Structural Optimization of Metal and Polymer Ore Conveyor Belt Rollers  

作　　者：Joao Pedro Ceniz Rodrigo de Sá Martins Marco Antonio Luersen Tiago Cousseau 

机构地区：[1]Department of Mechanical Engineering,Federal University of Technology-Parana(UTFPR),Curitiba,81280-340,Brazil

出　　处：《Computer Modeling in Engineering & Sciences》2022年第12期601-618,共18页工程与科学中的计算机建模（英文）

基　　金：financed by Vale S.A.Company(www.vale.com)and the Institute of Technology Vale(ITV-www.itv.org)through the Project No.SAP 4600048682.

摘　　要：Ore conveyor belt rollers operate in harsh environments,making them prone to premature failure.Their service lives are highly dependent on the stress field and bearing misalignment angle,for which limit values are defined in a standard.In this work,an optimization methodology using metamodels based on radial basis functions is implemented to reduce themass of twomodels of rollers.From a structural point of view,one of the rollers ismade completely of metal,while the other also has some components made of polymeric material.The objective of this study is to develop and apply a parametric structural optimization methodology to minimize the mass of the two models of rollers.To represent the mechanical behavior of the rollers,simulations were performed using the finite element method.During the numerical optimization process,the variable parameters were the dimensions of the shaft and external tube.The geometric configuration that corresponded at the same time to the lowest mass and acceptable ranges for the stress and bearingmisalignment angle was determined.With the proposed methodology,a 32.3% reduction in mass was obtained for a metal roller design and an 18.9% reduction for a polymer roller.In both cases,the constraints were not violated.For the all-metal roller,the safety factors for the maximum stress and bearingmisalignment angle were 1.44 and 1.75,respectively,while for the polymer roller the corresponding figures were 1.50 and 2.23.This work describes a low-computational-cost optimization methodology for roller designs that have been little studied in the literature.Furthermore,the methodology could be adapted for use with other types of rollers and rollers made of different materials.

关 键 词：Conveyor belt rollers structural optimization surrogate models radial basis functions 

分 类 号：TH2[机械工程—机械制造及自动化]