By belt tracking do you mean belt training or belt alignment or do you mean belt condition monitoring?

Joe Dos Santos ■

Udayas1978

Since I am not a big believer in the belt training systems please take my comments for what they are worth and compare them to the advice that others may offer. Indeed, a friend and customer of mine, whenever I include training idlers in my proposals to him, always asks if I will include a wire with each of these training idlers (meaning a wire to tie them off after the belt is properly trained).

The belt must be properly trained running empty then the material load must be centered on the belt. We always include load training adjustment flaps at our receiving skirts.

Belt training must be by gentle urging by steering the roll or rolls that support the running belt. Training should never be by fixed edge rolls that confront the belt edges on end, nor by edge stretch. Crown pulleys are great if lagged for traction but they should always be square with the belt line.

Having said that I do like to use one or two training returns (or more depending on the belt length). During the training process, at start-up, these serve as hard reference points where to start the training based on where he belt is moving downstream of the trainer.

Regarding the training systems suppliers, each idler manufacture offers there own training idlers. I certainly would get my training idlers from my idler supplier. One particular supplier, MELCO, offers two training idler variations; the traditional, with vertical edge rolls, that the off-center belt urges to pivot about a vertical center pin, thus steering the belt back to center. A second variation uses a center pin that is not vertical and causes the training idler to simultaneously rotate and twist, to urge the belt back to center.

On the specialty side there is the more pricey tru-trainer by ASSG0, heavy, lagged and crowned roll on a center pivot that is forward tilting.

I hope this is helpful.

Joe dos Santos ■

Mr. Lyle Brown,

Thanks for the links.

From your Melco link I could not find sub links to the training idlers. This link may help.

http://www.melco-usa.com/Idler%20Typ...er%20Types.htm

This presents a list of the various type idlers which are links to images of them. At the lower part of the list there are 6 lines of the various types of “Belt Tamer” Training idlers, followed by 2 lines of the traditional training idlers with side guide rolls. This does not reveal the details of the special "belt tamer".

Your link to ASGCO is excellent and depicts that system very well.

Joe Dos Santos ■

I believe that belt training and belt tracking are just two different ways of saying the same thing.

The different designs are somewhat different. They all work on the principle of steering the idler and gently urging the belt back to center.

In the traditional design the edge roll, on the side to which the belt is wondering off center, is engaged by the edge of the belt causing it to move outward, rotating the idller about a center pin, steering the belt back to center.

In case of the Melco Belt Tamer, the center pin is not vertical and the off center weight of the belt is what causes the rotation to affect steering. There are no edge rolls.

In case of the ASGCO Tru-Trainer, the lagged roll is slightly conical at the ends so that when the off-center belt engages the end, the belt to roll friction increases, on the side engaged, causing the roll to steer the belt back to center. The center pin is also slightly forward tilting.

I would urge you to contact the respective suppliers for a more authoritative explanation of their respective systems.

Joe Dos Santos ■

Dear Sir,

one of the best belt trackers that I have had to try and use has been the tru-trac unit which has units for both carry side and return side sets.

further information can be obtained for www.tru-trac.com ■

This appears to be the same as the ASGCO system. Is it a licensee of ASGCO?

Joe Dos Santos ■

The Tru-Trac is the original manufacturer/designer as well as the patent holder and ASGCO are an agent for Tru-Trac. ■

Thank you. It is nice to know so we can give inventive credit where credit is due.

Joe Dos Santos ■

For what it is worth..

I never use belt training devices.

To me its the same as putting a counterweight on your steering wheel if your tyres are out of alignment.

I prefer to align everything and do the job properly.

Regards

LSL Tekpro ■

Graham,

That is a great analogy. I'll have to remeber that.

Joe Dos Santos ■

Thanks for your kind words Joe..

(I do have more analogies, but most involve Meg Ryan, and some are a bit near the mark!)

Cheers

LSL Tekpro ■

Mr. Beckley,

I especially like your points about material training (centering) on the belt. Indeed, our systems include adjustable, material centering flaps at the skirts. There are other designs that target centering the material including:

- floating loading skirts that move laterally with the mis-tracking belt, keeping the load on center

- loading chutes with tapered backs

- field modifications, at start-up, to ensure that the load is centered

- etc

Some of these approaches are more elaborate than others, some maybe too tricky but the focus is the same, getting the material centered.

Joe Dos Santos ■

Hi there..

I have a low head transfer doing 3100t/h, and was worried that I would suffer from side loading and the de-tracking David mentioned. So.. what I did was to have a four part, highly adjustable dead box, at the top. This split the flow into four adjustable streams which flowed through the chute. One stream loaded the belt from the left side, one from the back-left, one from the back-right and the other from the right side of the belt.

I tuned the chute to load centally (on average) at the normal running capacity, and it works very well.

If however the feed rate is less than about half, the feed is a bit off centre. This does not matter however, as at half load, there is no spillage either.

Cheers

LSL Tekpro ■

Graham,

Does the four part chute expose more liner surfaces to costly metal attrition/wear? ■

Nope...

