When The Equity (aka Effingham Equity) purchased a grain elevator at Horace, IL from Ohio-based Coshocton Grain in 2016, the idea always was to continue to expand the facility. It is located in some of the best prime farmland in east central Illinois and west central Indiana, and yields continue to climb ever upward.
It quickly became apparent that what was needed was the cooperative’s second feed mill. (The first is located near company headquarters in Effingham, IL).
Vice President-Feed and Livestock Darwin Wohltman explains that the new Clemens Food Group pork processing plant, 300 miles away in Coldwater, MI, was drawing large numbers of hogs away from the local area. (Wohltman has been with The Equity his entire 30-year career, not counting college internships.)
With several big pork processors located much closer to The Equity’s trade territory, it was only a matter of time before they would need big increases in swine production locally. The Equity would be ready with a big new slipform concrete feed mill at its Horace site.
The coop took bids and awarded a contract to build a $16 million mill, with projected eventual capacity of 450,000 tpy of complete swine feeds, to ASI Industrial, Billings, MT (406-245-6231). ASI is a design-build contractor specializing in turnkey projects from start to finish.
Groundbreaking took place in fall 2016, and the mill began running its first test batches of feed in early February 2018.
Mill Description
The Equity built big with the idea of having room to expand in the future, as feed demand allows. The facility consists of three major concrete sections – a 156-foot-tall mill building on a 63-foot-x-43-foot footprint, a 49-foot-x-43-foot receiving and loadout building, and a 62-foot-x-145-foot warehouse.
Corn is supplied from the adjacent 3-million-bushel grain elevator. The mill is set up to receive other ingredients at up to 300 tph. So far, all of those have come in by truck, but the mill is designed to receive from railcars.
From receiving through loadout, all mill operations are under the control of a CPM/Beta Raven automation system.
Ingredients are sent to 23 ingredient bins inside the mill slip holding a total of about 1,750 tons. The structure also includes four mash ingredient bins holding 250 tons, and the adjacent loadout structure has 24 bins holding a total of 1,200 tons of finished feed. Prior to routing to ingredient bins, corn is ground on a pair of Roskamp Champion 35-tph triple-stack roller mills.
Ingredients drop from their storage bins into the mill’s batching scales via Diamondback spouting and ASI Industrial conveyors. The scales feed a Scott 6-ton double-ribbon mixer. Wohltmann says the mixer can produce 100 tph of mash feeds with a three-minute mix time.
Microingredients are fed to the mixer via a 36-bin Beta Raven micro system including four loss-in-weight bins. Liquid fat and choline also are added at the mixer from ASI-built liquid tanks housed indoors.
Mash feed is pelleted on a 500-hp CPM Model 7932 pellet mill outfitted with a Buhler steam conditioner. The process uses steam produced by a 200-hp Cleaver-Brooks boiler. The mill floor includes space for a second pellet line when needed.
Newly processed pellets then are cooled in a Geelen counterflow cooler before being sent to loadout bins. The Horace mill does not crumble pellets.
All feed produced at Horace is shipped in bulk, as there is no bagging equipment. It takes five to six minutes to load a semi-truck parked on the loadout scale through nine fixed spouts.
Reprinted from Grain Journal March/April 2018 Issue
