"Doubled Up" Roller Mills Boost Capacity

"Doubled Up" Roller Mills Boost Capacity LIVESTOCK Feeding Equipment 25-1-12 Art Leefers runs high moisture corn through roller mills and then blows it into a bunker silo for storage. To get the job done faster and to keep up with his combine at harvest, the Carlinville, Ill., farmer "doubled up" two roller mills, mounting them side by side on an old combine axle. Trucks unload shelled corn from the field into a swingaway auger which delivers the corn to the doubled-up mill. After the corn has been ground it's unloaded into a second auger, which delivers it into a bunker silo. Leefers used two roller mills made by Automatic Equipment Co. of Pender, Neb. One mill was originally a portable, pto-driven model. The other was an electric-driven stationary model that Leefers had been using to process whole shelled corn out of his Harvestore silo. "When I quit using the Harvestore, I decided to put the two mills together," he says. The stationary mill was equipped with a large 4-groove belt pulley. Leefers bought another 4-groove belt pulley and mounted it on the pto shaft on the pto-driven mill, then belted the two pulleys together so that both mills drive off the portable model's pto shaft. An idler at the bottom keeps the belts tight. He removed the tongue and axle from the pto-driven mill, then used 4 by 4-in. sq. tubing to build a frame big enough for both mills and mounted them side by side on it. Then he bolted the frame to the rear axle off an old Deere 95 combine and mounted a new tongue on it. He used sheet metal to build a 50-bu. hopper above both mills. Each mill was originally equipped with a bottom-mounted horizontal auger and gearbox that came out the back. Leefers lengthened the augers so they extend about 3 ft. behind the unit. He added a square steel spout at an angle onto the ends of both augers so they direct the corn together into a pile. A 10-in. dia. auger takes the corn from there to fill the bunker silo. Leefers mounts an aluminum hopper behind the machine in order to meter inoculant into the high moisture corn as it's unloaded into the auger. "It lets us grind about 1,200 bu. per hour. New commercial roller mills with comparable capacity sell for $20,000 to $30,000. I couldn't justify paying that much money for a machine that we only use for a week or two each year." Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Art Leefers, 21490 Cascade Road, Carlinville, Ill. 62626 (ph 217 854-3257).

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