Dynamic behaviour of a conveyor belt considering non-uniform bulk material distribution for speed control

Abstract

For the conveyor belt, variable material flow influences the energy efficiency of the speed control technology significantly. The fluctuation of material flow on the conveyor belt will lead to the detrimental vibrations on both the belt and the conveyor while the conveyor works at certain speeds. In order to improve the model inaccuracy caused by the uniform bulk material flow assumption in the current conveyor belt model, the paper establishes a high-precision dynamic model that can consider speed control of a conveyor belt under non-uniform bulk material transportation. In this dynamic model, a non-uniform bulk material distribution model is firstly proposed based on laser scanning technology. Then, a high-precision longitudinal dynamic model is proposed to investigate the dynamic behavior of a belt conveyor. Considering the micro-units of actual load on a conveyor belt, it can well describe the transient state of the conveyor belt. These models can be used to determine the optimal speed for safety and energy conservation in operation. Experimental results are used to validate the proposed dynamic model for analyzing belt mechanical behavior under non-uniform bulk material distribution on the belt. The results show that the proposed models can be used for optimizing the operating procedures of belt conveyor systems.