Belt conveyor is today's very important mechanism in material handling industries and is most commonly used to transport bulk materials such as grain, salt, coal and sand. Belt deflection indicates belt is loosening. It occurs between the idler roll sets due to the self-weight of the belt and the forces from the bulk material. This paper includes detailed analysis of the conveyor belt deflection under pragmatic load conditions. The aim of the project is to develop a Finite Element Method (FEM) simulation model for the deflection analysis of a conveyor belt using load data for bulk material calculated by a coupled Discrete Element Method (DEM) simulation. The scope of this project is on idler roll aspects. Two types of three-trough idlers were used in this project which were made of steel and plastic respectively. A variety of idler spacing were used to determine the most efficient configuration for the belt. This paper will explain the FEM procedures for the modelling of the belt behavior and the working principle of a coupled FEM-DEM analysis. Experimental results were presented and compared based on parameters. Comparisons showed plastic idler-rollers with smaller gap is better than the rest and it could be optimized to improve the performance and efficiency.
