Slatts, am I mad!

[Cmoran]

If you have room you could leave a 3’ passage at the back for extra meal feeding. Personally I find weanlings on slats need a lot of meal to keep them thriving compared to the weanlings in cubicle house with access to woodchip pad

 

[bobajob]

View attachment 1002792

Is that calve creep Gates onto the passage at the back? Where do the calves go?

 

[ridger]

I thought farm assurance won’t allow stock sleeping on slats. I’m sure I remember people on here saying they have to put a sheet over slats and bed with straw for inspections.

Nonsense

 

[jamesy]

Is that calve creep Gates onto the passage at the back? Where do the calves go?

Yes, the passage is 5ft wide & for when calves are young in the spring. Gets bedded.

 

[Xiaomi]

Has anyone used concrete panels to make a tank for slatted floors?

Would not thought they would provide sufficient prevention against leakage. You could put a sealing layer on top, but you'd be saving little or nothing over a poured floor.
In Ireland, Teagasc recommend in some cases to have some drains around the tank funneling into a catch tank in order to check for leakage. Poured floor and sides is the default, and best design.

 

[Xiaomi]

has anyone ever installed slats in an existing shed? I have a 80’s built atcost concrete frame shed in good condition wondering if it’s possible to rip up the floors and put tanks in?

Done a few here. We would always brace the steels to prevent against slippage and not dig too near the walls. As your tank walls will be around 2' - 3' away from the shed edge you need to decide what to do with that space as it will accumulate dung.
What we have done is to taper the shuttering back in towards the wall so that the 2' - 3' of space between edge of shed and tank can be slatted and dung will fall through onto the taper and drop into the tank.

You need a good crew though to do this work - no cheap cowboys.

 

[Xiaomi]

In regards to slat mats there are different opinions on which to get. From what I've heard/read the green comfort mats are the best ones as they do not reduce the area of the slots in the slat for the dung to pass through. Most of the others reduce have some type of wedge which sits into the slots and reduce the space for dung to go down through.

Slat mats would be around £1000 for a 15' x 15' bay.

 

[Xiaomi]

https://www.teagasc.ie/media/website/publications/2016/Beef-Manual-Section8.pdf

 

[Wesley]

Has anyone used concrete panels to make a tank for slatted floors?

We’ve done some this summer. Used 5’ panels as wasn’t really after lots of storage but wanted slatted passageways. Quick & simple way of doing it. 2 men could dig out, put in posts, put in panels & concrete the floor in 4 days for each 100’ x 12’6” tank.

 

[shumungus]

This a great chat and some great ideas and the talk of restrictions year on year.
But how mush i would like to know and how long is the farmer going to a slave for the factorys??

Since always and forever more. It's the nature of the game, a buyer's market.

 

[Xiaomi]

We’ve done some this summer. Used 5’ panels as wasn’t really after lots of storage but wanted slatted passageways. Quick & simple way of doing it. 2 men could dig out, put in posts, put in panels & concrete the floor in 4 days for each 100’ x 12’6” tank.

Why did you decide to use panels as opposed to pouring the floor?

 

[Wesley]

Why did you decide to use panels as opposed to pouring the floor?

You mean pouring the walls? Speed, which usually means labour cost & also less to dig out & back fill, again comes down to money. Labour cost was ultimately the deciding factor. The builders have their own shutters to pour walls but when it comes to shallower tanks they seem to prefer the simplicity & speed of panels.
They even ended up casting their own panels on site for a reception pit as the wait for panels was too long & using their shutters would’ve meant digging out a far bigger hole just to fit the shutters in, or using a lot of plywood.

 

[Xiaomi]

You mean pouring the walls? Speed, which usually means labour cost & also less to dig out & back fill, again comes down to money. Labour cost was ultimately the deciding factor. The builders have their own shutters to pour walls but when it comes to shallower tanks they seem to prefer the simplicity & speed of panels.
They even ended up casting their own panels on site for a reception pit as the wait for panels was too long & using their shutters would’ve meant digging out a far bigger hole just to fit the shutters in, or using a lot of plywood.

Ignore me - I misunderstood @Plas king query. I thought they meant using panels for the floor of the tank.

 

[GSB]

We're doing a tank at the moment with panels. We've got a number other tanks on the farm some poured. Some 50 years old shallow tanks built with brick. A poured tank will always be stronger and was going to be the same price but we opted to go with one local company to do the whole job as not a really deep tank. One advantage doing it this way is the shed is part of the tank so full write off being plant!!

 

[Jones24]

That looks a good way of doing it.. how deep is the tank?

 

[GSB]

That looks a good way of doing it.. how deep is the tank?

2.4m (8ft)

 

[Wesley]

Did they cover the steelwork inside the tank so it’s not exposed to the slurry?

 

[GSB]

Did they cover the steelwork inside the tank so it’s not exposed to the slurry?

Yes they make a shuttered and pour down the side of the post

 

[GSB]

Yes they make a shuttered and pour down the side of the post

 

[Wesley]

Looks a great job Never had a shed with slats before this winter. I love them & wouldn’t mind converting another shed as soon as funds allow.