Book Review: Foundations by R. Todd Swinderman [This book is available as a free PDF from Martin Engineering. A hard copy is available by attending one of their courses.]

Foundations is a key resource for an engineer dealing with belt conveyors for bulk material handling. The premise of “complete material control” is entirely compatible with other principles of manufacturing excellence, reliability, and TPM.

Each chapter contains an overview of solutions for various problems encountered in belt conveying. While the book was written and published by Martin Engineering—and Martin Engineering equipment is prominently features in the photos and illustrations—there are plenty of concepts and principals that will apply to whatever vendor might be used.

This is an excellent hard-copy resource, and is included in the cost of a short (one-day) seminar.

Key Concepts

Key concepts are either recurring themes throughout the book or strong individual points with a fairly general application. Books with a more theoretical bent will have more “key concepts.”

Control of fugitive material has real safety and cost impacts. Cleaning piles of is labor-intensive, wasteful, and a leading cause of conveyor-related injuries. One shovel (9 kg) of fugitive material per hour is worth over 77 tons of product per year.
To control dust, control air. Dust generated is proportional to air velocity divided by particle size & cohesiveness. Equations for estimating total air flow (when measured values are not available) are given in chapter 7.
Vulcanized belt splices are more durable and make cleaning easier, but mechanical links are faster and more flexible.
Cleanliness can be improved by specifying an acceptable level of carryback (oz/ft²) when ordering equipment. This forces the designer to consider conveyor performance with respect to efficiency and leave enough space for the cleaners needed.

Useful Features

Useful features are like pages, diagrams, or tables that one might bookmark and refer to later. Books oriented toward application will generally have more ”useful features.”

Major components of belt conveyors (p. 30)
Types of belt damage (pp. 51-6)
Equations for total airflow (pp. 92-4)
Solutions for wet, sticky, or adhesive materials (pp. 128)
Equations for calculating impact force from a single lump (p. 141) and from a stream of homogeneous material (p. 142)
Comparison of wear liner materials (p. 174)
Belt Conveyor Preventative Maintenance Tables (pp. 440-1)
Belt Conveyor Project Sequence (pp. 456-62)