Silos and hoppers
Pressure of grain, cement or aggregate on walls and hoppers during filling and discharge; fatigue of stiffeners and joints; wear at the outlet.
- Engines
- DEM . Finite elements . Wear
- Standards
- EN 1991-4 . EN 1993-1-9 . IIW


Zytel calculates your part before you build it, with finite elements, particle simulation and wear analysis, and delivers a technical report with the thickness, material and life of each variant.
We calculate the part you already make so that you can decide its next version with data: less weight, another material, another thickness or a new standard to meet.
Vehicles, trailers and agricultural and industrial machinery: stress and fatigue of the welded joints under the service load you declare.
Stress and fatigue of shells, bottoms and nozzles under filling and emptying cycles.
Silos, hoppers, drums and dryers: how the material moves and what load it puts on walls and lifters.
Plates and liners: which wear-resistant steel and which thickness to choose, and how long each option lasts.
The examples on this page are in steel. If your component is made of another material, tell us which one and we will tell you whether we can calculate it and with what data.
Each application is shown with a demonstration: a real calculation we ran on a generic part. The photographs show the type of part; the figures are our calculations.
Pressure of grain, cement or aggregate on walls and hoppers during filling and discharge; fatigue of stiffeners and joints; wear at the outlet.


Shell-to-bottom joint and nozzles: stress and fatigue under fill and drain cycles.


Chassis and bodies: fatigue of the welds on longitudinal members, cross-members and ribs under the service load you specify.


Dryers and asphalt plants: material motion, load on lifters and flights, weld fatigue and shell wear.

Which abrasion-resistant steel and thickness to choose, how long each option lasts and when to replace the plate.


For Baryserv Equipos y Servicios S.L. (Zaragoza, Spain) we have applied the three engines to the truck-mixer drum. The results and the workshop tool are in its private area, with restricted access. Truck-mixer analysis is exclusive to Baryserv.
Baryserv private area
The particle model reproduces the published slump test of the concrete, without adjusting the measured wall friction.
Concrete motion inside the drum and the force on each blade, revolution by revolution.
Blade and blade-to-shell weld variants analysed with finite elements and checked for fatigue to IIW and EN 1993-1-9.
Drum life as a function of steel hardness and thickness, with the uncertainty of each comparison.
In Baryserv's private area: steel and thickness comparison and a log of thicknesses measured in the workshop, in use.
The pilot case ends with a signed report, with professional endorsement when you ask for it, and a delivery meeting.

One analysis engine (DEM, finite elements or wear) applied to your part: load, stress or plate life.
Your part with the engines it needs: material load, stress and fatigue at each weld, and plate life.
How to engage
A drawing or description of the part, its material and how it works.
We send you the scope and timeline in writing, before we start.
We carry out the analysis with the engines agreed in the scope.
We deliver the report in PDF and explain it in a meeting.
Scope and timeline are set in writing in the proposal, before work begins.
Drawings in DXF, STEP or PDF, current steel grade and thicknesses, the material the part holds or moves, and the usual duty cycle. That is enough to prepare a proposal.
Drawings are used solely for this assignment and are not shared with third parties. We can sign a non-disclosure agreement before you send anything.
No. We are an external analysis service. Your design office remains responsible for the design; we calculate and sign the result of a specific analysis.
We calculate to IIW, EN 1993-1-9, EN 1991-4 and EN 14015. The report provides the calculation your technical file needs. Certification is issued by your certification body; we support your certification.
Write to us and we will tell you. If the part is welded steel with a load to calculate or a fatigue life to check, we can most likely help.
Yes. Professional-body endorsement (visado) is arranged when you ask for it.
We say so in the report, with the supporting data. If you ask, we also calculate alternative geometries or steel grades that do comply.
Yes. Reports can be delivered in English, for clients who export and must submit the calculation to their buyer.
Discrete element method: particle simulation
How a bulk material or a fresh mix moves and what forces it leaves on walls, hoppers and blades.
Calibrated against the published slump test (Li et al., 2021): slump 216 mm against 201 mm and spread 439 mm against 449 mm.
Meshing and finite element structural analysis
Plate and weld stress and hot-spot fatigue to IIW and EN 1993-1-9; sensitivity to each input.
Against the exact solution of a cantilever plate, error below 0.3 % with the fine mesh.
Plate life model
Thickness loss by abrasion as a function of steel hardness; plate life and when to replace it; steel comparison.
Fitted to the steelmaker's published chart of wear-resistant grades with R2 0.9976 (a thesis on its drum gives a lower slope); on a steel left out of the fit, the median deviates by 4.8 %.
Today each engine is checked on its own. Feeding the DEM load directly into the fatigue analysis is under development.
The fatigue analysis goes into your technical quality file. Certification is issued by your certification body.
Zytel is a Spanish engineering company founded in 2007 within the Zytech Group, together with the University of Zaragoza. Since then it has engineered electric vehicles: powertrain, batteries, BMS and European and Spanish homologation.
With the University of Zaragoza it developed the Gorila EV, its first electric car, included in the Spanish Ministry of Industry's MOVELE plan, and later the Zylog, one of the first electric cargo vehicles of its kind in Spain. It builds prototypes and runs tests at its plant in La Muela (Zaragoza).
The component analysis offered here applies to your part the same engineering Zytel uses to design its vehicles.
Discover Zytel at zytel.es“It will race with its Gorila vehicle, of its own design and manufacture.”
Heraldo de Aragón, 21 February 2010 (translated), on Zytel's entry in the Zero Race, the round-the-world electric car race.


Zytel submits its calculation models for external review and works with AIXC Research on artificial intelligence applied to materials science.
Zytel is part of the Zytech Group, together with companies in energy storage, solar energy, digital innovation and artificial intelligence research. AIXC Research is the group company that researches artificial intelligence applied to science, including materials science.
aixcresearch.comNearly five decades in technology and innovation; AI researcher since the 1990s. Former EVP at Meta, with senior leadership roles at Microsoft, Samsung and Oracle.
Submitting a paper for review does not guarantee acceptance.
Send us the drawing or a description of the part, its material and how it works. We will tell you what we can calculate, with which data and in what time frame. The pilot case ends with a signed report.
Write to ingenieria@zytel.esPhone: 976 14 18 19