Using Old Shed For Bulk Grain

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31262, 7 January 1967, Page 8

Using Old Shed For Bulk Grain

“I am interested in getting the maximum amount of storage for the smallest amount of money,” says Mr R. W. Fletcher, of Otaio, South Canterbury, discussing the conversion of a hay barn and implement shed to hold some 200 tons of bulk wheat.

The project has been made possible by a State Advances loan to renovate the shed and cover the purchase of an auger and drying fan. The corrugated - ironsheathed shed measures 60ft by 20ft, and it has been strengthened for its new role by 18 sections of railway line, which have been sunk about two feet into the- concrete poured for the floor but which still protrude about Bft 6in above floor level. Sixinch by two-inch timber on edge has been used to provide the framing of the four bins which will be lined with corrugated iron. The railway lines will be tied together across the top to give added

strength. The floor of the bins will consist of six-inch by one-inch slats, an inch apart, laid on four-inch by two-inch timber about a foot above the concrete floor sitting on fourinch by two-inch timber piles. In two bays the gaps between the floor slats will be covered by slotted tin strips supplied by a Morven engineer and air blown under the floor from a non-overloading fan supplied by a Waimate firm, will pass through these slots and up through the wheat. By way of comparison in the other two bays the gaps will be covered by hessian. As a precaution against dampness, the surface of the

concrete floor and the concrete blocks laid on the floor to seal off the bin areas to facilitate drying have been treated with a damp proofing preparation painted on the surface. With the wheat level in them it is estimated that the bins will hold about 46 tons of grain, but by coning up the wheat in the centre Mr Fletcher expects to get about 50 tons of wheat into each bin.

Mr Fletcher is doing most of the work himself and expects, that apart from his own labour, with the shed valued at about £5OO before the conversion, to end up with a shed costing about £llOO to £l2OO to store 200 tons of grain, all of which can be dried if need be. In a season he says that storage increments could bring in as much as £5OO, which is not far short of the additional cost involved.

This season he has got 125 acres in wheat as well as 24 acres in linseed, eight acres in peas and six acres in barley.