The Conveyor Belt Monitoring (CBM) Vision Profile System provides a reliable, non contact, 24/7, on line, system for vision and profile condition based monitoring of a conveyor belt. The vision-profile system continuously monitors the surface profile and is capable of picking up even the smallest changes in the belt condition such as belt thickness and damage such as holes and blisters.
Readings that deviate from the normal or expected, are recorded as ‘Events’. These events are recorded with a series of images before and after the event which enable a playback of the event for analysis. The events that are tagged enable those on/off line or by remote monitoring to prioritise the proactive preventative maintenance schedules thus enabling the extension of the belt life.
The events will also flag an alarm. The level of alarm depends on the amount of change from the reference data. The alarm can be an email notification through to stopping of the belt. The Vision Profile System is a maintenance tool designed to reduce conveyor belt equipment life cycle costs through the real-time management of conveyor belt health and maintenance processes. Remote condition monitoring, maintenance history, and operational data are integrated to provide the end user with sufficient information to make optimal maintenance decisions.
The Vision Profile System assists to lower maintenance costs through the reduction of unplanned maintenance, rework and associated down time. At the same time productivity and safety is enhanced resulting in an overall improvement of operation reliability. Allowing for a better return of investment on the assets employed. The equipment payback cycle is rapid considering the elimination of unplanned stoppages, CBM says.
Jonathan Krane, Business Development Manager, explains why there is a need for a vision and profile monitoring system in conveyor systems. “In large apparently endless conveyor belt systems that are used for transporting bulk materials such as coal, mineral rock and ores over long distances, effective use of ‘condition-based monitoring’ contributes to increased plant uptime and reduced maintenance costs, which combine to increase the return on net assets of a mining operation. Typically delimitation, bubbling, minor cuts, abrasions and the like, lead to a reduced life in the conveyor belt. Accordingly, it has long been recognised that a condition based monitoring system for the early detection of excessive or uneven wear and other events that will lead to a shortening of the conveyor belt life, is desirable.
“At present there are many systems that are either imbedded into or attached to the conveyor belt. They do monitor the belts to a point. Each of these systems is for a specific task and in the main one is the Steel Cord analysis. These systems have been developed with various methods of observation and recording events. They are generally expensive, as they perform one task and are quite complex in their circuitry requirements, thereby increasing the number of potential sources for component failure. However, of the greatest concern to the mining industry is the unnecessary and or early replacement of a conveyor belt, due to systems not covering the gambit of condition based monitoring needs. This exposes the partially monitored (or really unmonitored) sections, or the entire conveyor belt to ‘catastrophic failure’ and major expense.
“The CBM system is flexible enough to be designed to suit any belt width, belt type (Steel Cord, fabric or solid woven) and anywhere in the world.”
Krane is trying to find out how many companies as part of their Condition Based Monitoring – actually monitor their conveyor belts – for those that do not, as this is an essential part of risk mitigation please advise why not? [email protected]