How much can Pedestal fans reduce moisture?

[Zippy768]

As above. How much - if any - can well placed fans reduce the %?
Any good reversing the fan and blowing air in on a warmer day?
Just thinking out loud.
No drier and destined for 3rd party store.

Tia

 

[farmerm]

I would say sweet fa...

 

[chaffcutter]

When we were storing OSR in a big bulk aerated and cooled with pedestals, over the storage until spring the average m/c dropped by about 1% iirc, so there is a drying effect but it is very slow.

 

[Against_the_grain]

Nothing worth counting on imo

 

[David.]

Can you vent the fans to outside the building, that will help a bit by stopping the damp air circulating through the heap.

 

[Zippy768]

Ok, appears little affect can be achieved.
Not even by fanning dry/warmish air in on a *cough* nice day?

Can you vent the fans to outside the building, that will help a bit by stopping the damp air circulating through the heap.

Building is 45foot depth and 100 foot open front, so would had thought ventilated well.

Usually do the majority of hauling to store in September after harvest.

 

[David.]

The turbulence off the doves wings ought to move the air around a bit then

 

[Brisel]

You'd want a lot of air and close spacing on the pedestals to do any kind of drying or there just won't be enough airflow.

 

[MikeNeaverson]

I take up to 1% out with pedestals most years. Want putting at 8ft spacings and one of the larger fans on most of them permanently to do any good. Also good airflow though the shed to bring in dry ambient air.

It can be done, but the higher the moisture, the earlier you need to do it to get drier, warmer ambient air.

 

[Against_the_grain]

@Farmer.sa

 

[Grass And Grain]

I take up to 1% out with pedestals most years. Want putting at 8ft spacings and one of the larger fans on most of them permanently to do any good. Also good airflow though the shed to bring in dry ambient air.

It can be done, but the higher the moisture, the earlier you need to do it to get drier, warmer ambient air.

I agree with this. Need some nice dry days to achieve anything. 4 or 5 hot days on each pedestal seems to take 1% out in my experience.

 

[jrss]

As above very very little as just not enough airflow. We went down the full Lishman route pedestals with thermostat rh control and heaters on fans etc. Waste of money and time as will not dry wheat more than 1% having been told it would.
Very weather dependant temp/RH values.
All they are good for is conditioning wheat and keeping it stable.
Proper on floor system now and what a joy it is compared to pedestals.

 

[fermec860]

As above very very little as just not enough airflow. We went down the full Lishman route pedestals with thermostat rh control and heaters on fans etc. Waste of money and time as will not dry wheat more than 1% having been told it would.
Very weather dependant temp/RH values.
All they are good for is conditioning wheat and keeping it stable.
Proper on floor system now and what a joy it is compared to pedestals.

What do you mean whith a proper on floor system

 

[Zippy768]

Ok, would appear not possible to reduce moisture significantly in a short time.
Was just a thought with blowing air in rather than sucking.
Fans are placed 7 foot apart and have noticed in the past that moisture% has dropped a little on delivery to store, maybe 1% - as others have experienced.
We dont alternate sucking/blowing maybe looking at brisel's graph we should.

Will wait for the sun to return

 

[Farmer.sa]

We have just taken 2% moisture out 16.7-14.7 with Lishman rh controller 10 foot high with pedestals 4m apart 3m from walls, 3 phase fans sucking.
Not sure if this was just luck as have never tried to dry grain with pedestals only ever cool, IMO the only way to dry would be with a RH controller as early as you can while humidity tends to be lower.
To be fair to Lishman’s they only ever told us you could take out about half a percent, controller set 72< RH for 10 days not sure how long the fans where running for though

 

[Flat 10]

@Clive flogs them doesn’t he? Surely he has experience/recommendations?

 

[willy]

The beauty with pedestals is I find that you can cut wheat at high moisture and stuff it in a barn quickly without stiffiling out put of the combine. And then you can dry at you leisure over winter. So for me pedestals are great.

 

[Clive]

As above. How much - if any - can well placed fans reduce the %?
Any good reversing the fan and blowing air in on a warmer day?
Just thinking out loud.
No drier and destined for 3rd party store.

Tia

Will depend on ambient air temp and humidity - they are great for conditioning and cooling but not really vet effective dryers

With the right air though they wiill dry - to get that air some sort of RH control is required really. You can also buy heaters for the fans but probably a pricey way to dry then

Pollycool and metacool both available via TFF farm marketplace along with fans and hot spot spears etc

 

[DrWazzock]

They are just for cooling IMO. Any drying effect is a side effect and insignificant.

 

[jrss]

What do you mean whith a proper on floor system

Central tunnel, hard wood floors, gas modulator and a fan that has the air volume needed to dry grain.
The problem as I said with pedestals is that unless you have low RH and a decent ambient temperature they will only dry a small amount around the tower.
I was mislead and learnt an expensive but valuable lesson. If you want to dry airflow is king.