Wear resistance of blades in planetary concrete mixers. Part II: 3D validation of a new mixing blade design and efficiency evaluation

• Starting from a previous work, we discuss the goal of performing 3D measures of wear for the new blade.
• We describe in details the discharge operation.
• We show the used instruments and the phases of the measuring procedure explaining the chosen method.
• Given the 3D results, we present the step-by-step test results validating the wear rates of the blades.
• We analyze the efficiency of the new blades also in terms of discharge times.
• We present also a new improvement of the blade in terms of materials, as reported in a specific patent.

This paper presents an improvement of a previous work, where the optimization of a two stars’ planetary concrete mixer in terms of wear resistance of blades was proposed and a new design of the mixing blades’ shape was shown and discussed. Authors propose a new validation procedure of the mixing blades in terms of wear resistance and efficiency, based on 3D optical scanners. This new wear measuring procedure is classifiable as a digital wear evaluation method, included in the field of digital tribology. All the steps and results are presented and discussed. In addition, experimental tests and results about the efficiency of the new blade in terms of discharge times are shown. The results demonstrate that the proposed new blade's geometry improves the wear resistance, extends the useful-life and enhances the discharge operation.