Cereals farms electricity use

Example, 1000 tonne on floor with 37 kw fan (for drying)
Do you use the same fan for cooling and how long does it take to get safe for storing until following July?
Basically how many hours is the fan running to get there?
 

shakerator

Member
Location
LINCS
Example, 1000 tonne on floor with 37 kw fan (for drying)
Do you use the same fan for cooling and how long does it take to get safe for storing until following July?
Basically how many hours is the fan running to get there?

Get an inverter for lower speeds

Google affinity laws

Less fan torque required for cooling than drying

Cost saving is percentage of max torque used cubed
 

shakerator

Member
Location
LINCS
Thank you, I am not a student, and I am not interested in your costs or profits, that is your business. A dry year like last probably don't dry so does that mean you have to cool it more?

Storability is a function of moisture and temperature as I’m sure you know .

The energy required to cool is minuscule relative to energy required to remove water vapour. Under your scenario a fan at max output on a cold frosty night or 2 would cool 1000t.

Yes I’m sure last year very little supplemental heat was required to reduce drying humidity....
 
Example, 1000 tonne on floor with 37 kw fan (for drying)
Do you use the same fan for cooling and how long does it take to get safe for storing until following July?
Basically how many hours is the fan running to get there?

How longs a piece of string. How deep are you storing it for starters? Are you going to stir it?

Same fan definitely but you need to make sure the fan matches the size of the tunnels underfloor as well as ensuring the central tunnel is shaped to ensure the air is pushed down it. Get all that wrong and it’ll take months!
 

Lincsman

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lincolnshire
Example, 1000 tonne on floor with 37 kw fan (for drying)
Do you use the same fan for cooling and how long does it take to get safe for storing until following July?
Basically how many hours is the fan running to get there?

If it comes in hot, a few nights blowing at harvest and another blow when frost arrives is all thats needed, (once the frosty blowing gets it really cold you leave it.)...a regular check with your hand in the heap every fortnight just to check its ok is a good idea.
 

Brisel

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Midlands
I have 2 x 50 hp fans on a 2 x 750t underfloor ducts floor store. A Robydome controller does relative humidity drying and has a differential control for cooling. I only use 1 of the 2 fans for cooling left on auto. It usually takes around 15-20 hours to lower the temperature down to 5 degrees.
 

IEM

Member
Location
Essex
Get an inverter for lower speeds

Google affinity laws

Less fan torque required for cooling than drying

Cost saving is percentage of max torque used cubed

Useful thanks I have been thinking about this for a while as our fans are a bit oversized especially for cooling (2 x 30kW/40hp fans for a 1200t store)
If you have an inverter fitted is it just on 1 fan? Does it give you the ability to set the fan at a range of speeds? Even the option to set one fan at half or full speed would be a big help then I’d have 4 fan output options across the 2 fans
 

Brisel

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Midlands
Do the inverters take away the need for star delta starters? That has always seemed like a brutal way of starting a big fan motor. What do you think the payback time is on the inverters @yellow belly ? I appreciate that it will depend on the tariff and charging for peak demand.
 

shakerator

Member
Location
LINCS
Do the inverters take away the need for star delta starters? That has always seemed like a brutal way of starting a big fan motor. What do you think the payback time is on the inverters @yellow belly ? I appreciate that it will depend on the tariff and charging for peak demand.

Yes
Big savings on starting

All depends on your air flow requirement. The savings will come if you can reduce fan speed whilst retaining storage objectives over similar time horizon. I have a biomass heat exchanger so part of the motive for the inverter was to retain flexibility on materials to be dried , eg grain in tray type drying f system, woodchip, ambient heat in building etc ...
The savings are pretty huge if you consider 80% fan speed results in approx 50% power usage drop, 50% speed 88% drop etc
 

shakerator

Member
Location
LINCS
Useful thanks I have been thinking about this for a while as our fans are a bit oversized especially for cooling (2 x 30kW/40hp fans for a 1200t store)
If you have an inverter fitted is it just on 1 fan? Does it give you the ability to set the fan at a range of speeds? Even the option to set one fan at half or full speed would be a big help then I’d have 4 fan output options across the 2 fans

Yes it converts the incoming 60hz ac to DC by capacitors so frequency / speed can be custom dialed. Yes I’m sure t will make your life easier if max load is an issue at times
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

  • 0 %

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    Votes: 30 16.0%
  • 50-75%

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  • 75-100%

    Votes: 3 1.6%
  • 100% I’ve had enough of farming!

    Votes: 7 3.7%

Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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