I use dead boxes extensively, as long as the material is reasonabley consistent, and not sticky like power station ash, or stuff with wet clay in it.

Cheers Larry

LSL Tekpro ■

Hi Dave..

Actually the purpose of the four part adjustable upper dead box is to eliminate the lateral bias that you mention. It works very well.

As for the hood and spoon type chute arrangement, I find the belt scapings are difficult to accommodate.

I also have seen too many spoon type chutes wear out too quickly.

Long live dead boxes..

Regards to you

LSL Tekpro ■

An adjustable trim plate does not have to be a plate. you can add a lower lip or a shelf that will make it a trim rock box for the trajectory. This preserves all the adjusting features of the trim plate but eliminates the wear.

Similarly, I mentioned adjustable baffles at skirts. On occasion of very high wear materials I have lipped these as well to make them rock shelves.

Joe Dos Santos ■

Dear Sir,

A Japaneese company has developed motorised tracker roller which is very effetive.

Regards.

A.Banerjee ■

There is nothing on God's Earth, that would entice me to put a motorised Japanese tracking device, on any of my conveyors.

Regards

LSL Tekpro ■

A motorized belt tracking system strikes me as a very expensive way of treating the symptoms rather than solving the problem.

Joe Dos Santos ■

Dear Sir,

It is not so costly. We are going to introduce the same in TATA STEEL project in INDIA.

Or

Can you please highlight any demarites of motorised belt tracker so that I can write to TATA STEEL .

Regards.

A.Banerjee ■

Dear Mr. David,

We also use garner plate at loading zone to direct the material at the center of belt. Do you have any sketch?Can I have that one?

Regards.

A. Banerjee ■

Mr. Banergee,

As I stated from the outset I am not a big believer in belt training devices. If a belt is properly trained on center and the load is then centered no training devices should be needed.

With that aside there are indeed various training devices each with their respective advantages. Most work automatically, mechanically without any outside power source. In the past there have been training systems that consisted of a group (cluster) of training idlers, connected to steer the belt in unison. There have even been motorized versions of these idler groups. These have not endured in bulk handling conveyors. I understand that motorized training systems are used very successfully in the paper industry, steering the paper as it moves at high speed towards the rolling spindle.

Not knowing more about your system the only demerit that I can think of is its dependence on a power source. On the other hand a motorized system may give you more control for more taining affect.

Joe Dos Santos ■

We are the manufacturers of the SureGuide Belt tracking rollers and frames.

Belt tracking is our core business and we have been solving belt misalignment issues since 1992.

We have agents around the world and ask that you please visit our web site

href="http://www.sureguide.co.za" target="blank">www.sureguide.co.za to see what we can offer.

Please feel free to email me your requirements as well as a brief description of where your belt misalignment is occuring. I will offer a you a quotation and the ideal installation points to install the products.

Look forward to hearing from you

Kind regards

Mark Hupertz

Attachments

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Dear Mr Banerjee..

The point is, that you have introduced another item into the equation, therefore making the system more complicated.

If it ain't there, you don't have to buy it or maintain it, and it can't go wrong.

Always first fix the cause and not the effect, i.e. like what Joe said.

Cheers

LSL Tekpro ■

I must agree with Mr Spriggs in that the cause should be addressed first.

Many systems have belt misalignment issues that can be solved or improved by correcting certain points.

However we also know that one sometimes does not have the resources (time, money) to correct these issues in time, without running the risk of loosing a belt, suffering structural damage and loss of material through spillage.

There are also factors beyond human control that will affect belt tracking.

Ultimately the question comes down to whether or not you are willing to run the risk of loosing a belt, having spillage, and loosing production time by not installing a few products that will prevent and minimise these damages and at a fraction of the cost. ■

Hi ALL,

It is great to see I am not the only person battling the establishment with regards to belt trainers/trackers. I agree with everyone that mentioned that if the conveyor is correctly installed and maintained in reasonable condition, the use of ancilliary self trainers/trackers is never required. Fix the cause issue, not the resultant issues. I have a client who is using chain blocks to train the belt and they have to change the tension on one side during the day due to changing atmospheric moisture conditions. The explanation to one of the number of engineers who listened to my ideas and solutions (Line Level & Grade of the conveyor) said that there were not enough of us out there to enlighten 'incorrectly informed engineers' like him. He said that his collegues had huge egoes and would not accept that someone looked at the issues from a different set of eyes and could provide a simpler solution to the multiple 'Bandaids' they had been applying.

On another product, please correct me if I am wrong, but Mark Hupertz (waloni)'s SureGuide, appears to be the same as the patented Tru-Trac style product. ■

Tecmate,

I agree, it does look like the Tru-Trac. At the end of page 1 of this thread Mr. Duro indicated that they were the originators of the Tru-Trac. Mr. Duro may be able to advise if this is the Tru-Trac licensed to Waloni.

Joe Dos santos ■

Hi Joe,

Duro is a mate of mine and works for the Asutralian Distributor for Tru-Trac which is in the southern state of Australia.

