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CASE STUDY – COURTESY OF GRAIN JOURNAL

Railyard Opportunity

OHIO GRAIN HANDLER USES SITE FOR LOADING CONTAINERS, RAILCARS

One last overhead drag conveyor remained to be installed at the new Deerfield Ag Services rail terminal in Massillon, OH (330-584-4715), when Grain Journal visited in early November. But the elevator was already in operation, receiving grain and loading and shipping out containers (TEUs – 40-foot-equivalent units) of soybeans.

“We’ve loaded about 100 to 120 containers through our bulk weigh scale,” says Chief Operating Officer Nate Russo. “So far, it’s just been commercial soybeans, but we plan to load other  commodities, as well, including specialty items like soymeal and distillers grains. Mostly, they’re for export, but some will go to the southeastern states.”

Until recently, a rail terminal hadn’t been in Deerfield Ag’s near-term plans, but the opportunity arose at a 400-acre industrial site near State Highway 21 at Oberlin Avenue.

The location was the site of a huge steel mill operated by Republic Steel. That mill was shuttered around 2007 and torn down (although Republic Steel still has steel bar manufacturing operations elsewhere in Massillon). The property owner, RSL (Republic Short Line) Inc., still operates a short-line railroad that served the old mill and has been developing the property into an industrial park with rail connections to the Norfolk Southern and CSX Transportation railroads.

“They’ll be doing all of our rail movement for us,” Russo says.

Building the Elevator
Gearing up to build a rail terminal was a natural for Deerfield Ag Services.  In addition to operating grain elevators, the company has its own construction division and is a dealer for GSI and Brock equipment. At Massillon, Deerfield Ag was its own general contractor and also did all of the engineering and most of the millwright work.

Also working on the project, M&M Builders, Inc., Bessemer, AL (205-428-7325), constructed the steel tanks, and Graff Electric, Toledo, OH (419-472-7800), was the electrical contractor.

CompuWeigh Corp., Woodbury, CT (203-262-9400), automated the entire facility, including a SmartTruck scale automation and truck routing system, and supplied a 50,000-bph bulkweigher

with CD-4000 automation controls.

Construction on the 520,000-bushel terminal began early in 2017 and was just finishing up in November 2017.

Facility Specs
Grain storage consists of two Brock flat-bottom and two Brock hopper tanks, one each for wet grain and grain ready for shipping.

The flat-bottom tanks stand 60 feet in diameter, 88 feet tall at the eaves, and 104 feet tall at the peaks and hold 222,000 bushels each. They are equipped with outside stiffeners, GSI X-Series zero-entry sweep augers, and BinMaster laser-type level monitors, but no grain temperature systems. A pair of Brock 10-hp centrifugal fans provide 1/7 cfm per bushel of aeration through in-floor ducting in a double-H pattern.

The hopper tanks, holding 40,000 bushels each, stand 30 feet in diameter, 76 feet tall at the eaves, 84 feet tall at the peaks, and 40-degree steel hoppers.

Steve Ramseyer, western region grain manager, notes that these tanks are engineered to handle difficult materials such as distillers grains or soy meal, though they’ve handled primarily soybeans so far.

Incoming trucks are routed to a Gamet Apollo truck probe, where they are sampled and the grain delivered to a dickey-JOHN GAC2500 moisture meter in an adjacent two-story scalehouse for testing. From there, they continue onto a 72-foor Brechbuhler pit-type inbound scale for weighing. Trucks continue to a 1,000-bushel mechanical receiving pit to deposit grain, then move on to a second Brechbuhler outbound scale for tare weight and automatically printed scale ticket.

A 20,000-bph GSI drag conveyor carries grain beneath a driveway to a 174-foot-tall 25,000-bph GSI leg equipped with two rows of Maxi-Lift TIGER-TUFF orange 14×8 buckets mounted on a 30-inch belt.

The leg lifts grain to a seven-hole InterSystems SwingFlow triple distributor.

The distributor sends grain to storage via gravity spout into the hopper tanks or 20,000-bph GSI overhead drag conveyors to the flat-bottom tanks.  The storage tanks empty grain onto a series of GSI 20,000-bph reclaim conveyors running back to the receiving leg and distributor.

One distributor outlet sends the grain via 50,000-bph overhead GSI enclosed belt conveyor to a 50,000-bph CompuWeigh bulkweigher with a CD-4000 controller. There is no cleaner atop the bulkweigher, though there is space to add one if needed, but the bulkweigher spout is equipped with a Gamet sampler for grain inspection. The bulk weigh scale so far has been used to load containers via a portable auger. The ability to generate accurate origin weights helps with this process, since the containers must be loaded to within 500 pounds of maximum rated capacity.

Russo says the facility is expected to begin loading unit trains on the NS and CSX early in 2018. He adds that the current facility is only the beginning in Massillon. The site has enough space to build up to 4 million bushels worth of steel storage.

