Vacuum belt conveyor 1

[Sebastijonas]

Hello, maybe someone has/ knows some guidelines or a book on designing vacuum (suction) belt conveyor? Belt conveyor should be transporting carton boxes, and there's is a need to "hold " these boxes in place.
Any help appreciated.
Example below.

https://www.dornerconveyors.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Vacuum.jpg

 

[Jboggs]

I have a question - why are you designing something that already exists? Even if what you need is a little different from their stated catalog items, let them do it. They make specials and they've probably done it before. They know how to avoid the mistakes. Pick up the phone and call the manufacturers. Ask for an Application Engineer. His job is to help you successfully use their products. (I know my suggestion of actually talking to a live person at the manufacturer rather than relying completely on the internet is outside the comfort zone for most new millenial engineers. It's old school but it works!)

 

[Sebastijonas]

Thanks for a reply. We are trying to design and develop this type of conveyor ourselves, not buying it .

 

[Jboggs]

Design, build, try.
Design, build, try.
Repeat as required.
Its called development.

 

[3DDave]

The tricky part is finding a supplier for the belt. It should have a high-friction surface on one side and a low friction surface on the other.

Unless the book has dimensioned drawings and a list of suppliers, it's not clear what more is required than might be on a chip-pickup vacuum system except the volume of air being moved during operation is smaller, though the start-up conditions still require a lot of air. Also, it's good if the vacuum box doesn't collapse or deform severely, but that's a condition a stress analyst can help with.

 

[JohnRBaker]

This is the only vacuum conveying that I'm familiar with:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PgXz5eo_Jo

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without

 

[dvd]

Do you want to hold the boxes in place on a horizontal belt? inclined belt?

The big issue with design of this type of conveyor, to me, is to get enough static pressure to develop the required holding force, when possibly large percentage of the belt is open and suction air is flowing through. The conveyor drive will need to overcome the static pressure loading on the belt, plus the conveyed load.

 

[Compositepro]

Typically, the vacuum table has tiny pinholes in a grid pattern. This allows a "high" vacuum with only low flow, even when there is nothing on the table. The belt would be porous and therefore almost no vacuum under most of the belt area. When a non-porous object is placed on the belt there will be a vacuum created under the object in a large area around each pinhole that is covered. It would be desirable that the belt has a low friction surface toward the table, and a high friction surface toward the box/object.

 

[Sebastijonas]

Thanks You for replies. The first step I want to accomplish , is to correctly size the needed volume of "air box", diameter and amount of holes needed and power of the suction pump. Carton boxes should be held in place, as conveyor travels 15m/min; conveyor is horizontal. Boxes should be held with a force MIN 400N. Belt width - 800mm. Area of the box approx. 0.2m2. Some boxes are larger than that though.

 

[Scuka]

Buy one and copy it.

It will end up cheaper than spending time reinventing the wheel, building a prototype, and then fixing your own mistakes you'll inevitably make.

 

[dvd]

Pages 26 & 27 of the attached Perforator's Handbook will help to quantify the pressure drop through the perforated conveyor bed based on flow (and probably a reasonable approximation for perforated belt also). The problem breaks down into deciding how much open area to use to develop the holding force and then quantifying the flow through open area which isn't covered by a box. You need to develop a static pressure inside of the plenum when your worst-case open area is flowing - i.e., when nothing is yet on the belt (first box).

 

[Sebastijonas]

Thanks dvd for an answer. This was exactly what I was looking for.