On another subject, I would like to advise to all that I also have an idler assembly which I have patented around the world and we are in the process of getting our product onto the market proper. Please see http://www.idlertech.com.au for more information. This product will also have built-in self aligning properties in future models without extra costs, but that is further development being addressed at the present. ■

Hi there tecmate..

I have a solution with your web page (there is no such thing as a problem we are told...)

It gobbled up my personal information and then stopped, asking me to click on "continue" which, due to my sheltered existance, I could not find.

Where did I go wrong?

Cheers

LSL Tekpro ■

Hi Graham,

I have been informed that the site is still under going some refinements so please try again tomorrow. Please be patient as I am not in charge of the site development but I will attempt to have it rectified urgently. http://www.idlertech.com.au ■

Thanks tecmate...got into the video of your de-mountable idler. Looks nice.

(I hope it works as well on a conveyor as it does on the back of a bakkie...(space?))

Anyway, what is the principle that you will use to make it self-aligning?

Cheers

LSL Tekpro ■

Tecmate,

I watched the video, pretty nice. Surely there is a cost premium, and careful design to leave ample free space below the idlers.

Joe Dos Santos ■

Hi Joe and ALL,

There is a capital cost premium. From the retrofitted installed models in the return only belt strands in a ramp section, it has been found stopping the belt using local stop of the conveyor, that the minimum downtime savings in dollar sense has resulted in savings covering the total premium capital costs for the whole conveyor retrofit-ment in trough and returns in less than one week on the ramp section of the conveyor. The capital costs also included the removal and replacement of the old idler sets with the new idler assemblies.

The assembly also reduced the prior hazard reduction engineering, that had been undertaken design wise, for that ramp conveyor from $M3.5 - 4 to this product at <$400,000 and the mine did not have to shut down for 3 to 4 months whilst the hazard engineering fabrication was undertaken and installed. The original design would have had most of the hazards and required manpower requirements still inherent in the maintenance. My design has eliminated, I believe, almost all the conveyor idler roll maintenance hazards and which can be completed by a semi-skilled person.

The cost premium with the new Standards that are being sort in Australia which include severe guarding, will far out weigh the simplicity of this design, installation & maintenance cost. These Standards that have been advanced have all the hallmarks of creating new hazards by their very nature.

This could be another Blog-Thread whereby a World Standard for conveyors could be created by we in the industry worldwide. What do you think? ■

Tecmate..

On a %age basis, roughly how much more expensive are these demountable idler sets than normal fixed ones?

Are garland idlers with drop-down facility significantly cheaper?

Cheers

LSL Tekpro ■

Hi Graham,

The price varies x 2 to x 2.5 times, depending, as the inbuilt design caters as equivalent to impact station suitability. In some locations it would actually be almost a comparable price to the existing idler sets. There is a model that will act as a catenary but will be more expensive than a standard catenary but would be only a fraction of the handling masses of each individual roll for a person to handle.

As for if it works, one two man (they in a buddy system) mine crew, without training, was able to change out (24 rolls) 8 complete 3 roll assemblies and replace the rolls in 53 minutes on a 2000mm conveyor. This was pretty impressive. ■

Thanks for that..

I actually see a perfect application being the loading station where you can't normally lift the belt to get the rolls out.

Cheers

LSL Tekpro ■

Dear Mr. Tecmate,

Even properly alined, central loading in conveyor & with gerner plate, conveyor is out of its centre line. So some client prefers zero spillage plant, then you have to use some device to reduce the same. I have seen in many places.

Regards.

A.Banerjee ■

Hello,

I know it is a little late but I just saw your questions regarding trackers for your belts.

I can recommend Techno-Track products. The products are for belts between 500mm to 6000mm. AS Techno-Track has probably the widest selection of belt trackers available. There is trackers for upper, lower and reversible belts

Techno-Trackers are delivered worldwide at all kind of conveyors.

AS Techno-Track are specialized in Belt-Trackers and Belt-Scrapers.

Contact at;

www.technotrack.no

e-mail to post@technotrack.no

Harry Holtar ■

Originally Posted by udayas1978

We are looking for conveyor belt tracking system of belt width 1400/1800 and 2000 mm trough angle 35 degrees.There are too many players in the market, do suggest the reliable one.

I produce a new type of ROLLERS made out of FULL-PLASTIC (no tubes!) So I can give them a double, ore twice-conic form.

This is a new and low-cost feature of my patented rollers/idlers.

I can do this on the upper brakets and also with the return-rollers.

The odinary rollers I produce have the diameter 89 up to 100 (bearing 6204 etc.)

The biggest rollers have the Diameter 200 up to 250 mm (bearing 6310)

If you give me your quantity/measures of the rollers I give you a quotation.

If you send me your MAIL I give you more information of this inovativ rollers.

Best reagards

BLAHA, Peter Rosenstr.5 D-85609 Aschheim

FAX 0049 89 9039200

For more information, please visit:

https://edir.bulk-online.com/oldedirredirect/204146.htm

http://www.google.com/search?client=...UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 ■