Conveyor Belt Condition Evaluation via Non-Destructive Testing Techniques

Abstract

Belt conveyors seem to be the primary transportation technique for mining materials in many countries, especially it is the case in the mining industry in Poland. One of the key and challenging issue is maintenance policy for conveyor belt, probably the most critical part of a conveyor. The total length of conveyor belts in Polish mining industry exceeds 2,200 km. Taking into account safety, economic, reliability and other aspects, maintenance of these belts becomes a serious task. How to detect damages in a belt? How to relate detected damages and condition assessment? When a belt segment (splice, whole belt loop on a conveyor) should be replaced? When the actual belt tensile strength matches the operational requirements? To answer these questions the up-to-date results on Non-Destructive Testing techniques developed for opencast lignite mining are presented in the paper. These techniques are related to vision systems, magnetic systems and infrared thermography. Some of them are still being tested in laboratory conditions, while other are already in deployment phase though it seems to be useful to share recent experience and present the state-of-the-art. In the paper a brief idea of each applied method is explained and some both laboratory as well as industrial examples of investigation are discussed.