Higher production requirements in all areas of bulk material handling require efficiency improvements in the safest and most efficient way at the lowest operating cost. As conveyor systems become wider, faster and longer, more power and more controlled throughput will be required. Combined with increasingly stringent regulatory requirements, cost-conscious business leaders must carefully consider which new equipment and design options meet their long-term goals for the best return on investment (ROI).
Security may well become a new source of cost reduction. Over the next 30 years, the proportion of mines and processing plants with a high safety culture is likely to increase to the point where they will become the norm rather than the exception. In most cases, operators can quickly detect unexpected problems with existing equipment and workplace safety with only minor belt speed adjustments. These problems typically show up as large leaks, increased dust emissions, belt shifting, and more frequent equipment wear/failures.
Large volumes on the conveyor belt create more spills and volatile materials around the system that can be tripped over. According to the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), slips, trips and falls are responsible for 15 percent of all workplace deaths and 25 percent of all workplace injury claims. [1] In addition, higher belt speeds make pinch and drop points on conveyors more dangerous, as reaction times are greatly reduced when a worker’s clothing, tools, or limbs are poked by accidental contact. [2]
The faster the conveyor belt moves, the faster it deviates from its path and the harder it is for the conveyor tracking system to compensate for this, resulting in leakage along the entire conveyor path. Due to shifting of the load, jammed idlers, or other causes, the belt can quickly come into contact with the main frame, tearing the edges and potentially causing a friction fire. In addition to the implications for workplace safety, conveyor belts can spread fire throughout a facility at extremely high speeds.
Another workplace hazard — and one that is increasingly regulated — is dust emissions. Increased load volume means more weight at higher belt speeds, which causes more vibration in the system and degrades air quality with dust. In addition, cleaning blades tend to become less effective as volume increases, resulting in more fugitive emissions on the return path of the conveyor. Abrasive particles can contaminate rolling parts and cause them to seize, increasing the chance of friction ignition and increasing maintenance costs and downtime. In addition, lower air quality can lead to inspector fines and forced shutdowns.
As conveyor belts get longer and faster, modern tracking technologies become more important, able to detect small changes in the conveyor path and quickly compensate for weight, speed and drift forces before they overload the tracker. Mounted typically every 70 to 150 feet (21 to 50 meters) on the return and load sides—in front of the unloading pulley on the load side and the front pulley on the return side—the new up and down trackers use an innovative multi-hinge mechanism. Torque multiplier technology with sensor arm assembly detects small changes in belt path and instantly adjusts one flat rubber idler pulley to re-align the belt.
To reduce costs per tonne of material transported, many industries are moving to wider and faster conveyors. The traditional slot design is likely to remain standard. But with the move to wider, higher speed conveyor belts, bulk material handlers will require significant upgrades to more robust components such as idlers, wheel chocks and chutes.
The main problem with most standard gutter designs is that they are not designed to meet growing production needs. Unloading bulk material from the transfer chute onto a fast moving conveyor belt can change the flow of material in the chute, cause off-center loading, increase fugitive material leakage and dust release after exiting the settling zone.
The latest trough designs help concentrate material on the belt in a well-sealed environment, maximizing throughput, limiting leakage, reducing dust and minimizing common workplace injury hazards. Instead of dropping weights directly onto the belt with high impact force, the drop of weights is controlled to improve belt condition and prolong the life of the impact bases and rollers by limiting the force on the weights in the load area. Reduced turbulence makes it easier to impact the wear liner and skirt and reduces the chance of short material getting caught between the skirt and the belt, which can cause frictional damage and belt wear.
The modular quiet zone is longer and taller than previous designs, allowing time for the load to settle, providing more space and time for air to slow down, allowing dust to settle more thoroughly. Modular design easily adapts to future container modifications. The outer wear lining can be replaced from the outside of the chute, rather than requiring the hazardous entry into the chute as in previous designs. Chute covers with internal dust curtains control the airflow along the entire length of the chute, allowing dust to settle on the curtain and eventually fall back onto the belt in large clumps. The double skirt seal system features a primary seal and a secondary seal in a double-sided elastomer strip to help prevent spills and dust leaks from both sides of the chute.
