Municipal Waste Sorting Equipment worked example

Pick Line Labor at 14% fatigue, rotation, and break allowance: a worked example

This worked example runs the pick line labor numbers for a tougher week than the baseline: 14% fatigue, rotation, and break allowance instead of the typical 20%. Estimate the manual pick time needed to clean a target stream at the sort cabin given a measured picks-per-minute rate.

The inputs for this scenario

  • Manual picks required at the sort cabin: 9,000 picks (held at the documented default)
  • Picks per minute per sorter: 30 picks / min (held at the documented default)
  • Fatigue, rotation, and break allowance: 14 % (the input this scenario stresses; the baseline uses 20)

Working through the calculation

  • The calculation starts from the formula this tool documents: Base pick time = picks required / picks per minute per sorter.
  • Required pick line labor time works out to 342 min at these inputs, and this is the headline figure for the scenario.
  • Base pick line labor time works out to 300 min at these inputs.
  • Fatigue and rotation allowance applied works out to 14 % at these inputs.
  • Picks per minute per sorter works out to 30 pieces / min at these inputs.

How this compares with the baseline

  • Against the tool's baseline example, where fatigue, rotation, and break allowance sits at 20% and the headline result is 360 min, this scenario comes in 5% below the baseline at 342 min.
  • Use it when staffing a sort cabin for a shift or estimating labor for a given inbound volume and contamination level. A result at this level usually justifies acting on the stressed input before touching anything else, because every other figure in the table is downstream of it.

Results at a glance

  • Required pick line labor time: 342 min (headline result)
  • Base pick line labor time: 300 min
  • Fatigue and rotation allowance applied: 14 %
  • Picks per minute per sorter: 30 pieces / min

Run it with your numbers

  • To rerun this with your own numbers, open the live Pick Line Labor calculator, set fatigue, rotation, and break allowance to your actual value, and adjust the remaining inputs to match your operation.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.