Industrial Conveyor Brushes
Conveyor belt systems play an essential role in a wide range of industrial applications, including baking, compositing, food processing, grain milling, mining, pulp and paper making, plastic manufacturing, and more. One of the key components of these machines is brushes. They can serve a number of functions within an industrial conveyor system, including guiding and sorting material, sealing and shielding sensitive equipment areas, and cleaning conveyed items and conveyor components.
Since conveyor systems are generally custom designed and built to meet the application and space requirements, they often require the use of custom conveyor brushes. Industrial conveyor brushes come in a variety of configurations and materials to suit different specifications. While this broad design freedom makes it possible for you to construct a brush component that meets your exact needs, it can also make it more challenging. Partnering with an experienced custom conveyor brush manufacturer can help you ensure you receive the ideal brush solution.
At Fuller Custom Products, our custom brush division specializes in the design and manufacture of customized brush products for the industrial and institutional markets. Over the years, we’ve developed and maintained a reputation for greater product design, higher product quality, and better customer service. Our brushes are built to exacting specifications, ensuring they provide superior performance in their intended application. Looking for quality conveyor brushes? The Fuller team has you covered.
Types and Styles of Conveyor Brushes
Industrial conveyor brushes are available in many types and styles to fit different system requirements and restrictions. Below, we highlight our product offerings.
Guiding, Sorting, and Sealing Brushes
Brushes are often used to control the flow of materials and products on a conveyor system, guiding them to remain on the line and/or sorting them into separate lines for further processing. They are also used to seal off certain areas of the conveyor to prevent product contamination or system damage.
The brush products we offer for these purposes are Fullergript® Metal Channel Strip Brushes. They are highly customizable; customers can choose the fill material, backing material, trim, channel size, channel shape, and center wire options that best suit their needs. Additionally, they can be formed into various shapes, including straight strip, coiled, spiraled, and more.
Cleaning Brushes
In addition to facilitating material guiding and sorting, conveyor brushes can also serve as secondary cleaning elements. They can remove powder, dust, and other dry residues from the conveyed materials or the conveyor belt, which helps ensure products are clean and the work area is free of excessive buildup during and between runs.
Our conveyor belt cleaning brushes include Fullergript® Cylinder Straight Strip Brushes. These cylindrical conveyor brushes are ideal for powered conveyor cleaning operations. Their fill materials and mounting configurations can be customized to suit different application requirements and restrictions.
We also offer Fullergript® Cylinder Spiral Strip Brushes for cleaning tasks. While similar to the cylindrical straight strip brushes, these brushes accommodate higher speeds with no risk of increased vibrations. Their spiral design ensures they maintain continuous contact with the conveyor belt, resulting in excellent cleaning performance at a lower cost than full face brushes.
Fullergript® Coil Brushes are another good choice. These brushes are formed by winding a strip brush around a shaft. They are available in closed lead (i.e., full face brushes with no space between the strips) and open lead (i.e., some space is left between the strip) variations. The latter is suitable for handling aggregate, debris, and grain.
Industrial Applications of Conveyor Brushes
Industrial conveyor brushes find use in the conveyor systems of a wide range of industries. Some of the industries that regularly rely on these components to facilitate their conveyor guiding, sorting, sealing, and cleaning operations include:
- The agricultural industry for grain processing, fruit and vegetable processing, and seeding applications
- The automotive industry for material conveying, parting sorting and distribution, painting, coating, and debris removal applications
- The bakery industry for ingredient sorting and mixing, line cleaning, and product separation and distribution applications
- The food processing industry for product and ingredient sorting and mixing, line cleaning, and product distribution applications
- The machining and assembly industry for component handling and sorting and debris removal applications
- The mining industry for separating, sorting, and mixing gravel, ores, and other mined materials and debris removal
- The woodworking industry for finishing, painting, and cleaning applications
Conveyor Brush Materials
All of our industrial conveyor brushes are highly customizable. They are available with numerous material options for the backing and fill components. This wide selection enables customers to tailor the brush to suit their application and system requirements.
Metal Channel Strip Brushes
Our metal channel strip brushes feature a patented brush construction that firmly anchors the brush filaments in place. This unique design results in superior brush density, uniformity, and durability than stable tufted brushes. Both their backing material and fill material can be customized.
Backing Material Options
We use heavy gauge metal to form an indestructible backing component for the fill material. The metals we use include:
- Aluminum
- Stainless steel
- Steel
Fill Material Options
We use various materials for the fill of our metal channel strip brushes, including metals:
- Steel wire: This material has excellent fatigue resistance.
- Stainless steel wire: This material demonstrates resistance to corrosion and thermal deformation/degradation. It is suitable for contaminated areas.
- Brass wire: This material is softer than steel or stainless steel. It is suitable for reducing heavy static in concentrated areas.
- Bronze wire: This material offers better temper properties than brass with the addition of corrosion resistance.
Plastics fill material options include:
- Nylon: This material comes in numerous variations, each of which offers slightly different characteristics that make them suitable for different applications.
- Polyester: This material offers exceed wet stiffness and good bend recovery.
- Polypropylene: This material exhibits low water absorption properties and excellent bend recovery and solvent resistance. It is a cost-effective alternative to many nylon materials.
Natural Fiber fill choices include:
- Tampico: This material is the superior option for applications requiring liquid retention, scrubbing, and/or surface finishing.
- Bassine: This material is suitable for heavy-duty scrubbing applications.
- Goat hair: This material is generally used for short trim soft brushes.
- Horsehair: This material offers good durability and a soft to slightly stiff texture. It is suitable for scratch-free cleaning of highly polished surfaces.
The fill material can be trimmed into flat, notched, or shaved end designs.
Consider Cylinder Brushes for Conveyor Needs
Our cylinder brushes come with the same fill material options as our metal channel strip brushes. While they can be made with a wider variety of core materials (e.g., plastic and wood), we typically stick with aluminum, stainless steel, or steel. Learn more about our cylinder brushes here.
What Makes a Good Conveyor Brush?
There are many things to keep in mind when choosing an industrial conveyor brush to ensure your conveyor system operates and performs as intended. Some of the key considerations include:
- Shape and size. Does the brush fit the system and handle the material/product properly?
- Material: Does the core and fill material offer the necessary durability to withstand the conditions of the application (e.g., corrosive materials or high/low temperatures)?
- Will you be able to find a replacement for the brush when it has reached the end of its service life?
Quality Custom Conveyor Brushes at Fuller Custom Products
If you need custom conveyor brushes for your conveyor system, turn to the experts at Fuller. Our extensive product customization capabilities allow us to design and manufacture brush products for nearly any conveyor application. For more information on our product and service offerings, contact us today. To get started on your custom brush design, submit a request.