Van den Bos Flowerbulbs in Naaldwijk has been operating a new sorting machine for freesia bulbs for a year now. The GearVision was designed and manufactured by Gearbox, a company based in Westland. The major advantage of this sorting method is that it results in much more uniform freesia cultivation in pots or flower cultivation.
Van den Bos Flowerbulbs contacted Gearbox in 2018. Van den Bos anticipated a knowledge gap in the sorting and packaging of freesia bulbs because one of their permanent employees was approaching retirement. Daan Vermeer of Van den Bos Freesia B.V. presented Gearbox with the challenge of safeguarding quality knowledge, and in the same year, a Proof of Concept was already running in the halls at Van den Bos. Since then, the machine has been extensively refined, algorithms have been trained, and the machine has been further developed. "It was a long process, but I am really proud of what we have achieved," says Vermeer. On Freesia Product Day on 22 November, he presented GearVision to around forty Dutch growers.
The tubers prepared by Van den Bos are fed into the machine via a conveyor belt. Using multiple camera techniques, GearVision then determines the weight and quality of each potato tuber. Advanced camera technology also scans the inside of the tuber in 0.8 seconds. "Things like fusarium, petrified tubers, tubers with sprouts that are too long and snotty tubers are removed." The tubers are then transported via three conveyor belts and with air support to the correct exit, where they end up in a crate. When the tubers are exported, they are immediately placed in bags. The batches that Van den Bos runs through the machine consist of at least a thousand tubers. The machine's capacity is approximately 17,000 tubers per hour. Vermeer assumes 180,000 tubers per day. According to Gearbox, the capacity can be increased even further.