Ed Zdrojewski, editor

A case study on what it takes to make the highest speed,
most accurate bulkweighing scale system

CompuWeigh has always sold more bulkweighing scale controllers to the grain industry than all its competitors combined. It was only recently however, that CompuWeigh also became the largest supplier of the physical scales themselves. This is because customers recognize that to get the best results, the scale and the controller must work seamlessly together and the best way to ensure this is to have one company take responsibility for both.

Here are some statistics reported by an elevator manager in Kansas who is using the CompuWeigh Bulkweighing System.

• The largest deviation on any car to target weight was 25 lbs
• The total deviation for the entire unit train was only 45 lbs
• Actual loading time was 7 hrs 8 minutes, with 3 hrs 2 minutes for transitioning cars because of our restricted track layout
• Actual loading speed was 62,000 BPH even though scale is rated for 50,000 BPH

What does the Elevator Manager have to say about it?
“Unbelievably Accurate & Fast…… One Great System!”

How do we achieve this kind of performance – There are four main components:

1. Highest Speed
2. Highest Accuracy
3. Most Reliable
4. Continuous Improvement

How do we achieve the highest speed?

Our scale controllers are so fast that the limitation is now the physical size of the gates and the capacity of the weigh hopper. The fact is that most other bulk weighing scale controllers do not fully utilize the potential of a scale. Here are some of the things that we do to improve our throughput:

1. Any time the weigh hopper is not running full drafts, it is losing throughput. Our CD-4000 controller runs through its entire weighing routine 10,000 times a second and is therefore able to immediately react to changing flow rates. This means that we can safely run much larger drafts without any danger of overfilling the weigh hopper.
2. Our system allows the operator to enter an over-ride value allowing the scale to run at a slightly higher capacity if it will save a draft. Since a draft takes approximately 30 seconds, this will often save 10 minutes on a unit train.
3. On the last draft of an order where you need to be extremely accurate, competitive products close the feed gate just before the end, calculate how more needs to be added and then jog the feed gate to meter in the last amount. This takes time and is not very accurate. Our system is monitoring the system in real time and is able to move from the full gate open position, to a partial closed position and finally to fully closed in one fluid motion. In fact our last draft takes no longer than a normal draft yet we are typically within 10lbs of the target weight.
4. Our latest controller, the Compudraft® CD-4000, is over 1,000 times more powerful than our previous model, the CD-3000, which was the Industry’s best selling unit. The CD-4000 completely eliminates the ‘thinking’ time of the previous system and this alone saves 40 minutes on a unit train.
5. Most of our customers use our SmartRead Rail RF system. This eliminates all the time delay of walking the track and entering car numbers and weights into the system. This ensures that the maximum time is available for running the scales.
6. Options like our SmartLoad system completely eliminate any delay between one car and the next, as well as reducing the need for a large upper garner. Typically SmartLoad will reduce unit train load out by an hour.
7. We build our own scales, so we are able to optimize the size of the hoppers and gates, as well as position the level sensors, to optimize throughput.

How are we able to provide the most accurate controller on the market?

1. Our CD-4000 is constantly reacting to the changing conditions of the scale. On a cold morning, the gate cylinders will be working much slower than at the end of a day and therefore the gate closing times will be dramatically different. The CD-4000 is constantly monitoring gate closing times and learns how the scale is operating and adjusts to these changing conditions.
2. The flow rate into the weigh hopper can change dramatically even during a single order. At the beginning of an order, the upper garner may be full of product and therefore the flow rate into the weigh hopper may be in the order of 3,000 lbs a second. Once the scale catches up with the upper garner, the feed rate will slow down to the leg speed, which may be in the order of 500 lbs a second. This dramatic change requires immediate action. Our CD-4000 instantly reacts and has a resolution of 1/10,000th of a second in deciding when to close the gate. Clearly this is well inside the repeatability of the gate closing time.
3. Facilities that are using our CD-4000 report that more than 75% of the cars loaded are within 10 lbs of target weight. We are the only company that is able to control a gate with a maximum throughput of 3,000 lbs a second and control the flow down to within 10 lbs.

Speed and accuracy don’t do you any good if the system isn’t reliable

Not only do we have the fastest, most accurate bulkweighing controller on the market, but it’s also the most reliable. How can we say this?

