Construction Trends: Looking to Build? Contractors Share Their Grain Industry Insights

From the November/December 2019 Grain Journal.

Receiving capacities going up

Lawrence Scanlan
Sales Engineer
Frisbie Construction Co.
Gypsum, KS

“We are seeing a continuation of the past few years; it’s driven by the farmers’ increasing capability to harvest more acres faster. The result is more bushels at the elevator. To compensate, our customers need to be increasing their receiving capability. In the past few years, we’ve had requests to increase our older 500-bushel dump pits to 1,000-bushel one-stop receiving pits. This reduces truck unloading times by 1 to 1-1/2 minutes per truck. At the end of dumping 125 trucks in a day, this can equate to an additional 1 to 1-1/2 hours of run time.

“Faster receiving equipment and longer runs of equipment to multiple locations requires automation to ensure proof of grain flow and destination points. This is an asset when considering the difficulty of hiring, training, and keeping skilled labor.

“In our area, we are seeing higher-performance aeration systems along with automation management of the aeration fans. Customers are using these higher-performance aeration systems in an attempt to use their dryers as infrequently as possible. All of our newer temperature systems have included monitoring equipment with line of sight and direct transmitting to site office.

“Along with receiving grain faster, we have gone almost solely to ceramic lining (depending on the application) in the receiving leg head, discharge transitions, distributor, and spouting. Ceramic lining is more durable and has a longer life. I’ve seen millions of bushels pass through these systems, and I can’t tell you that I’ve seen any ceramic lining wear out. It’s possible for ceramic to have small pieces break off, but I’ve never seen any that has worn out.

“Lastly, truck traffic efficiency is becoming increasingly important for customers. Outbound scales, stop light systems, and electronic ticket printers are some of the equipment being used.”

Receiving capacities could top out

Andrew Ellsworth
General Manager
EBM Construction
Norfolk, NE

“What we’ve seen in previous years still holds true today. But what’s interesting is we hadn’t put up a grain dryer for three or four years. But in 2019, we have installed three, so a lot of people obviously saw the need to dry this year and wanted to go about it that way.

“Also, as far as hazard monitoring equipment with leg speed, bearing temperatures, and rub sensors, I’ve seen a lot of people, even at older facilities, who have recognized the value of having the ability to continuously monitor shaft speed, bearing temperature, belt misalignment, and vibration.

“With grain receiving, once you have reached 20,000 to 25,000 bph range, you can’t dump it any faster from the truck. So that’s something we’re seeing more of, an up-tick in multiple dump pits to increase receiving speeds.

“We also have been seeing a lot more radar level indicator units in the past year. Elevators are getting away from using mechanical sensors and using radar instead. We now put radar in every facility we build.

“However, a negative aspect of the increase in technology is that elevators don’t know as much about the equipment. Everything is just operated by the push of a button. It’s getting to where you can run a facility with two people instead of six, and what suffers the most is maintenance and repairs. You still need to know how to diagnose problems with your equipment.

“One last thing is a trend in the handling of organic grains and oilseeds, as well as the cleanout that’s involved. So, between organic, non-organic, and non-GMO products, we’ve had to change some designs and make some modifications for the handling of different commodities. If you’re running multiple commodities through your elevators and don’t clean out your equipment, you will have problems.”

Safety, efficiency reliability

Joe Fink
President
Hogenson Construction Co.
West Fargo, ND

“The vast majority of our work continues to be greenfield facilities, primarily feed manufacturing facilities over the last four years. However, we are once again seeing activity with new grain terminals. I cannot speak to overall industry trends but can speak to our internal trends, which are an increasing focus on safety, efficiency, and reliability in our designs.

“We focus on safety in part by incorporating ease of accessibility throughout, ample area for servicing equipment, and methods of handling heavy loads associated with servicing equipment. Of course, safety devices on all applicable equipment has been a standard for many years. However, suppression systems of a wide variety now are being incorporated within many facilities.

“We’re seeing greater efficiency of operating systems to address the costs of both power usage and providing for minimal manpower requirements throughout the life of the facility. These items are weighed equally in providing a completed facility that delivers the lowest operating costs possible while fulfilling our customer’s needs and expectations.

“Lastly, we’re helping to ensure the reliability of equipment and reliability of the process flow. These items are addressed and provided with heavier equipment running slower speeds and system backups incorporated into the flow by certain systems having the ability to serve two and sometimes three purposes. Both of these factors are weighed with cost/benefit analysis, but many times the three- to seven-year benefit outweighs the cost and is incorporated into the final facility.

Designing facilities for the future

Walt Johnson
Owner
Walt Johnson Construction
Alexandria, MN

“The trends that we saw six or even eight years ago just continue to be the new standard for the industry in that we’re seeing bigger capacity, receiving, larger loadouts, and handling quicker. Increasing speed really is the biggest trend we’ve seen recently. 2019 was my 30th year in the industry, and every year things continue to get larger and faster. Engineering is getting to be really a big part of what we’re doing as well, because a lot of people are designing a little more forward-looking projects, so that maybe they’re not going to put another bin up for 10 years, but they want to have that catwalk sized to add a second conveyor in the future. They’re building for future growth in a way.

“Also, with the technology changing and improving constantly, 10-year-old-knowledge is out the window now, but automation is a really big thing on all the new facilities. They’re all tied together and some people go as far as adding some grain inventory tied into that, temperature monitoring on legs and bearings, plug switches, speed sensors, etc. Everybody’s adding hazard monitoring. When building new facilities, a lot of the focus is on answering these questions: What are we going to do in the future, and how are we going to tie this together if we do another expansion down the road?

“Overall, industry trends have changed a lot, and it seems like somebody is always coming up with a different idea or different way of doing something. For example, guarding is one thing that’s really changed a lot on the safety side – where shafts and bearings used to be exposed, they want them covered now. That’s the new normal. So they’re really trying to be proactive with safety and find the areas on everything that could be potential hazards. Standards have changed a lot, and they continue to shape the trends we’re seeing in the design and construction of grain and feed facilities.”

High capacities, increased safety, more technology

Scott Mitlyng
Sales Manager
J&D Construction, Inc.
Montevideo, MN

“Bigger is better in most cases, whether it’s storage or receiving capacity. The tight margins on the grain elevator side has kind of driven a lot of people to look at low-cost alternatives to storage, whether it’s larger bins or a center pile tower with aeration for piling grain on the ground. Grain piles up to 2 million bushels are becoming quite popular, because they are about a fifth of the price of upright storage. So we’re seeing a lot of emphasis on ground piles, so facilities can take on larger quantities of grain at harvest, store it reasonably, and get rid of it throughout the year.

“There’s also been a big push for a number of years on personal safety, which is good. As a result, we’re seeing a redesign now on access and things like that, and some of that stuff is getting to be big and has been probably a long time coming.

“Another thing we see is technology driving the lack of finding qualified employees. You’ll see a lot of automation at facilities where you can do more with one person and monitor more equipment. The ergonomics of a facility is somewhat taken into consideration already, but what they could do for automation – for stopping, starting, and monitoring equipment – is definitely growing.

“Lastly, we’re seeing a fair amount of companies developing software for monitoring grain condition and some new technology out there that seems to be evolving continuously.”