Smart Roller technology for monitoring and analyzing data of belt conveyor rollers

Mines – Ports – Process plants

Increase productivity

Optimise maintenance

Reduce downtime

“Smart roller” with Smart-Idler® imbedded is an innovative industrial IoT based condition monitoring system developed by Vayeron, which intelligently predicts and reports failure for conveyor rollers in bulk materials handling operations. The system improves productivity and personnel safety, while reducing downtime and excessive roller expenditure.

With Smart rollers, operators can wirelessly monitor conveyor rollers 24/7, through the automated system and can instantly predict roller failure and supply metrics to improve conveyor productivity.

Smart-Idler® data is gold

Smart-Idler

The data you can obtain from your Smart rollers is the real gold. The whole reason for installing this system is to be able to gather critical data to identify when and where the problem on your conveyor may be about to take place.
To manage the data there is a data access monitoring subscription which makes the data available for you to ingest into any 3rd party software package, control system or on-premises solution that you prefer.

The easy-to-operate interface keeps teams out of harm’s way, while monitoring roller temperature, vibration faults and roller shell-wear to predict roller failure.

Using conventional roller management processes bulk material handling operators are continually faced with costly downtime due to unplanned roller changeouts.

Conveyor rollers are treated as consumables – they are just a throwaway item. Being the second most expensive budget line item on a conveyor belt sheet, to treat it as a consumable and a throwaway item just seems absurd.
Ryan Norris
Vayeron CEO

Work smarter, not harder with Smart roller system

why Smart-Idler®
The application of the "Smart" system turns ordinary conveyor rollers into something much more intelligent. This reduces costly downtime, maintenance costs and over-stocking while improving the safety of site personnel. Read and watch why you need Smart rollers installed on your key conveyors.
smart technology
Smart-Idler® system is the latest patented technology to intelligently monitor your conveyor rollers 24/7 to instantly predict failure and provide you with data that helps improve conveyor performance. Read about how this technology works.
frequently asked questions
The development of this technology is an impressive achievement in the field of bulk material handling conveyors condition monitoring. Read frequently asked questions to get answers.
Digital solutions to physical bulk material handling machines to solve critical productivity and safety issues.

Benefits of Smart Rollers

Reduce conveyor downtime
Reduce downtime
Technology accurately monitors the health of your rollers, predicts roller failure and provides advanced alerts so you can take proactive action to replace rollers about to fail during scheduled maintenance periods. This eliminates the needless early batch roller replacements and reduces excess roller inventory.
Prevent belt conveyor fire
Improves safety
Smart Roller allows your staff to remotely monitor the status of each smart roller without leaving the comfort and safety of the control room. This eliminates the human error associated with manual control methods and instantly alerts personnel to temperature critical rises in the bearings, mitigating the risk of a fire.
Improve belt conveyor maintenance
Predict failure
Conveyor monitoring automation technology provides you with unprecedented data about your rollers' condition, giving you the ability to make quick maintenance decisions to keep your conveyors running. It internally monitors the key characteristics of rollers, and “intelligently” predicts and reports their failure.
COMPARE Smart-Idler® TO OTHER INSPECTION METHODSClick to open table
Features Smart-Idler Fibre Optic Drones In-house smart roller from roller company Manual inspection
Automated 24/7 ✓ не 24/7 None available as of yet X
Online vibration frequency analysis of bearings 24/7 X X None available as of yet X
Detect shell wear pre-emptively 24/7 X X None available as of yet X
Detect carry-back build up 24/7 X X None available as of yet X
Detect cross-sectional load distribution on belt* 24/7 X X None available as of yet X
Detect belt skipping / frame alignment issues along conveyor* 24/7 X X None available as of yet X
Detect bearing temperature 24/7 X ✓ не 24/7 None available as of yet X
Automated maintenance alerts / integrate with ERP systems and DCS None available as of yet X
Use with all brands of idlers / rollers X X
Wireless X None available as of yet X
Human labour cost X X X None available as of yet
Pro Con
Pro Con
Pro Con
Pro Con
Pro Con
Rollers are required make them Smart. Agnostic platform which can be used in multiple roller brands. This is the Android ecosystem model. Additional cost to each individual roller.
Fibre cable is low cost. Fibre cable is difficult to repair when damaged. Expensive to install. Deriving meaningful insight from signal is unproven.
Quick to deploy as an attempted solution. Fundamentally the same as a manual inspection. Lack of access to certain areas such as covered conveyors. Safety risk of flying drone along conveyor. Not 24/7
Rollers are required regardless make them smart. Purchaser is stuck with the roller brand for lige of the conveyor. This is the Apple ecosystem model. Roller supplier flexibility of choice is demanded.
Status quo. No change management. Not comprehensive. Exposes personnel to risk and is laborious. Historically has failed to solve the problem.
Indicative price (USD) Contact representative for pricing. ̴̴̴̴̴̴$80k per km + subscription (based on one known case study). Unknown. Likely under a capital purchase and / or a service contract. No commercialised solution available on the market at this stage. Local labour rates apply

Trusted by big business

Technology tested and implemented by:

Smart roller system in action

Application examples

A practical example of an application in a quarry - a shuttle conveyor of an ore processing plant

With an annual loss of production totalling $1,294,780 plus $48,913 in labour costs this section of the Ore processing plant needed a solution that reduced roller issues and drastically reduced their annualised costs.

smart conveyor rollers economics

Open Cut Metalliferous Mine

Outcome: 34 times Return on Investment (ROI)
Saved 375 man hours on labour

BEFORE INSTALLING SMART-IDLER®

Roller Related Expenses Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4
Annual conveyor roller incident costs 1,294,780 $1,294,780 $1,294,780 $1,294,780
Annual conveyor belt crew labour for rollers $48,913 $48,913 $48,913 $48,913
Annual conveyor roller replacement costs $1,250 $1,250 $1,250 $1,250
Annual roller related expenses $1,344,810 $1,344,810 $1,344,810 $1,344,810

In this instance, the mine spent $$39,600 and saved $1.3M = ROI of 34 times their investment

AFTER INSTALLING SMART-IDLER®

Roller Related Expenses Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4
Annual conveyor roller incident costs $0 $0 $0 $0
Annual conveyor belt crew labour for rollers $0 $0 $0 $0
Annual conveyor roller replacement costs $24,600 $2,201 $2,201 $2,201
Annual software cost to manage smart idler $15,000 $15,000 $15,000 $15,000
Annual roller related expenses $39,600 $17,201 $17,201 $17,201

Return on Investment – Payback Period

Return on Investment Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4
Vayeron Return on Investment Multiple 33.9 78.2 78.2 78.2
Time to payback (months) 0.5 0.1 0.1 0.1
ROI multiple if we price in catastrophic risk 78.2 349 349 349
Time to payback (months) 0.2 0 0 0
Reduction in Risk Exposure (man hours) 375 375 375 375
Conveyor rollers are not just expenditure, if not treated properly, they can cause a lot of damage and loss to the business.
Increase operation productivity and efficiency today with innovative state-of-the-art conveyor roller monitoring technology.