Breaks in the so-called “continuous” (unspliced) belt sections, and not in the spliced areas, are infrequent but do happen in practice. This article presents some aspects, which may account for such breaks in conveyor belts. It indicates the so-called “sensitive points” in design, especially in the transition section of the conveyor belt and in identifying the actual strength of the belt. The presented results include the influence of the width of a belt specimen on the identified belt tensile strength. An increase in the specimen width entails a decrease in the belt strength. The research involved develops a universal theoretical model of the belt on a transition section of a troughed conveyor in which, in the case of steel-cord belts, the belt is composed of cords and layers of rubber, and in the case of a textile belt, of narrow strips. The article also describes geometrical forces in the transition section of the belt and an illustrative analysis of loads acting on the belt. Attention was also devoted to the influence of the belt type on the non-uniform character of loads in the transition section of the conveyor. A replacement of a conveyor belt with a belt having different elastic properties may increase the non-uniformity of belt loads in the transition section of the conveyor, even by 100%.

As steel cord conveyor belts are vulcanized during the production process, rubber penetrates into steel cords. It is a positive and a desired phenomenon allowing the belt to reach its required properties and ensuring its reliable and long operation on the belt conveyor. Advantageously, the rubber...

In conveyor belt drive pulleys and intermediate belt drives, the power transferred from the drive system to the belt increases together with the increasing friction coefficient between the belt surface and the pulley surface, or between the surface of the main (carrying) belt and the surface of the intermediate (drive) belt. Belt conveyors used in the mining industry are typically exposed to dust and moisture. This paper presents the method and results of laboratory tests on the friction coefficient between a conveyor belt and rubber plates with grooved and flat surfaces. The tests were performed for different mine-typical contamination conditions of these surfaces. The results demonstrate that in the case of dry friction (regardless of the presence of dust), the grooving of the surface does not significantly affect the friction coefficient of the rubber–rubber friction pair. However, grooving has a significantly positive impact in the case of wet friction. In cases where the surface is grooved in a “diamond” pattern, the measured friction coefficient values are similar for both wet and dry surfaces. The lowest friction coefficient values were obtained for surfaces contaminated with solid rock dust.

Belt conveyors are main part of transporting systems in mines and in many other branches of industry. During conveyor belt works different types of resistances are generated. Indentation rolling resistance is the most significant component of the resistances from the perspective of energy losses and it cause the biggest costs as well. According to latest state of analyses and measurements it is well known that theoretical rolling resistance were underestimated in comparison with the measured in-situ one. In this paper new method for determination indentation rolling resistance is presented. The authors compared theoretically and experimentally established damping factors. The relation between these two values enabled to obtain more precise equation for damping function. This function is one of the most important component in calculation of the rolling resistance. In new theoretical model value of rolling resistance is nearly twice higher than this used so far.