Prediction of contact forces on idler rolls of a pipe conveyor idler housing for the needs of its online monitoring

Pipe conveyors are currently widely employed in continuous transport of raw materials. Contact forces on idler rolls of an idler housing represent an important parameter to be monitored in the process of online operational monitoring. Operational tension force cannot be reached during the experimental research performed on laboratory conditions with regard to construction of the testing equipment. It is impossible for the current experimental rig. The main objective of the manuscript is to monitor dependences of contact forces on tension forces in individual idler rolls of a pipe conveyor idler housing. The manuscript output is in form of contact forces’ prediction for respective idler rolls for two more rates of tension forces and two cases of measurements: with and without material load.