Why do we use Stainless Steel Construction for Vibrating Bowl Feeders?

It is very important not to overlook the material part contact surface of a feeder. In older days the industry once used cast iron and cast aluminum for the bowl construction. Through years of hard use feeder companies began to see significant wear using these materials. The metal-on-metal contact caused friction which is why those materials did not hold up very well. That is why all of our FCI builders only build with 304 and 316 Stainless Steel. The wear strength and hardness of stainless steel makes it a perfect choice for any feeding project. It is a hard-enough material to trust in the field, but also still has the flexibility to be re-worked and repaired.

Using stainless steel construction on a vibratory feeder improves the overall life of the tooling setup and basic bowl features. Some applications such as food and pharmaceutical parts feeders can benefit from this finish as well. Keeping our system rigid and reliable is our main goal for any project that leaves our doors. That is why we elect to use stainless steel and heat-treated steel inserts on all of our feeders so they can perform well in the field after constant use.

If you have a really abrasive part, you can elect to coat your bowl feeder in polyurethane or Rhino LINE-X liner coating. The Line-X coating is the same coating that storm chasers use on their vehicles when driving through the eye of a tornado. Unlike polyurethane it is virtually bullet proof and has worked coast to coast on many truck beds you see today. The addition of any coating on your feeder gives you the added wear protection and assurance. In the event that the parts do wear through the coating it is unlikely they will wear through the stainless-steel sidewalls and tracks. If that were to ever occur, we could burn out the old coating, sandblast, and then recoat with a new coating.

Check out some of stainless steel vibratory feeder bowls on our YouTube page today!

Surlyn Coating in a Vibratory Feeder Bowl

Vibrating bowl feeders can benefit from using various coatings in the industry. These coatings have various uses and perks such as durability and part-friendly surfacing. One of our most popular coatings is the Surlyn thermoplastic powder coating.

The best way to describe surlyn is to visualize the coating of a golf ball. That is exactly what they use and it’s the only way to hold up against heavy blows from continued use. Standard polyurethane holds up well but sometimes it doesn’t fit certain applications such as food grade systems and abrasive part contact. The surlyn offers outstanding corrosion protection with a high impact strength and good weathering capability. It has been used for over two decades and meets the FDA standards for direct food contact. A vibratory parts feeder coated in surlyn can also withstand temperatures from 200 degrees Fahrenheit all the way down to cryogenic temperatures.

We have implemented this coating on many medical and food safe systems. To this date we have never had to re-coat any surlyn bowls in the field. The wear resistance and tensile strength is phenomenal. That is why many of customers elect to choose this coating for the main part contact surfacing.

This is just one of our many coatings and options you can chose to add to a system. Offering this optional coating allows us to work with many industries and also ensures we meet the standards on critical vibrating parts feeding applications.

Sound Reduction Using Enclosures & Curtains

As one could expect, a vibratory feeder is not quietest piece of equipment around. Sound waves are produced with vibration, parts colliding, and metal-to-metal contact. These sounds echo off the steel and conical walls of the bowl which can amplify across a wide area. This kind of interference makes things difficult for production managers and operators that must work around the equipment.

That is why implementing some sound reduction features may be usefully on your next feeding system. The average vibratory feeder system includes polyurethane liner inside the bowl which does help to alleviate the metal contact of the parts from the hopper loading tray and bowl tooling. If the bowl does not have poly-u, then it is bare stainless-steel bead blasted. This type of finish creates the loudest noises you will see from a feeder. To take preventive measures you can look at (3) options to reduce the sound of your system:

  1. Add an aluminum sound enclosure with sound proof foam and hinged roof access.
  2. Add poly-urethane liner to the bowl for sound reduction.
  3. Add sound curtains around the entire machine to contain the sound waves.

Some additional sound may be the root cause of a poorly tuned drive unit also. Drive units that have broken springs or hammering coils can cause a loud banging noise. To fix this issue the unit must be retuned properly so it is a resonant “hum” you would hear from a typical feeder drive unit.

Nobody likes a noisy system in the plant and it’s no fun working around those types of systems either.

Please ask us about our sound reduction options if you feel it may be needed on your next project.

Conveyor Feeding Systems with Parts Feeders

You may have seen a parts feeding system with a conveyor added for a variety of reasons. A normal system usually has a straight-line vibratory unit, or a gravity fed track. However, sometimes these components cannot perform as well as a conveyor. Therefore, the application at hand may require a conveyor to successfully fulfill the production requirements.

Some factors to consider when choosing a conveyor over an inline or gravity track would be that they can travel at a much faster flow rate per minute. You will see more inches per minute out of a conveyor, so this helps to integrate with high speed systems such as packaging machines and fast-moving assemblies. In addition to the high feed rate these conveying systems can also be utilized to feed out to a point that is very far away from the main bowl feeder discharge. This allows the customer to offset the whole feeding system while the conveyor reaches into the machine to deliver the parts accordingly.

Our customers love our conveyors because we use modular machined units that are equipped with oriental motors and drivers. The gear heads are guaranteed for life and we have never had an issue with those components after high stress in the field. With our LP (Low Profile) design we can get into very tight areas. This is especially useful for existing tooling integration. The profiles of the conveyors can be changed from width to length as needed for the application. FCI can change the mounting package to an undermount setup or direct shaft coupling. Also, we offer multiple belt options such as PVC, Urethane, Fabric, Transparent, and other materials.  These are just some of the options we offer to provide that extra flexibility during the design phase of the project.

If you think a conveyor system will be needed on your next feeding project, please reach out to us today. Our engineers have years of experience in the field and can find the correct unit for your application.

Air-Track Systems in Place of Inlines and Conveyors

Under certain circumstances a part must feed to an extended distance away from the bowl center. The typical vibratory inline can only support about 8-12” of overhang off the plate before it becomes sporadic. Conveyors can only go so far but the transition and costs can get complicated. There is an alternative solution to these problems. That fix would be implementing an air-track in place.

FCI Air-Track systems typically consist of a blower system with flexible air tubing. This tubing connects at the back of the track and provides a consistent flow of air down the main channel of the track frame. The track frame usually consists of steel or stainless-steel tubing equipped with angled holes so the air escapes in the direction of feed. This design allows for a linear motion without adjusting flexible air-jets or air-knifes. It is a fixed setup that is consistent and efficient.

Air-Tracks have several pros, one being that they can be machined at very long lengths. Machine builders and integrators love this because it allows us to supply a track that is capable of running through their machine enclosure to an area of interest such as a pick and place mechanism or rotary actuator. No electronics exist on an air track except for the full track switch sensor and the blower system. Everything else runs off the air flow produced. This air flow can produce a very high feed rate per minute which is also why many of our customers elect to choose this type of system over a standard vibratory inline or conveyor.

If you think this type of system could be used on your next project, please reach out to us and a member of our team can provide some insights.