When shopping for a conveyor belt for your line, its essential that you gather as much information as possible. Whether youre considering the physical layout of your operation, the temperature of your products, the ease of the inspection process, or any number of other factors, carefully documenting exactly what you need starts with asking the right questions. As there are thousands even hundreds of thousands of possible configurations, it can be a real challenge to even know what questions you need to ask. Thankfully, when you work with an experienced team, like the team at Great Lakes Belting, you can count on them to walk you through the process. But, in case youre looking for a starting point, lets look at a handful of questions you should be asking.
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Color isnt just an aesthetic choice, it impacts your quality assurance and inspection processes. No matter how youve configured your line visual inspections, automatic cameras, or any number of other methods contrast is key. Our recommendation is to select a color that doesnt tend to occur in your products. For example, white is great for food processing and industrial applications. The resulting contrast will help you spot and address any leftover materials, residues, and so forth.
If you plan to move your products vertically, youre going to want a belt with cleats. Cleated belts grip your products better, allowing them to be carried safely upward or transported safely downward. Without cleats, your products could easily collect in problem areas, creating clogs that reduce your productivity and threaten your uptime.
Sometimes there just isnt an off-the-shelf solution that works. In those cases, youre going to want to work with a conveyor belt supplier that can customize your belt. With a wide range of custom fabrications available, Great Lakes Belting is the industrys go-to source for highly customized, highly specific belting products. No matter what you need, if you can envision it, we can deliver it.
At Great Lakes Belting, were passionate about offering the absolute largest selection of belting products on the market. Whether youre in material handling, paper converting, industrial automation, or food processing, you can count on us to help you locate exactly the products that you and your operation need. So, if youre considering switching, upgrading, or replacing your conveyor belts, reach out to us today to learn how we can help.
One of the most important factors to check when choosing a conveyor belt is its strength. To choose the right strength of tape, you need to know the load the tape will be subjected to. How many tons per hour (t/h), lifting height, length of conveyor, engine power and angle of inclination. Whether its a soft or abrupt start also matters. For particularly heavy loads, belt manufacturers can help with calculations.
You can quickly check how strong a conveyor belt is by looking at the product designation itself.
Example:
A tape could be labeled EP400/3 4+2, where letters and numbers describe different elements. Heres a brief explanation:
There are countless combinations of qualities, for example: 250/2, 315/3, 500/3, 630/4, /4, /5 etc. The number combinations give an overall indication of strength.
There are many different grades of conveyor belt, check how strong a conveyor belt is by looking at the product designation itself.The actual strength can be documented in the test certificate for each roll, which states how much force is required before the tape breaks. You may want to take a look at this to check the actual strength of the tape.
Another very important quality indicator that you may want to check is how much wear and tear the conveyor belt can withstand. It is often referred to as abrasion in the test specification, and describes how many cubic millimeters (mm3) are worn off in a fixed test cycle. (PS! This is tested in practice by using a machine in which they put a sample piece and sand it with certified abrasive media). Here, the quality indication is the opposite of wear resistance (n/mm). So a lower number and number of cubic millimeters worn off means a more wear-resistant belt.
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Its a good idea to check how much wear and tear the conveyor belt can withstand. Here is an example from where worn support rollers under a conveyor belt are being replaced by an industrial fitter.For example, the standard DIN norm for a Y-quality tape is 150 mm3. This means that the belts should have an abrasion or wear that is lower than this level. Note that there is a very large distance from the maximum abrasion in Y-quality, which is 150 mm3, down to the best belts within Y-standard, which are often between 110 and 120 mm3.
The diameter of the drive and turning drum must be considered before choosing a conveyor belt. With small diameter drums, you should not choose a conveyor belt that has too many layers of cloths. A thick conveyor belt with many layers should not be bent too hard. Then the different layers of rubber can be separated from each other. This happens if you have too small a drum diameter.
The diameter of both the drive drum and the turning drum is crucial for the belt quality in terms of strength.Example:
If you need to haul a lot of mass on a steep uphill slope, you need a strong conveyor belt. Such a tape will have several layers of fabric, perhaps up to 4 layers of rubber. Then it has great thickness. If you then have a small drum, the four layers start to separate and the strength disappears.
We have examples of trials with special tapes and specially adapted constructions of tapes that have multiplied their lifespan. In situations where the load is high, there are alternatives with extra good rubber that should be used.
In special cases, it often needs to be tested and calculated in order to order correctly. Most suppliers can help you with that.If you have a belt that is directly under a large crusher, where there is a fall of heavy stones or you have a conveyor of several hundred meters, you may want to consider an alternative and choose a belt with stronger rubber, multiple layers and thick cores.
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In such cases, you can check the tensile strenght of the tape in the inspection certificate. This will give you a good indication of what the tape can withstand in terms of shocks and heavy loads.
Conveyor belts with quality rubber from European manufacturers have significantly stricter quality requirements than the standard DIN norm. Well-known brands have modern factories and established production routines. This ensures that the quality is consistent every time a conveyor belt rolls out of the factory. In addition, they test the wear factor and strength of their conveyor belts. Some also provide a test certificate to guarantee that what you get is of the quality they promise.
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAWhen ordering, you may often only specify the desired quality, width and thickness of the tape.
You may want to provide additional details about, among other things:
If you ask the questions and check the various points above when buying conveyor belts, you will be in a better position to buy the right belt for your application. When it comes to purchasing conveyor belts, it may not be the purchase price that matters most. The most important thing is that you make a thorough assessment of your characteristics and needs. Choosing the right tape for your needs will have a positive impact on production and you will achieve the best possible durability per ton produced in the long term.
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