Description
Belt conveyors are the most reliable, and most gentle way to handle your grain – there is a reason that belt conveyors are used in most high capacity, high usage applications – where hundreds of thousands of tons a year are moved – they are easy to handle, easy to maintain, and have minimal wear – even with highly abrasive materials, and over long distances. The power consumption is also just about the lowest for all conveyors – when calculated at KWH used per ton moved per meter.
Belts are also the most gentle way to handle grain – with nearly no handling breakage to speak of – compared to augers (up to 3% breakage per handling) and chain and loop conveyors (around 0.5-1% breakage per handling)
The disadvantages of belt conveyors are that they aren’t suitable for handling grain at steep inclines, and that they are the most expensive type of conveyors at the point of initial investment.
The principle of a belt conveyor is that the grain is discharged onto the belt that runs ontop of rollers that have bearings – the belt is driven by a drive pulley, which pulls the belt in the direction of travel – and at the other end a lagging pulley is fitted – that is adjustable to adjust the tension of the belt. The belt is formed according to the placement and the angles of the rollers on the conveyor, as the belt lies ontop of the rollers. Typically the rollers would be placed in a V configuration – to create a concave shape in the belt, where the grain can then safely be transported.
At the discharge points – there are three options.
– The conveyor can discharge at the (usually) drive end of the conveyor – where the grain is simply discharged from the conveyor by passing over the pulley section of the conveyor, and falling off
– The second option is to have an intermediate discharge on the conveyor – where a trolley or cart is placed which lifts the belt and discharges the grain to the side (also known as a grain cart)
– The third option is for have scrapers on the belt (usually used with flat shaped belts) where a scraper is lowered onto the belt at an angle, which then scrapes the grain to the side into a discharge port – as the belt passes beneath the scraper.
Capacities of belt conveyors can also easily be controlled via VFD’s and speed controls on the motors – as the conveyor doesn’t rely on any other forces than the movement of the belt to convey the grain – and typical conveyors can have their belt speeds varied between 0.5m per second up to 3.5m per second belt travel.
Basic capacities and specifications:
Capacity @1.5m/s Width Height
85TPH 610mm 533mm
160TPH 760mm 533mm
45TPH 890mm 685mm
340TPH 1050mm 685mm
500TPH 1190mm 685mm
Typical belt conveyor power consumption requirements can be calculated at approximately 0.003KWH per ton per meter conveyed.
All capacities above are based on 0º incline / horizontal operation
