Engineering and Mining Journal - Whether the market is copper, gold, nickel, iron ore, lead/zinc, PGM, diamonds or other commodities, E&MJ takes the lead in projecting trends, following development and reporting on the most efficient operating pr
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CONVEYORS 64 E&MJ; • OCTOBER 2017 www.e-mj.com may be mounted on a conventional bracket without requiring any adjustments. Cutting Carryback Carryback is one of the main conveyor maintenance problems, and cost genera- tors, encountered in mining applications. CEMA has estimated that carryback can total as much as 3 tons per week on a 60-in.-wide belt traveling at 800 ft/min. Annually, this totals more than 150 tons of material for one belt. If carryback on a conveyor can be reduced from 3% to 1%, it can result in a 67% reduction in conveyor maintenance costs. Martin Engineering aims to minimize this problem, and enhance worker safety, with a new family of heavy-duty conveyor belt cleaner designs, engineered so the blade cartridge can be pulled away from the belt for safe access and replaced by a single worker. Martin Engineering devel- oped the Safe to Service (STS) blades to secure both primary and secondary clean- ers rigidly to the conveyor mainframe, while offering more versatility and easier access. Initially available on the Martin QC1 Cleaner HD, Martin QC1 Clean- er XHD and Martin SQC2S Secondary Cleaner, external servicing reduces con- fined space entry and eliminates reach- in maintenance, while facilitating faster blade replacement. "Routine maintenance and replace- ment of blades that require reach-in or chute entry is an unpleasant and poten- tially dangerous task for workers," said Daniel Marshall, product engineer for Martin Engineering. "We developed the STS system so operators could work on the product safely from outside the chute wall, without breaking the plane of entry." The system was originally developed for a client who needed a safer method for workers to replace cleaner blades on the large conveyor system. After field-testing, operators found that the STS design low- ered the chance of injury and required fewer workers to perform maintenance. "Though the STS is currently geared toward heavy-duty conveyor systems, we're working on expanding the technol- ogy to accommodate more of our product line," Marshall explained. "Our ultimate goal is to reduce and eventually eliminate reach-in and chute entry injuries related to blade cleaning and maintenance." Designed for conveyor speeds up to 1,200 ft/min and belt widths from 18 in. to 120 in., the STS system is claimed to be well-suited to heavy-duty applications. Primary cleaner urethane blades come color-coded to suit specific applications and are set in a multihole cartridge, allow- ing the sliding blade rack to be correctly aligned with the material path for effective cleaning. The SQC2S Secondary Cleaner is designed to allow the system to handle belt reversals and rollback with no damage to the belt or splice. Martin Engineering has designed its new Safe to Service (STS) blade cleaner designs to improve worker safety and reduce maintenance downtime.