Practical guidelines

Identifying causes and solving conveyor belt mistracking

1 Contact with the support structure can cause serious belt damage

2 When the belt is not center-loaded, the cargo weight pushes the belt toward the more lightly-loaded side

3 Contact with the structure can break mechanical splices with expensive consequences

4 Adjusting idlers for tracking can make correcting the belt for changes in speed or material harder later

5 The Torsion Arms sense changes in the belt path and adjust the roller to compensate

6 This roller tracker uses a unique ribbed lagging made of durable polyurethane to increase performance

7 The in-line sensing roll trainer has a carrying roll on a central pivot bearing with vertical guide rolls mounted on both sides

8 Multi-pivot belt trainers use a torque-multiplying system to improve belt path correction

The moment a conveyor belt begins to wander, the safety and productivity of the system quickly degrade, and the cost of operation rises. Even a slight belt misalignment can lead to a variety of issues, from small annoyances to full-blown catastrophes involving a conveyor system. However, in the vast majority of cases, mistracking is a problem that can be corrected. Belt behavior is based on a set of principles, which serve as the guidelines for “belt training”.

A misaligned belt can also come in contact with the stringer, causing fraying, shredding or splice damage. If this condition isn’t noticed right away, great lengths of valuable belting can be destroyed, and the structural steel itself can be damaged. In fact, a high-speed belt edge rubbing on the support structure can cut through steel mounts with surprising speed, leaving a razor-sharp edge that poses a safety risk (Fig. 1).

Further, a compromised bracket or support can cause a catastrophic idler failure, which could damage other components of the system. All of these consequences of...

Identifying causes and solving conveyor belt mistracking

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