Maxi-Lift to Present at VICTAM LatAm 2025

In port terminals and large-scale grain handling operations, high-capacity bucket elevators are a critical piece of infrastructure. Designed to move enormous volumes of product efficiently, these systems are often built with extra-wide belts and multiple rows of bucket, a setup that has become the industry standard.

But standard doesn’t always mean optimal.

As demand increases and facilities scale up, many operators are discovering that the typical high-capacity elevator design creates a new set of problems: difficulty feeding the elevator evenly, increased material and fabrication costs, and long lead times due to hard-to-source components. The very elements designed to boost capacity are introducing complexity and inefficiency where it’s least welcome.

This September at VICTAM LatAm 2025, Maxi-Lift will offer an alternative. In a technical seminar titled “Optimization in the Sizing of High-Capacity Bucket Elevators,” Rudson Moschini, Maxi-Lift’s global technical and applications engineer, will present a new design approach that helps solve the real-world issues faced by terminal operators, engineers, and material handling professionals.

The Challenges of Conventional Design

When systems are built for extreme capacity, it’s natural to assume they need to be wider, heavier, and bigger in every dimension. That’s why many engineers default to wide belts and multi-row bucket configurations—more width equals more throughput.

In practice, though, this approach creates a number of significant challenges:

• Feeding the elevator becomes more difficult. With wide belts, product flow must be carefully managed to avoid uneven loading. This means the elevator may not reach its rated capacity, especially if it was designed with small margins (which is the case most of the time). Uneven and premature wear of the buckets and elevator liners may occur, causing alignment problems in the elevator.
• Steel usage increases. To support wider belt widths and larger structures, manufacturers must use more steel, adding cost, weight, and complexity to the system.
• Component sourcing becomes a bottleneck. Extra-wide belts are not always readily available. When they are, they’re often expensive and come with long delivery times that delay projects and inflate budgets.

And there’s a final concern that’s especially important when conveying materials that generate combustible dust, such as grain, meal, or sugar. Wider elevators create larger air volumes inside the housing, which can amplify the force of an explosion in a dust ignition event. That makes mitigation more difficult and increases regulatory pressure on system design.

A Smarter Solution: The 12-Inch Projection Advantage

At VICTAM LatAm, Maxi-Lift will show how a more strategic approach to bucket selection can solve many of these issues. By using buckets with a 12-inch projection, engineers can achieve the same (or greater) throughput with a narrower elevator.

This design approach introduces several practical advantages:

• Simplified feeding: With a narrower belt, material entry into the bucket line is more consistent and easier to control, resulting in smoother operation and reduced wear.
• Reduced structural requirements: A narrower system footprint means less steel, fewer support components, and a shorter fabrication timeline.
• Better sourcing flexibility: Belts in more conventional widths are easier to procure, helping projects move forward faster and with fewer supply chain surprises.
• Improved explosion mitigation: With less internal air volume, the potential explosive force from a dust ignition is reduced—making the system inherently safer and easier to design for compliance.

It’s a design rethink that prioritizes performance, cost control, and safety without compromising throughput.

Join the Presentation at VICTAM LatAm 2025

If you’re attending VICTAM LatAm 2025, we invite you to hear more about this approach during Maxi-Lift’s technical seminar:

• Title: Optimization in the Sizing of High-Capacity Bucket Elevators
• Date: September 17, 2025
• Time: 15:15 – 15:45
• Location: Palco Victam LatAm, Expo Center Norte – Pavilhão Branco, São Paulo, Brazil

We’ll walk through real-world examples, design logic, and practical takeaways you can apply to your next elevator project—whether you're planning a new build or looking to optimize an existing system.

Visit Maxi-Lift at Booth 6033

Outside of the seminar, the Maxi-Lift team will also be exhibiting throughout the event at Booth 6033. Stop by to talk with our team, learn more about our product lines, and explore how Maxi-Lift buckets are helping grain processors and port facilities operate more efficiently and safely.

If you're dealing with the complexities of high-capacity handling or just want a better way to move material, this is a conversation worth having.

We’ll See You in São Paulo

At Maxi-Lift, we believe that sometimes the best innovations can come from rethinking things  how bucket selection shapes the entire elevator design.

We’re looking forward to sharing this insight with the industry at VICTAM LatAm 2025. Whether you're designing systems for speed, safety, or operational efficiency, our team is ready to help you rethink what’s possible.