Product Transfer - Boom Conveyor Belt

Application

Ship Loading Boom Conveyor Belt

Objective

• Reduce Downtime
• Reduce Conveyor Belt Wear
• Reduce Dust and Spillage

Transfer Detail

• Two identical, side-by-side ship loading conveyor belt transfers moving approximately 4000 tons per hour of material.
• 2.5m of drop height with 1800mm wide conveyor belts.
• One transfer was of traditional design, while the other was designed with Tasman Warajay® Technology.

Challenge

The terminal’s goal was to install one traditional and one Tasman Warajay transfer point in order to measure the effectiveness of controlled flow systems. Their main objective was to reduce the downtime associated with replacing the boom receiving conveyor belt. Since the booms are short in length, the heavy loading of material quickly wore away the belting meaning replacement and repair was frequent.
Beyond lost time during regular belt replacement and maintenance, any downtime due to belt failure would be catastrophic when loading a ship because the facility could incur demurrage charges.

Tasman Warajay Solution

Tasman Warajay Technology FlowFirst™ design approach was used to help the facility improve their conveyor belt life. In order to do so, material needed to be load softly and in the center of the receiving conveyor belt. The new system turned the material in the direction of the conveyor to reduce the angle of impact. This kept material moving in the direction of flow, while imparting less force on the belt.
Additionally, reducing impact forces has the added benefit of reducing the amount of dust and spillage generated.

Result

The facility hired a third party to perform a study on the belt life of the two identical ship loading transfers. The study found that the new Tasman Warajay transfer had a wear rate of 0.018mm per million tons of material and the traditional transfer had a wear rate of 0.065mm per million tons of material. Thus, there was 3.6 times less wear from the Tasman Warajay FlowFirst™ transfer point. The facility concluded that they saw substantial operational savings by partnering with Tasman Warajay Technology.