It’s difficult to distinguish between apple damage and fruit axis and calyx in image processing. This results in poor efficiency and accuracy. An apple orientation mechanism is designed, and realized orientation of apple before image acquisition, thereby reducing image processing time. It mainly includes fruit pan, synchronous wheel, fixed caster and drive shaft. ADAMS was used to simulate the orientation process of apple, which verified the feasibility of the mechanism, and sure that the apple will not scratched in the orientation process. In order to improve the efficiency of apple sorting system, the optimal scheme was obtained by simulating the mechanism with different structure parameters.According to the simulation results of the optimal scheme, the beat of the system was 1.5 s.