Title: Investigation of attapulgite clay crushing by bionic tooth plates inspired from convex structures on body surface of dung beetles

Authors: Xingqiao Deng; Shike Wang; Jie Wang; Shisong Wang; Yucheng Liu; Ge He

Addresses: College of Nuclear Technology and Automation Engineering, Chengdu University of Technology, Chengdu, Sichuan 610059, China; Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems, Mississippi State University, Mississippi State, MS 39762, USA ' School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Xihua University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610039, China ' School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Xihua University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610039, China ' School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Xihua University, Chengdu, Sichuan 610039, China ' Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems, Mississippi State University, Mississippi State, MS 39762, USA; Department of Mechanical Engineering, Mississippi State University, Mississippi State, MS 39762, USA ' University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21201, USA

Abstract: A bioinspired tooth plate structures imitating convex structures on the head and body surfaces of dung beetles was presented and analysed using the discrete element method. Simulation results showed that compared with the regular tooth plates without bionic structures, the bionic crushing tooth plate offers a better performance and higher efficiency in crushing wet attapulgite clay. Based on the simulation results, a two-stage crushing machine was designed, produced, and validated through experiments. Experimental results confirmed that the developed crushing equipment with the bioinspired convex structures can effectively crush the attapulgite clay with high moisture content, which cannot be crushed by existing crushers due to the adhesion of the wet clay particles to the tooth plate surfaces. The produced crushing equipment has been applied for processing the attapulgite clay in China, and the design idea can be applied to develop other equipment for crushing rare earth minerals with high moisture content.

Keywords: attapulgite clay; crushing performance; bionic design; dung beetle; two-layered double geared-roller crusher.

DOI: 10.1504/IJDE.2021.113267

International Journal of Design Engineering, 2021 Vol.10 No.1, pp.45 - 71

Received: 18 Oct 2020
Accepted: 24 Oct 2020
Published online: 25 Feb 2021 *

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