FARMING NOTES.

Grey River Argus, 16 May 1922, Page 8

FARMING NOTES.

A GRAIN ELEVATOR OR SILO. (Our Special Reporter.) During a visit to Waimate, your reporter was shown tin- Silo built by a Sydney firm for the South Canterbury Co-operative Flour Milling Association. This elevator reaches a height of 130 feet, and is a conspicuous landmark for miles around. For those of your readers interested in mechanics let me explain its appearance and working. This tower-like structure consists of i four upright concrete cylinder-shaped compartments, these are called silos, the space between the circular compartments forming a fifth silo. Trucks run from the’railway station along a private siding to a platform outside the silo. In this platform is a hopper covered with netting into which Ihe wheat is emptied. Leading from this hopper is the band-conveyer, a rubber band about 12in in width. The wheat is carried along this band, the speed keeping the wheat in the centre with a margin of about 2in on each side. As the wheat leaves the band the dust is caught by a neat contrivance and conveyed by a tube to the outside of the building. The wheat is now carried up the central silo in small containers arranged like the buckets of a dredge. When it reaches the top it is tipped into one of the exterior silos. One of these' may contain Tuscan, another red chaff and so on. The wheat in the exterior silos is unmixed. At tin- top of the elevator is a large saucer-shaped metal plate. Near the edge of this plate ar six holes at regular intervals. By means of a turn-table on a swivel in the centre of the saucer spouts leading to any of the silos or to tin- mill may be adjusted to one of the six holes in the saucer. This contrivance is worked by a wheel at the bottom of the silo, and saves sending up a man to regulate the flow of wheat. The top motor is housed in a room at the top of the tower. This and other motors referred to are regulated from a switch-board at the base of the building in the ground floor. The only means of reaching the top of the tower is by a ladder outside the building. There are five- landing stages to enable tin' climber to rest at intervals. Each of these tall silos is hopper-bot-tomed and may be opened or shut. Above the conveyer-band first described is a. gunge—which regulates the amount of wheat which flows from each silo before entering the mixer. Instead of a spout from each silo there is a screw conveyer, that is.instead of the flat conveyer band already described it is semi-circular with a screw-shaped plate composed of metal passing along iis centre. Thus the wheat is mixed automatically before again passing up the central silo before being conveyed to the mill. This is done by means of a metal pipe supported by metal stays. All the machinery is worked by an electric generator. The main engine is a 45 h.p. suction-gas engine. A 10 h.p. motor drives the top elevator and a 3 h.p. engine works the band conveyer. It. is estimated that the Waimate silo can store 40,000 sacks of wheat. The walls are 7in reinforced concrete. While your reporter was in the office ' some photographs were shown of this elevator and (if the twin towns of Fort Williams and Fort Arthur at the head of Lake Ontario, Canada. Here there are 30 silos capable of handling 500 • bushels in a season. They have a st or- j age capacity of 5(5,000,000 busels. Ele- i vator No. 20 belonging to the Canadian National Railway Elevator Co. has a storage capacity of 10,000,000 bushels.