Simulation and study on soft start of belt conveyors with time-varying loads based on FEM

The dynamic model for soft start of the belt conveyor is built with FEM,based on which,the dynamic starting behavior of the belt conveyor with full,empty and time-varying load is simulated by MatLab. Simulation results of the upward belt conveyor and the horizontal belt conveyor show that the dynamic tension of the belt with time-varying load is more complicated than that of full and empty load.Thus the necessity of soft start of the belt conveyor with time-varying loads is verified.