An enhanced simulation model for DC motor belt drive conveyor system control

Belt drive systems provide freedom to position the motor relative to the load and this phenomenon enables reduction of the conveyor inertia. It also facilitates quick response when employed in robotics applications. Unfortunately, the flexible dynamics deteriorates the positioning accuracy. Therefore, there exists a trade-off between the simplicity of the control strategy to reject time varying disturbance caused by belt's flexibility and the precision in performance. Further, resonance of the system leads to vibrations and poor accuracy in positioning. In this paper, an overall model of belt drive conveyor system is presented which is enhanced by the dc motor model and an realistic friction model. This leads to more accurate positioning of the belt driven mechanism. Thus, reliable simulations can be performed prior to any controller design. The effectiveness of the proposed model was proven by means of simulation-where actual belt driven system parameters used-which carried out with and without these enhancements.