Belt Conveyor Design Load

The conveyor manufacturer should be able to supply the information about the conveyor itself and the rated loading. You should also ask for the belt tension for design of the end supports. As for design of the support system, after you have the conveyor details, that is standard structural engineering work.

I would suggest you contact Caljan Rite Hite UK.

The self weight of the conveyor could vary widely depending on the style, so I don't think you will find a rule of thumb on that. If you don't have drawings, you will need to measure members and calculate actual weight.

For the belt, you can look at a few manufacturers (US Rubber, Goodyear, Fenner Dunlop, etc.) and average their weights. It depends on belt width and thickness. Remember you will have two layers (carrying side and return side) per lineal foot of conveyor.

Idlers weights are easily found from manufacturers ( websites. Depends on the style of idler, belt width, and also the spacing.

Cross sectional areas for different belt widths, surcharge angles, and troughing angles are given in "Belt Conveyors for Bulk Materials" by the Conveyor Equipment Manufacturers Association. You can calculate your material load from those.

If you have walkways on the conveyor you need to allow for some live load and the dead load obviously.

As mentioned above, you may need to calculate the belt tensions too depending on what you are getting into.