higher capacities than other horizontal-motion conveyors.

The reversible Zephyr, which can now flow in either direction, increases production line versatility while improving sanitation and lowering maintenance.

“We’ve made design changes to our field-proven Zephyr to expand its capabilities and meet the needs of even more food processors. Previously, if customers needed to redirect a product stream, they had two options – diverter gates and reversible belt conveyors – both of which have more moving parts that require additional cleaning and service. The new modified Zephyr offers the same simple design, great sanitation, and low maintenance as our standard model but now with a reversible function,” said Rudy Sanchez, Process Systems Product Development manager at Key said.

The reversible Zephyr is suitable for frozen bulk foods like potato chips/crisps, nuts, and cereals, along with dry products like potato chips/crisps, nuts, and cereals. The unique motion profile of Zephyr gently slides and conveys product with no segregation or stratification, reducing product damage and coating loss such as seasoning, batter, and certain types of oil. The Zephyr provides up to twice the throughput of other horizontal-motion conveyors while keeping noise levels at or below 75 decibels.

The reversible Zephyr, when integrated with pneumatic controls on the production floor, allows processors to change the direction of product flow with the push of a button or automatically if fully integrated with the line. Reversible Zephyr can be configured to split a single product stream between two machines or to divert a single stream to two different downstream production lines to produce different products.

The sturdy construction of Zephyr aids in sanitation, cleaning, and maintenance. Its simple drive system requires no timing setup and can be placed anywhere beneath the bed to support seamless integration with other equipment in the line.

With a bed width and length that can be tailored for individual customer applications, Zephyr can be equipped with a variety of options including slide gates for scale feed distribution, a discharge to enhance multi-head weighing, or a bias to spread product when feeding downstream systems. It can also be configured with a stop-start mode for scale feeding or product distribution. Zephyr easily accommodates varying product flow rates, maximizing the flexibility of the system to meet a broad range of customer requirements.