Belt with criteria small conveyor

Belt Width Criteria for Small Conveyors
Belt width fixing criteria for small conveyors used to feed other conveyors
Quite often we use small conveyors (Approx 10/12 metre length) within building to distribute the material on to the other conveyors both in unidirectional mode or in reversible mode to reduce transfer height. Many a times such conveyors are called beltfeeders, which may not be exact term since the rate is basically set by the preceeding conveyor. Quite often such conveyors or belt feeders are made wider with less speed. We are little confused as to whether such short belts need to be wider than normal with less belt speed or not. Moreover such belts are many times fully skirted to avoid spillage. Now with such belts is it necessaryto consider material shear as in case of hopper. Consideration of shear can make the conveyor very power consuming, although actual case may not be so. It is also noted that in ISO no such method is given to calculate crosssectional area of fully skirted belt. There is another issue that materaial may not be fully spread out in a wider belt from a narrow chute, dictaed by the feeding conveyor, unless some spreading arrangement is provided.
Hence the bottom line is that is it at all benifitial to increase the belt width with reduced speed and consider material shear in power calculation and in the process losing from both sides ?