I do not believe you will receive a reply from the major belt suppliers for two reasons:

1. The process involves Intellectural property issues on: a) what, b) how and c) their validation procedures

2. Often they do not know enough to give proper answers since they do not have the proper testing equipment to establish what and how.

The specifications have evolved based on experience by some and they do not want others to have the details of their long and costly evolution.

Without tools to do properly measure and equate/validate those measurements to pipe conveyor behavior the result is a guessing game. It is also costlier and complex to get it right.

Read the patents and see some of the features that are protected and that have evolved.

You must develop the tools yourself or know from others what to specify when attempting to control a bid process. ■

In addition:

1. Pipe conveyors can have different critieria such as curvatures, temperatures, lump size,

2. Rubber and fabric relax over time that may cause the pipe shape to collapse. Some suppliers have developed methods to control shape with different techniques. The secret is how to apply the technique with know success.

3. Pipe conveyors will have different performance standards depending on the evironment. The environment, such as temperature may alter the design features such as civil works. Temperatures vary from extreme cold to quite hot. Different rubbers and tensile members need to be specified to meet these variations.

4. Power and belt tension vary according to the rubber formulation and fabric construction used. Some pipe conveyor belt suppliers will tell you that you do not need to specify the rubber. Rubbish. They say that today. They will not say that tomorrow.

I recently asked a major pipe conveyor engineer on how do you orient the seam. He had a 50:50 chance to get it right. He did not. So the question is how should the seam be oriented? A simple question that does require some thought. The question becomes more complex with conveyors with many curves.

What is the consequence of miss applying the seam? There was a very interesting advertisement, published about 6 months back, from a major pipe conveyor supplier. It had the seam installed in a way that lead to rain entering the pipe inner surface which pollutes the product. I tried to go back and fetch it for illustration. It is now gone.

There are many points to consider when designing the pipe, its route, and its construction. I do not see any easy answer to your question. ■

You can read more on pipe conveyor construction from the below patent summary.

http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20100018841 ■

Hi,

In the absence of any real input from vendors we have developed a basic test trig to allow the performance of a belt sample to be analized.

The work we have done allows us to to have a degree of confidence and therefore comfort that the selected belt will perform to our requirements.

The problem with this test rig is that it requires a 12m long full width belt sample and it is not a dynamic test.

However the test results are then able to be verified in the field after installation.

Thanks ■