Conveyor belt systems are crucial for transporting valuable commodities, with idlers supporting and guiding the conveyor belts.
Idlers are susceptible to various issues, such as worn bearings, bent frames, and material build-up, which impact conveyor system safety and performance. Due to the critical nature of conveyors and the idlers supporting them; condition monitoring is critical to detect the issues surrounding idler reliability & failure.
Visual inspection is the most common method, involving physical inspection. However, the accuracy of visual inspection is unreliable due to various environmental, human and access limitations.
Distributed fibre optic sensing (DFOS) conveyor condition monitoring system transmits laser pulses through a retrofitted fibre optic cable along the conveyor system. As bearings wear, they vibrate, transmitting vibrations through the conveyor’s frame and onto the cable.
These vibrations cause microscopic changes in the backscattered laser light. The system processes this data, generating a report and alerts to potential failures and wear. The fibre optic cable also senses the distributed temperature profile along the entire conveyor, alerting to conditions caused by frictional heating that could potentially lead to fires.
Up to 10% of all unscheduled maintenance and breakdowns are due to idler related failures. With the DFOS conveyor condition monitoring system, the conveyor availability increases with a minimum of 1,5% to 3%.
The DFOS systems return on investment is within weeks based on additional production availability.
DFOS conveyor condition monitoring is an essential and cost-effective solution for any conveyor belt system, offering benefits such as reduced downtime, minimized maintenance costs, increased production, and improved safety.
By adopting monitoring systems such as DFOS; industries, particularly in mining, enhances overall productivity while mitigating safety risks to achieve the goal of Zero Harm.
