Abstract: A high-speed conveyor system for conveying articles of baggage, includes a number of accelerating conveyor belt sections arranged in tandem for transporting a number of baggage articles loaded onto an upstream end of a first one of the belt sections to a downstream end of a last one of the belt sections. The sections are driven at successively increasing rates of speed from the first to the last one. High-speed conveyor belt sections transport baggage articles received from the last one of the accelerating conveyor belt sections at a substantially high rate of speed over a relatively long distance to a downstream end of the high-speed sections. A number of decelerating conveyor belt sections are arranged in tandem for transporting baggage articles fed from the high-speed conveyor belt sections onto an upstream end of a first one of the decelerating conveyor belt sections.

Abstract: A conveyor system for uniformly distributing flat articles such as packaged documents at a pick-up location, without allowing them to bunch together. The articles are dropped to land on the surface of a slide and descend to the pick-up location. A feed conveyor delivers the articles to a feed end in the vicinity of the slide. A conveyor section is arranged to pivot about an axis near its downstream end. A drive arrangement swings the conveyor section between a first position where its upstream end confronts the feed end of the feed conveyor to receive articles and convey them to its downstream end, and a second position where its upstream end is raised a certain height above the feed end of the feed conveyor. Thus, when the pivoting section is at the first position, articles delivered by the feed conveyor are then conveyed by the pivoting section and drop to land on one portion of the slide.