HELIXORTER

The HELIXORTER is Vanderlande's highest-throughput tilt-tray loop sorter, designed for large hub airports where final sortation is the bottleneck and system availability is a contractual obligation rather than an aspiration. It processes up to 6,000 trays per hour at a conveyor speed of 2 m/s — making it one of the highest-capacity sorters commercially deployed in airport baggage handling.

The patented closed-deck design is the critical differentiator from conventional tilt-tray sorters. Traditional open-gap designs trap irregular, soft, or oversized bags in the mechanical joints between tray units, generating jams, sort errors, and maintenance interventions. HELIXORTER's fully closed deck eliminates those gaps even through curves, providing the same uninterrupted surface whether the sorter is on a straight section or negotiating a bend — a meaningful reliability advantage in high-volume operations.

Propulsion uses a synchronous linear motor, which Vanderlande rates among the lowest energy-consuming drives on the market for this class of sorter. The trays themselves are manufactured from recyclable bamboo, with reusable plastic components and unpainted steel — a sustainability specification increasingly demanded in airline and airport sustainability frameworks.

For procurement teams at mega-hub airports or large network carriers evaluating sortation infrastructure, the HELIXORTER sits at the top of the throughput range: the relevant comparison questions are system footprint per tray-per-hour, energy draw, and availability SLA — not headline throughput alone.