Higher belt speeds also result in higher operating temperatures and increased wear on the cleaner blades. Larger loads approaching at high speed hit the main blades with more force, causing some structures to wear faster, more drift and more spillage and dust. To compensate for shorter equipment life, manufacturers can lower the cost of belt cleaners, but this is not an sustainable solution that does not eliminate the extra downtime associated with cleaner maintenance and occasional blade changes.
While some blade manufacturers struggle to keep up with changing production needs, the industry leader in conveyor solutions is changing the cleaning industry by offering blades made from specially formulated heavy-duty polyurethane that are ordered and cut on site to ensure the freshest and durable delivery. product. Using torsion, spring or pneumatic tensioners, primary cleaners do not affect the belts and joints, but still remove drift very effectively. For the toughest jobs, the primary cleaner uses a matrix of tungsten carbide blades set diagonally to create a three-dimensional curve around the main pulley. Field service has determined that the life of a polyurethane primary cleaner is typically 4 times the life without retensioning.
Using future belt cleaning technologies, automated systems extend blade life and belt health by eliminating blade-to-belt contact when the conveyor is idling. The pneumatic tensioner, connected to the compressed air system, is equipped with a sensor that detects when the belt is no longer loaded and automatically retracts the blades, minimizing unnecessary wear on the belt and cleaner. It also reduces the effort of constantly controlling and tensioning the blades for optimum performance. The result is consistently correct blade tension, reliable cleaning and longer blade life, all without operator intervention.
Systems designed to travel long distances at high speeds often only provide power to critical points such as the head pulley, ignoring the adequacy of automated “smart systems”, sensors, lights, attachments, or other equipment along the length of the conveyor. electricity. Auxiliary power can be complex and expensive, requiring oversized transformers, conduits, junction boxes and cables to compensate for the inevitable voltage drops over long periods of operation. Solar and wind power can be unreliable in some environments, especially in mines, so operators need alternative methods to generate electricity reliably.
By connecting a patented microgenerator to an idler pulley and harnessing the kinetic energy generated by a moving belt, it is now possible to overcome the availability barriers that come with powering auxiliary systems. These generators are designed as stand-alone power plants that can be retrofitted to existing idler support structures and used with virtually any steel roll.
The design uses a magnetic coupling to attach a “drive stop” to the end of an existing pulley that matches the outside diameter. The drive pawl, rotated by the movement of the belt, engages with the generator through machined drive lugs on the housing. Magnetic mounts ensure that electrical or mechanical overloads do not bring the roll to a standstill, instead the magnets are detached from the roll surface. By positioning the generator outside of the material path, the new innovative design avoids the damaging effects of heavy loads and bulk materials.
Automation is the way of the future, but as experienced service personnel retire and young workers entering the market face unique challenges, safety and maintenance skills become more complex and critical. While basic mechanical knowledge is still required, new service technicians also require more advanced technical knowledge. This division of work requirement will make it difficult to find people with multiple skills, encouraging operators to outsource some professional services and making maintenance contracts more common.
Conveyor monitoring related to safety and preventive maintenance will become increasingly reliable and widespread, allowing conveyors to operate autonomously and predict maintenance needs. Eventually, specialized autonomous agents (robots, drones, etc.) will take on some of the dangerous tasks, especially in underground mining, as the security ROI provides additional rationale.
Ultimately, the inexpensive and safe handling of large volumes of bulk materials will lead to the development of many new and more productive semi-automated bulk material handling stations. Vehicles previously transported by trucks, trains or barges, long distance overland conveyors that move materials from mines or quarries to warehouses or processing plants, may even affect the transport sector. These long-distance high-volume processing networks have already been established in some hard-to-reach places, but could soon become commonplace in many parts of the world.
[1] “Slips, Trips & Falls Identification and Prevention;” [1] “Slips, Trips & Falls Identification and Prevention;” [1] “Detection and prevention of slips, trips and falls”; [1] Slip, Trip, and Fall Recognition and Prevention, Occupational Safety and Health Administration, Sacramento, CA, 2007. https://www.osha.gov/dte/grant_materials/fy07/sh-16625-07/ slipstripsfalls.ppt
[2] Swindman, Todd, Marty, Andrew D., Marshall, Daniel: “Conveyor Safety Fundamentals”, Martin Engineering, Section 1, p. 14. Worzalla Publishing Company, Stevens Point, Wisconsin, 2016 https://www.martin-eng.com/content/product/690/security book
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