Evaluating Conveyor Belt Systems using DEM Simulation

Discover how computational simulation helps solve common conveyor challenges across industries.

Challenges

Conveyor belts are indispensable in industries such as mining, agriculture, manufacturing, food processing, and logistics. They facilitate the efficient movement of bulk materials and products across various stages of production and distribution. However, despite their widespread use, conveyor systems often encounter operational challenges that can impede efficiency and increase costs. The most common challenges are described as follows.

• Mistracking: When the belt deviates from its path, causing uneven wear, edge damage, and potential system failures. It is often due to misaligned frames, improper loading, or worn rollers.
  
  
• Material spillage: Loss of material from the belt, especially at transfer points, leading to safety risks and higher maintenance. Caused by poor sealing or misalignment.
  
  
• Belt slippage: Loss of traction between the belt and drive pulleys, delaying transport and increasing wear. Commonly due to low tension or worn pulleys.
  
  
• Blockages: Material buildup obstructs flow, damaging belts and causing downtime. Often triggered by accumulation or foreign objects.
  
  
• Carryback: Residual material sticking to the belt returns to the system, building up on rollers and pulleys, and requiring frequent cleaning.
  
  
• Seized rollers: Stationary rollers create friction, damaging belts and raising energy use. Regular inspections help prevent this.
  
  
• Belt sag: Tension loss causes the belt to sag, increasing power consumption and reducing efficiency. Over-tensioning can worsen wear.

Engineering Solutions

Traditionally, conveyor belt issues are addressed through periodic inspections, empirical adjustments, and conservative design margins. Although these methods help, they often rely heavily on trial-and-error, which can be time-consuming and costly. Proactive engineering solutions, such as advanced material testing and system redesign, are increasingly supported by digital technologies, offering faster, more precise improvements. Discrete Element Method (DEM) simulation provides a powerful environment for testing different operating conditions and predict the behavior of bulk materials on conveyor belts at a particle level, such as:

• Analyze material flow patterns in detail.

• Predict areas of high wear, spillage, or clogging.

• Optimize design features like chute angles, belt speed, and idler placement.

• Reduce trial-and-error in the physical world, cutting down on prototyping costs and speeding up innovation cycles.

Methods

To demonstrate the power of this approach, let's consider the conveyor belt shown below. Each component in the assemply is a separate STL file imported into Ansys Rocky. The buckets are not shown, but the user can easily load multiple profiles to test them one at a time and identify the option that provides the best results.

In the setup we include:

• Physics & Additional modules. Gravity and rolling resistance Models are activated. The modules calculate variables from the particle interactions that are later used in the postprocessing (for instance, to estimate power consumption).
  
  
• Particle data. The next picture shows the potatoe shape suggested in the Help Manual using a Sphero-Polyhedron volume. The shape is generated by adjusting parameters such as the vertical/horizontal aspect ratio, smoothness, and number of corners. Additionally, particle size can be uniform or follow a Particle Size Distribution (PSD), as in this case ranging between 0.08 - 0.12 m.
  
  

• Mass Flow Rate. We first create a surface for particle release. Then, the inlet mass flow rate is defined for each particle shape, if multiple shapes are used. In this case, only the potatoe-shaped particle is included in the simulation.
  
  
• Motion Frames. This is the key aspect of this kind of simulations. Basically, the imported geometry only contains one bucket that is replicated inside Rocky. There is one traslation motion and n rotations depending on the n rollers in the system. The user must define:
   - The belt speed
   - The time to complete one lap or cycle
   - The number of buckets
  
  
• Materials. In Ansys Rocky it is possible to create materials for both walls (boundaries) and particles. Properties such as density, Young's modulus and Poisson's Ratio are required. Interaction parameters between particles and between particles and boundaries are also important, including static and dynamic friction, as well as restitution coefficients. Ansys Rocky has a material Wizard to assist with this process when material data is unavailable.

Results

Ansys Rocky enables the evaluation of key operational parameters such as power consumption, particle distribution, and discharge statistics based on mass and volume, offering valuable data for design optimization and decision-making.

• Power Curve. The picture shows that a maximum power of 1,679 W is reached at 47.05 s. Rounding this to 1,700 W and assuming a high-efficiency motor (90-95%), the required input power ranges between 1,789 - 1,889 W (2.40 - 2.53 hp). The simulation time can be extended to verify these values.

• Tracking Variables over time. In DEM simulations, a region can be created in space to allow particles to pass through it. This setup makes it possible to generate plots that show how variables such as particle count, mass, or volume change over time. These values can be recorded and plotted either as instantaneous measurements or accumulated totals. The plot on the left-hand side shows the cumulative mass of all particles that pass through the region, while the one on the right-hand side displays the instantaneous number of particles.
  
  
  
  
• Specific results. To track how many potatoes with a specific value or within a certain range of a given property are transported over time, the same measurement region can be used. For example, to count the number of potatoes within a specific size range, a Property object can be created, followed by generating the corresponding plot.

Computational Time. The simulation was solved using CPU and GPU to assess how long does it take using different number of cores, and it is shown in the plot below. The time using the specified GPU Card is also provided as reference (Users may have one with better capabilities and the time will be lower than that for the presented Card). Be aware that the processing time depends on different aspects of the setup like:

• Particle size, shape and total number.
• Modules enabled (Calculations performed).
• Simulation time. 

The video below shows a visual walkthrough of the main steps:

Ansys Solution Benefits

Ansys Rocky is a leading discrete element method (DEM) software used for simulating the motion of granular and discontinuous materials. It is designed to solve engineering problems by accurately simulating particle flows. Rocky is capable of modeling real particle shapes, including solids, 2D shells, and rigid and flexible fibers. The software is known for its fast and accurate simulations, utilizing multi-graphics processing unit (GPU) solver technology to handle different shaped and sized particles in various industrial applications.

It offers features like multi-GPU processing, realistic particle shapes, wear modeling, particle breakage, and cohesion. Ansys Rocky is recognized for its ability to accelerate complex particle simulations with its powerful DEM software capabilities. Additionally, Ansys Rocky unlocks the potential of solving large-scale DEM simulations, handling millions of particles with ease.

It supports multi-GPU processing, realistic complex particle shapes, and offers coupling with fluids, structural mechanics, and electromagnetic fields. The software also includes advanced features like breakage modeling and smoothed-particle hydrodynamics, making it a comprehensive tool for particle dynamics simulation.

Ozen Engineering Expertise

Ozen Engineering Inc. leverages its extensive consulting expertise in CFD, FEA, optics, photonics, and electromagnetic simulations to achieve exceptional results across various engineering projects, addressing complex challenges like multiphase flows, erosion modeling, and channel flows using Ansys software.

We offer support, mentoring, and consulting services to enhance the performance and reliability of your systems. Trust our proven track record to accelerate projects, optimize performance, and deliver high-quality, cost-effective results for both new and existing water control systems. For more information, please visit https://ozeninc.com.

Suggested blogs by Ozen Engineering

• From ore to metal: How simulation is shaping modern mining
• Transfer chute Analysis
• Optimizing vibrating screens for industrial applications
• Ansys Rocky 2025 R1: Transforming particle simulations