Abstract: Apparatus for sorting slender elongate items, some of which are defective, includes a viewing area with sensing means that sense defects in the items and produces a signal when a defect is sensed, and a removal area with removal means that operate in response to the signals from the sensing means to remove defective items. A conveyor having upstanding walls defining a series of longitudinal side by side channels receives a flow of randomly oriented items and places them in substantially singulated end to end alignment. An endless belt conveyor is arranged as a longitudinal continuation of the first conveyor and has a series of troughs aligned with the series of channels for receiving the substantially singulated and aligned items from the channels of the first conveyor and for carrying the received items through the viewing area and into the removal area in substantially singulated end to end alignment.

Abstract: Sorting apparatus and method comprise a viewing area, a removal area, and a conveyor for passing a thin bed of indiscriminately mixed items first through the viewing area and then through the removal area. Radiant energy, which includes bands of two mutually different wavelengths that are reflected in a predetermined relationship by some of the items and in other than that relationship by the other items in the mixture, is flooded into the viewing area as an integrated spread throughout the area from preferably special light fixtures producing both visible light and infrared radiation.

Abstract: Apparatus for sorting items, such as peeled whole potatoes, which, in the absence of abnormalities, exhibit a substantially uniform light reflectivity, includes an illumination chamber through which the items to be sorted are passed successively as a stream. Light sensors are focused on a cross-sectional slice of the illumination chamber through which the items pass, each of these light sensors being focused on only a small portion of the slice. Electronic circuitry in conjunction with the light sensors counts the number of such sensors sensing abnormalities. If the number of sensors sensing abnormalities is greater than a predetermined minimum, a reject signal is produced. If desired, the circuitry may be arranged to also determine whether the number of sensors sensing abnormalities is greater than a predetermined percentage, for example, 50%, of the total number of sensors sensing the item, and thus produce a second reject signal if the abnromalities make up more than the predetermined percentage.