Drive power of a discharge belt

Usually there is a discharger under the hopper at the bottom of a silo (e.g. discharge belt, discharge screw). It must be able to bear the load of the bulk material and should achieve the intended interaction with the hopper for optimum draw-down. Immediately after filling the empty hopper, the vertical pressure in the outlet opening is usually higher than in the emptying state. For a discharger this situation represents the critical load. Subject of this paper is the determination of loads and drive powers of a belt discharger test stand. The results of recognized analytical models, simulation results and measurement results are compared. In particular, the influence of the outlet height on the drive power will be analysed.