Bucket conveyors are used to supply packaging machines. These are designed for vertical loft of free-flowing materials. It may be open or enclosed and can be used for powders; granules, or pallets to convey materials to storage bins or hoppers, these carriers discharge as they pass over a pulley at the top of a vertical shaft or incline. This makes it ideal to load the hoppers of mixers with preblend or blenders with such solids as may be encountered with ribbon blender or intensive nonfluxing mixer operations.
A bucket elevator is used only for lifting solids vertically or at a very steep angle. These are simple and dependable units for the vertical conveying of dry materials. These are an economical means of elevating bulk raw materials, typically straight up at 90 degrees before discharging the material at the head of the elevator.