Apron Feeder Inspection AI

Inspect every pan, bolt, roller, and skirt on every rotation, and catch spillage before it wears out the tail.

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An industrial conveyor belt carrying ore, with AI annotations highlighting a crack, a missing bolt, and material spillage.

Apron Feeder Inspection AI for the Toughest Primary Crushers, Hoppers, and Reclaim Lines

  • Deploy Anywhere, Run Everywhere

    Run apron feeder inspection on feeder, hopper, and tail cameras on the edge, on-prem, in your VPC, or via API.

  • One Platform, Full Adoption

    Tools every maintenance and operations team can adopt, from reliability engineers to fitters and control room operators, no separate ML team required.

  • Secure, Compliant, and Audit-Ready

    Data stays safe with SOC 2 Type II compliance, encrypted data, HIPAA compliance, and an uptime SLA.

  • Cracked & Worn Pans and Flight Plates
  • Loose & Missing Pan Bolts
  • Master Link & Chain Condition
  • Seized Carry & Tail Rollers
  • Skirt Wear & Spillage Under the Feeder
  • Hopper Level & Material Flow

Talk to a Vision AI engineer who's shipped in mining and minerals processing.

Bring us your toughest apron feeder problem and we'll map a working solution.

Ask us about:

  • Solution architecture that fits your feeders, maintenance strategy, and plant controls
  • A live demo on your own feeder camera footage
  • Deployment options: edge, on-prem, air-gapped, VPC, or on the cameras and network your plant already runs
  • ROI modeling against chain failures, unplanned shutdowns, spillage cleanup, and pan and roller replacement

Over 80,000 organizations build with Roboflow.

  • Rivian
  • Pella
  • Chobani
  • USG Corporation
  • BNSF Railway
  • American Woodmark
Start where you are

Vision AI is transforming businesses

Customers across the board are solving complex challenges and driving meaningful impact.

  • Automotive customer

    $10 million

    Saved by automatically detecting defects on the production line

  • Logistics & freight company

    90%

    Less time spent manually tracking shipping inventory

  • Building materials supplier

    60%

    Lower customer return rate with improved product quality

Inspect Every Pan, from the Feed Hopper to the Head Sprocket

Add a real-time inspection layer to every apron feeder with Roboflow vision AI for apron feeder inspection. Built for primary crushers, hoppers, and reclaim lines where the feeder is rarely redundant, a cracked pan or a loose bolt can end in a broken chain, and spillage quietly wears out the tail rollers and sprocket.

Pans, bolts, and the chain:

  • Inspect every pan and flight plate on every rotation for cracks, wear, and impact damage, and tag each finding to its pan number, with a model trained on your own feeder.
  • Detect loose and missing pan bolts before a bolt head catches on the structure.
  • Watch master links and chain sag for damage and stretch, so tension adjustments and link changes are planned, not forced by a failure.

Rollers, skirts, and spillage:

  • Spot carry and tail rollers that have stopped turning or are damaged, with the same approach as conveyor idler monitoring.
  • Find hot rollers and sprocket bearings with thermal cameras, as in hot bearing detection.
  • Check skirt wear and the gap to the pans, and measure spillage building up under the feeder and at the tail.

Feed, flow, and maintenance:

  • Monitor hopper level and material flow onto the feeder, and flag bridging, blockages, and empty running.
  • Catch tramp metal and oversize rock on the feeder before they reach the crusher, with foreign material detection at the crusher.
  • Send findings to maintenance as work orders, and trend wear by pan and position to plan shutdowns, as part of predictive maintenance.

Bring intelligence to every apron feeder today. Stop a cracked pan, a loose bolt, or a pile of spillage from becoming a broken chain and a plant stopped for days.

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Frequently asked questions

What is apron feeder inspection with Vision AI?

Apron feeder inspection with Vision AI uses cameras along the feeder, under the hopper, and at the tail with a trained computer vision model (opens in a new tab) to inspect pans, bolts, chain, rollers, and skirts on every rotation, measure spillage, and tie every finding to a pan and position. It works with conveyor idler monitoring and foreign material detection at the crusher across computer vision in mining.

Why inspect apron feeders continuously?

Apron feeders are usually not redundant, so a failure stops production. Reliability studies trace failures to cracked master links, loose bolts that catch and break the chain, chain stretch, and spillage that wears out tail rollers and sprockets.

Does it work alongside pan wear sensors and shutdown inspections?

Yes. Wear sensors measure pan thickness, and shutdown inspections check bolt torque and chain stretch. Cameras add a visual check of every pan and bolt on every rotation while the feeder runs, with an image for every finding, so shutdown time goes to the pans and links that need it.

Roboflow serves as the inspection engine, and your maintenance and reliability teams own the inspection criteria, alarm limits, and repair decisions.

Can it integrate with our plant controls and maintenance systems?

Yes. Roboflow writes findings and alarms to a PLC tag over OPC UA, Modbus TCP, or MQTT, so the feeder can be slowed or stopped on a critical fault, and sends results and images over REST (opens in a new tab) or to a database for SCADA platforms such as Ignition and AVEVA, and to maintenance systems as work orders.

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