Using Scan Tunnels to Track, Sort and Route Warehouse Packages

If you’re using conveyor lines to move products, packages and shipments through your warehouse, there’s a smart way to take that automation further, so you can automatically track, sort, route and inspect everything that’s on the move.

You can do this by creating scan tunnels at key points on your conveyor lines. Scan tunnels are modular frameworks that allow you to mount machine visions sensors above and around your conveyor lines, so you can automatically scan barcodes or DPMs on each item, read text characters, and perform sophisticated visual inspections to check for label presence, size, shape, color, uniformity and much more.

This all happens at high speeds, allowing you to automatically transmit the results to your warehouse systems, diverters, and robotic systems to help you trace, count, sort, and route packages and shipments.

You can uniquely identify every item and package, trace it throughout your warehouse processes, and get it to the right stage, packing area or loading dock—all with automated efficiency and machine precision. There’s no need to manually scan barcodes or perform visual checks or inspections with the human eye, so you can save on resources and assign them to other value-added tasks.

To get a quick sense of how it works and how you can use scan tunnels in your warehouse, watch our quick animated video here:

Using Zebra Machine Vision Sensors to Create Scan Tunnels

To get the best results, our team at Automation Distribution strongly recommends using Zebra machine vision sensors, as Zebra’s platform provides both fixed industrial scanning and machine vision capabilities in one hardware device, with one easy-to-use software application to set up and configure your jobs.

Each sensor offers plug-and-play simplicity and easy connection via USB-C or any major industrial communication protocol. You don’t need a host computer either, which saves on hardware costs. Power is provided by either USB-C, 24VDC, or PoE.

Once you mount your sensors to a scan tunnel framework and connect them to your network, you can use Zebra’s Aurora software to configure each one for a specific scanning or inspection task, with criteria that you specify. If you need specialized lighting, lensing or filters to get the right results on your conveyors and in your environment, Zebra has built-in or additional hardware to help you.

Each sensor can capture up to 16 images of a target object with a single trigger event, and each image can have its own settings for instant and highly sophisticated analysis of barcodes, labels and packages. This means you can create an extremely intelligent system that can recognize specific types of packages or items by their barcodes, their labels, or even their shapes and other characteristics.

It’s all remarkably simple to set up since Zebra’s software provides an extremely modern interface where everything is as easy as using sliders and radio buttons to dial in the right settings. There are also tutorials, video walkthroughs, and auto-tuning tools available to help you configure your jobs as quickly as possible.

If you need help with designing and configuring your scan tunnel solution, our team at ADI can provide any assistance you need, from expert guidance and consultation to full-service system design, testing, and implementation.

Ways You Can Use Scan Tunnels in Your Warehouse

Machine vision technology has almost limitless potential applications in warehousing, manufacturing, and logistics. But here are some key ways that our customers have used machine vision scan tunnels on their warehouse conveyor lines:

• End-to-End Traceability
• Date and Lot Code Reading
• Optical Character Recognition (OCR)
• Label Checks and Inspection
• Conveyor Loading and Unloading
• Counting, Sorting and Routing
• Package Integrity Checks
• Package Content Verification
• Package Measurements

Learn More About Zebra Machine Vision and Scan Tunnels

To learn more about using Zebra machine vision to set up scanning tunnels and also automate packing bench, dock door and forklift workflows, download our Zebra Ready Solutions Guide  and contact our industrial automation experts at Automation Distribution. We’ve helped warehouses and manufacturers deploy automation technologies to increase productivity, efficiency and quality since 1977, and we’d be happy to schedule a free consultation at your convenience.

To get started, call us at 1-888-600-3080 or email us now.