Abstract
The article is devoted to the study of the characteristics of a sand-polymer composite (SPC) and a comparison of its strength properties with those of a traditional structural material, St10 steel, using the example of a roller support shell for a belt conveyor. Numerical modeling using the finite element method was used to evaluate the stress-strain state of the structure. It was found that the proposed sand-polymer composite provides a sufficient level of strength, with maximum stresses in the part reaching 7.3 MPa, which does not exceed the material’s yield strength of 30 MPa. The minimum safety factor for the SPC shell was 3.216, which is 3.2 times higher than the standard. The maximum displacement at the point of load application for the SPC shell was 0.1645 mm. Compared to the steel counterpart (St10), which has maximum stresses of 3.2 MPa and a safety factor of 9.6, the sand-polymer composite reduces the weight of the product by 3.5 times (the weight of the SPC shell is 1.73 kg, while that of the St10 steel shell is 6.185 kg). The results obtained confirm the feasibility of using sand-polymer material to optimize roller bearing designs, providing the required strength characteristics at a lower weight, as well as economic efficiency due to the lower cost of the material