Method and conveying technology element for combining conveyor streams in a conveyor system

A conveyor system, comprising a number of conveying elements for merging conveyor steams, a conveying element of the number of conveying elements comprising:

• a number of ingoing conveyor segments;
• at least one coupling for an outgoing conveyor segment, on which the ingoing conveyor segments are merged;
• and
• a number of conveyor flow retainers on the ingoing conveyor segments;
• a number of conveyor flow release sensors disposed downstream of said ingoing conveyor segments;
• and
• a controller having a number of logically OR-connected inputs and being connected to said conveyor flow release sensors on the input side and to conveyor flow retainers on the output side, wherein the controller is configured to release a conveyor flow retainer and accordingly an object waiting at the conveyor flow retainer when an object preceding said object in a sorting sequence passes one of said conveyor flow release sensors or when there is no preceding object;
• and
• wherein at least one coupling for an outgoing conveyor segment of one conveying element is directly or indirectly connected to an ingoing conveyor segment of another conveying element.

A method for merging conveyor streams on a conveying element having a number of ingoing conveyor segments, at least one coupling to an outgoing conveyor segment on which the ingoing conveyor segments are merged, a number of conveyor flow retainers on the ingoing conveyor segments, and a number of logically OR-connected conveyor flow release sensors disposed downstream of said ingoing conveyor segments, the method comprising:

• causing an object to wait at a conveyor flow retainer;
• and
• releasing the conveyor flow retainer and accordingly the object waiting at the conveyor flow retainer when an object preceding the waiting object in a sorting sequence passes one of the OR-connected conveyor flow release sensors or when there is no preceding object;
• wherein several objects have the same sequence number in the sorting sequence.

A method for merging conveyor streams on a conveying element having a number of ingoing conveyor segments, at least one coupling to an outgoing conveyor segment on which the ingoing conveyor segments are merged, a number of conveyor flow retainers on the ingoing conveyor segments, and a number of logically OR-connected conveyor flow release sensors disposed downstream of said ingoing conveyor segments, the method comprising:

• causing an object to wait at a conveyor flow retainer;
• and
• releasing the conveyor flow retainer and accordingly the object waiting at the conveyor flow retainer when an object preceding the waiting object in a sorting sequence passes one of the OR-connected conveyor flow release sensors or when there is no preceding object;
• wherein the releases per unit of time are monitored by a higher-level controller and wherein that conveyor flow retainer is released, at which the object with the lowest sequence number is waiting, if the releases per unit of time drop below a threshold value.