IM 2021 February 21 | Page 51

CONVEYOR TECHNOLOGY
Fenner Dunlop last year placed an order with Siempelkamp for a new steel cord conveyor belt press line including a multi-cylinder press for its location in Kwinana
maximum number of steel cord let offs to provide a higher flexibility and a quick changeover with respect to the production settings .”
This design effectively eliminates several hours of downtime for loading and unloading of the creel and dramatically increases the number of usable production hours of the whole production line , according to Siempelkamp .
Steffen Aumüller , Sales Manager at Siempelkamp , said : “ With this order , we are pleased to continue a successful co-operation in a special application and to support Fenner Dunlop Australia , member of the Michelin group , with our technology .”
COREAL conveyor inspection innovation in Chile
Currently in Chile , conveyor belt maintenance , both in the port and mining areas , is traditionally carried out based on the results of visual inspections and corrective maintenance . However , new practices are emerging in the market that combine visual inspections with different non-destructive inspection technologies , based on thermography , ultrasound or vibration analysis , with the aim of reducing the limitations and subjectivity associated with traditional practices .
However , these techniques have important limitations . For example , solutions based on thermography , which study the temperature levels of machines in order to detect electromechanical problems , have as their main limitation their inability to diagnose the problems , since they only detect them once they are in highly advanced states .
On the other hand , there are solutions based on ultrasound , which are based on the analysis of highfrequency sound waves produced by the machines when they experience a problem . However , its use is limited to bearings and is not capable of either detecting the reason for the failure or providing a diagnosis .
Finally , there are solutions based on vibration analysis , which rely on the study of the vibratory signals emitted by rotating machinery , allowing certain signal processing methods to be applied to extract the information contained in these vibration registers . Its main limitation is the masking of the
signals , presenting low accuracy in detecting faults ( around 40-50 %).
Considering the limitations of the existing systems and the technologies presented in the state of the art , Coreal Desarrollos Tecnológicos SpA ( COREAL ) says it focused on developing its own solution which ,
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through the development of filters and advanced mathematical processing of data recorded in situ , would be capable of achieving precise diagnoses in early stages of all the key elements that compose a conveyor belt .
“ Through its methodology , taking as a starting point the requirements defined as a result of the analysis and research carried out , we decided to develop a global monitoring system for the different elements of the belt that would make it possible to carry out a diagnosis in a simple , automatic , wireless and real-time manner , while generating a predictive maintenance plan . Based on this approach , and after an exhaustive analysis of the state of the art , we determined that the best approach was to combine two different technologies : vibration analysis of the drive pulley , tail pulley and take up pulley ; and

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FEBRUARY 2021 | International Mining 47