Manufacturing
Belt conveyor and gearmotor
A belt is a long machine with a lot of small bearings. The drive power tells you how they are doing.
The motor power needed for a conveyor can be worked out from the belt, the load and the lift. When the real number goes above it, something along the line is dragging.
800 tph, 2.5 m/s, 590 ft belt, 75 kW gearmotor
- Power, loaded
- 51.6 kW
- Power, empty
- 9.5 kW
- Belt loading
- 89 kg/m
- Output speed
- 74.2 rpm
Anatomy and nameplate
- 1Motor current and power. Drive load against the calculated load.
- 2Gearbox vibration. Mesh and bearing condition.
- 3Gearbox oil temperature. Friction and oil health.
- 4Idler roller temperature. Infrared scan for seizing rollers.
- 5Belt speed. Slip and stretch.
- 6Belt scale. Tons per hour that the power is compared with.
- 7Pulley bearing vibration. Tail and head pulley condition.
- 8Belt alignment switch. Tracking.
| Belt | |
|---|---|
| Belt width | 48 in (1,200 mm) |
| Length / lift | 590 ft (180 m) / 39 ft (12 m) |
| Belt speed | 2.5 m/s (492 fpm) |
| Capacity | 800 tph |
| Belt loading | 89 kg/m |
| Idlers | 35° trough carry, 4 ft spacing |
| Idler friction factor | 0.020 |
| Drive | |
| Motor | 75 kW, 1,780 rpm, 460 V |
| Gearbox | Two-stage helical, 24:1 |
| Stage 1 teeth | 21 / 76 |
| Stage 2 teeth | 19 / 126 |
| Output speed | 74.2 rpm |
| Mesh frequencies | 623 Hz and 155.8 Hz |
| Power, loaded / empty | 51.6 kW / 9.5 kW |
The physics
The equations behind every curve on this page.
Belt pull
F = C·f·L·g·[m_R + (2·m_B + m_L)·cos δ] + m_L·g·H
Drag from idlers and belt, plus the lift.
Drive power
P = F·v / η
51.6 kW loaded, 9.5 kW empty.
Gear mesh frequency
GMF = teeth × shaft Hz
623 Hz on stage one, 155.8 Hz on stage two.
Drive power
The belt, the idlers and the lift each take a known share. A seized roller adds its own.
Drive power against tonnage
2.5 m/s belt, 12 m lift
- Drive power
Power has two parts: dragging the belt and idlers empty, and lifting and moving the load. Both are known from the belt itself.
F_U = C·f·L·g·[m_R + (2·m_B + m_L)·cos δ] + m_L·g·H P = F_U·v / η
Seized idlers drag on the belt
- Drive power at 800 tph
- Each seized idler
- 1.39 kW
A stuck roller does not turn. The belt slides over it, which costs power, heats the belt and wears a flat spot into the shell.
ΔF = n_seized · μ · (m_B + m_L) · g · spacing
The gearbox
Every tooth passes at a known rate. A worn tooth strikes once per turn of its gear, which modulates the mesh tone.
Gearbox vibration: worn tooth on the output gear
Mesh frequency 155.8 Hz, output shaft 1.236 Hz
- Healthy mesh
- Worn tooth
A damaged tooth hits once per turn of its gear. That modulates the mesh tone and leaves a row of side peaks spaced at the gear’s own speed.
GMF = teeth × shaft Hz sidebands at GMF ± n · f_gear
Failure modes
What breaks, what it looks like, what the twin does about it.
| Failure mode | The physics | Signals that show it | How the twin catches it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Idler seizure | A locked roller drags the belt and heats the shell. | Power above the calculated value. Hot roller on infrared scan. | Converts the power residual into an equivalent number of seized rollers. |
| Gear tooth wear | A damaged tooth strikes once per revolution of its gear. | Sidebands around the mesh frequency. | Looks for sidebands spaced at the gear’s own speed. |
| Pulley lagging wear | Lower friction lets the belt slip. | Belt speed below drive speed. Motor current spikes. | Checks belt speed against pulley speed. |
| Belt mistracking | Side load raises friction at the frame. | Alignment switch. Edge wear. Power creep. | Adds the extra drag to the power balance. |
| Pulley bearing wear | Bearing geometry sets the defect frequency. | Vibration lines at bearing frequencies. | Tracks band energy at the predicted lines. |
How we catch it early
A physics twin and a PINN, working on one belt conveyor and gearmotor.
The twin is a set of equations for this machine, tuned to its nameplate. Give it the flow, speed and conditions and it returns what every reading should be. It always gives the same answer for the same inputs.
A physics-informed neural network, or PINN, sits on top. It is trained on the plant’s own data and it is penalized whenever it breaks a physics rule. So it can only learn what the equations leave out: wear, fouling, friction. It cannot invent an answer that the machine could never produce.
Step 1
Measure
Flow, pressure, current, temperature, vibration. Whatever the asset already has.
Step 2
Physics twin
The equations of this machine, set to its nameplate. It says what the readings should be right now.
Step 3
Residual
Measured minus expected. Demand, weather and speed are already taken out.
Step 4
PINN
A small neural network that learns the cause of the gap, under the physics rules.
Step 5
Finding
A named cause, a date, and the kWh or hours at stake. An engineer reviews it.
loss = (measured − predicted)² + λ · (physics residual)²
The second term is the rulebook. It is zero when the network obeys the equations.
Why this beats black-box AI
A black-box model learns patterns from history. It needs examples of each failure, and it goes quiet when the pump runs at a point it has not seen. The twin starts from physics, so it works on day one. The PINN adds what physics cannot know about this particular machine.
That is also what makes the savings countable. The baseline is a calculation, not a guess, so the gap between baseline and meter is a number a customer can check.
What the twin checks on this asset
- Drive power against the calculated pull
- Idler count from the power residual
- Mesh sidebands at gear speed
- Belt speed against pulley speed
| Fixed alarm | Black-box AI | Twin + PINN | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Needs failure history to learn | No | Yes, lots | No |
| Says what is wrong | No | Rarely | Yes, by name |
| Works at a flow it has never seen | No | Often fails | Yes, the equations still hold |
| Puts a number on the saving | No | No | Yes, in kWh and dollars |
| Lead time on slow wear | Late | Varies | Weeks to months |
| Every number can be traced | Yes | No | Yes, to an equation |
What the twin puts a number on
Energy and cost, from the equations.
Loaded drive power
51.6 kW
800 tph, 12 m lift
Empty belt
9.5 kW
Idler and belt drag only
Each seized idler
1.39 kW
$996 a year each
What we do for you
We watch it. We catch it. We prove it.
Our reliability engineers run the twin on your belt conveyor and gearmotor, review every finding, and help your crew fix it. After the repair we compare the meter to the baseline and write the result in the ledger.