The LABOTRIX CONVEY R8 educational conveyor line is a desktop belt conveyor with object detection means, intended for modelling automated production processes together with an educational robotic manipulator. The product reproduces a typical section of an automated line: objects travel along the belt, sensors detect their appearance and determine their colour, and the manipulator picks, sorts or transfers them. The line is used in computer science, technology and robotics lessons and in club and project work, for studying the fundamentals of automation, industrial control logic, flow assembly, sorting and logistics, and work with discrete sensors.
The conveyor carries a maximum payload of 500 g over an effective transport length of 600 mm, with a maximum belt speed of 120 mm/s and a maximum acceleration of 1100 mm/s². The belt speed changes smoothly and is set by the program, and the direction of travel is reversed by changing the sign of the set speed value, which allows the pace of the line to be matched to the work of one or several manipulators. The belt is driven by a stepper motor connected directly to the stepper motor interface of the manipulator controller: the conveyor has no power supply or control unit of its own and is powered through that port. The frame is made of aluminium and carries two shafts, a driving one and a driven one, and the belt tension is adjusted with the screws of the tensioning unit at the driven end of the frame using the hexagon key from the set. Two sensors are fixed on a common bracket at the end of the frame and connect to the universal ports of the manipulator: an infrared photoelectric sensor that gives a discrete signal on whether an object is present, and a colour sensor that recognises red, green and blue. Synchronisation with the manipulator follows the signal of the photoelectric sensor: the belt stops, the manipulator performs the pick at the recorded point, and the belt then resumes motion. The line is positioned relative to the manipulator by the demonstration positioning plate from the set, which fixes the mutual arrangement of the conveyor and the manipulator base and lets the same line geometry be reproduced in later lessons. The product works with educational manipulators with 4 degrees of freedom that have expansion ports for sensors and a stepper motor interface.
The conveyor is controlled from the single software environment of the manipulator with a Ukrainian interface, which supports graphical block programming and text scripts in Python, so the motion logic of the line and the actions of the manipulator are written in one program. A typical algorithm switches on the sensors and the motor, reads the signal of the photoelectric sensor in a loop, stops the motor once an object is detected, reads its colour, gives the manipulator the command to pick and transfer the object and then switches the motor on again. Every program includes the motor switch-off command both in its normal ending and in the emergency branches of the algorithm, otherwise the belt keeps running until the power of the manipulator is switched off.
The set includes the conveyor belt module with the stepper motor, a colour sensor with a mounting bracket, a photoelectric sensor, an infrared switch, with a mounting bracket, a set of tools for mounting and for adjusting the belt tension, comprising M4 and M5 hexagon keys, wooden cubes in three colours, red, green and blue, as learning objects for sorting — 40 pcs, a demonstration positioning plate, the access right to the online course with the language model assistant, the passport with the warranty card and individual transport packaging. The educational manipulator, the air pump with the end effector and the power supply unit are not part of the set and are supplied separately; the cables connecting the stepper motor and the sensors to the manipulator are supplied together with those units. The product arrives assembled and needs no assembly beyond mounting the sensor bracket and adjusting the belt tension before the first start.
The product is supplied with the access right to an online teaching support course of 70 academic hours hosted in a learning management system and compiled for the current curricula of general secondary education institutions of Ukraine. The materials are grouped into research modules in physics, biology, chemistry and STEM, and every topic contains a lesson plan, a list of the required equipment, a scenario of the experiment, a step-by-step laboratory work instruction with an explanation of the expected result, a video demonstration of the working techniques, and interactive exercises and tasks for independent work suitable for both individual and group study. All modules are compiled for this same equipment and tested on it, so the course follows a direct chain from the equipment through the teaching method to the learning outcomes. The kit includes an AI assistant built into the learning management system on retrieval-augmented generation. It selects research tasks and experiments matching the topic of the lesson, describes the procedure of the experiment step by step, identifies typical student errors and gives personalised recommendations for correcting them, adapts task difficulty to different levels of student preparation, supports students in compiling reports on research results and in structuring the conclusions drawn from experiments, and works on a localised knowledge base aligned with the national curriculum of Ukraine. The licence for the course and the software is valid for 12 months; content, interface and learning materials are in Ukrainian.
The main hazard of the conveyor is entrapment of fingers, hair, clothing or laces in the gap between the belt and the driving or driven shaft, so hands are kept away from the shafts while the belt is moving, the moving belt is never touched or held, long hair is tied back and scarves, ties, bracelets and chains are removed and wide sleeves fastened or rolled up before work. Any adjustment of the belt tension, the sensor position or the frame fastening is made only after the belt has fully stopped and the manipulator power has been switched off, and a jammed object is released only after the motor has been stopped by the program and the manipulator switched off. The conveyor and the sensors are powered from the manipulator through their connectors and are not connected to other power sources; all cables are connected and disconnected with the manipulator switched off, and the stepper motor cable goes to the stepper motor interface while the sensor cables go to the universal ports. The belt, the frame and the sensor bodies are wiped with a dry or slightly damp soft cloth and the optical windows with a dry optical wipe, while the belt and the shafts are never lubricated, because lubricant makes the belt slip. The product is intended for educational work in general secondary education institutions under the supervision of a teacher; the recommended age of students is from 10 years, that is grade 5 and above. Service life is 5 years and the warranty period is 12 months from the date of sale.