1. Experience has shown that mechanical devices are more prone to problems than solid-state systems. For this reason our CD-4000 has no moving parts – no hard drives, floppy drives, etc. This is the reason that we are the only company that offers free life-time support on our controller. Others charge $500 to $1,000 a year for this.
2. We love Microsoft Windows, but when it comes to highly reliable real time systems, we have found that it falls well short of the mark. For this reason we only use Windows where it is backed up by an alternative system. For example, should one of our GMS Windows based systems go down, the operator just turns a key switch on the CD-4000 and the operator can continue on – running at full speed, on a full color screen and with a full sized keyboard, rather than alternative systems that provide a small keypad and a tiny screen.
3. To many, the bulkweigher is a ‘black box,’ so when it develops a problem, particularly in the middle of loading a unit train, there is a huge concern – sometimes panic! To solve this problem we have invented a unique product called SmartTech which constantly monitors over 40 things that can go wrong with the scale. Usually we will spot a problem before it becomes a serious issue and show the operator right on his monitor, what the problem is where it is on the scale and finally,how to fix it. In some cases the operator can take care of the problem right away. For more serious problems, the operator is able to tell the scale serviceman exactly what component is faulty so the right part is brought to the site.
4. We also provide the best technical support in the industry. Our staff are knowledgeable about both the physical scale, which in many cases we built, and the electronics so you can get help straight away. We also provide modem support direct to our customer’s controllers so that we can take care of problems, provide updates or show a new operator how to use the system right over the phone. For larger customers, we can provide TCP/IP communications so that support can be provided by a companies internal resources from anywhere in world.

Continuous Improvement
There are two components to this.

Continuous improvement by CompuWeigh. Our whole focus is on designing systems that increase our customers’ productivity while reducing operating costs. Our latest improvement is adding wheel sensors to our SmartRead rail car RF so that we can alarm the operator if there is a car without a tag.

Continuous improvement by our customers. Yes, we actually expect our customers to improve! We provide the managers with the tools to analyze their operations.On the right is an example of a unit train load out graph. From this graph the manager can see exactly how long the unit train took to load and where the problems were.

The manager can then ‘drill down’ to look at a problem car and run a slow motion ‘movie’ of exactly what happened. The SmartTech system is also monitoring the scale and provides a detailed analysis of what the problem is, where it is and finally how to fix it. These are the tools that let a manager improve their operations.

These are some of the tools that really separate us from the rest.

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A Light Harvest Year

LOW VOLUME PROVIDES OPPORTUNITY TO UPGRADE AN ELEVATOR

Kokomo Grain Inc.’s rail terminal in Amboy, IN, which was upgraded extensively in 2003. Photos by Ed Zdrojewski.

Kokomo Grain Inc. in 2002 added 1.1 million bushels of storage space at its Amboy, IN rail loading terminal, in order to accommodate ever-larger harvests without having to pile grain on the ground (covered in the March/April 2003 issue of Grain Journal).

It was a good idea at the time, but Mother Nature had other plans. Dry weather that summer resulted in a smallerthan- normal crop in central Indiana.

Faced with relatively low volumes for 2003, the cooperative decided to take advantage of the downtime to perform some major upgrades at Amboy, says Plant Manager Jeff Ortmann. “It was the best time to upgrade with a minimum of disruption” he notes. So the last weekend in March, we disconnected the motors and started pulling belts out of the legs.

The upgrade involved installing an automation system, boosting leg capacity, installing a higher-capacity bulk weigh loadout scale, and building a new office and truck scale.

Kokomo Grain did its own engineering on these upgrades and supplied much of the labor on the $1-million-plus project. B-P Construction, Sheridan, IN (317-758- 6126) served as general contractor on construction work, and Richard Myers & Son, Russiaville, IN (765-883-8177), performed millwright work. Dever Electric, Livermore, KY (270-278-2116) served as electrical and automation contractor.

During the course of construction, workers utilized a permanent 15-ton crane Kokomo Grain had installed on the roof of the elevator in 2002.

Work was completed in time for the 2003 harvest.

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The Project
Major components of the work done in 2003 at Amboy include:

• Installing a new PLC-based control system incorporating receiving operations and monitoring functions such as grain temperature and bearing temperature. The system tracks bin inventories and automatically routes incoming grain to the appropriate bin via the appropriate equipment.
• Built a new power room above the grain receiving station to house the motor control center for the new automation system.
• Replaced two old receiving legs with new 22,500-bph GSI legs, outfitted with 14×8 Tapco HD-CC low profile buckets on a 16-inch Scandura belt.
• Replaced an old seven-hole distributor with a new Rapat eight-hole double distributor. Replacing the distributor also required the installation of new spouting with Tandem Rhino-Hyde lining at critical wear points.

• Replaced old 7,500-bph wet and dry legs serving the facility’s grain dryer with new, much larger legs that double for both dryer service and as loadout legs. The wet/loadout leg is rated at 18,000 bph with 16×8 Tapco HD-CC low-profile buckets on a 20- inch Scandura belt. The dry/loadout leg is rated at 36,000 bph and features two rows of the buckets on a 35-inch Scandura belt. Both legs are powered by 200-hp WorldWide motors with dual Dodge drives. Before this upgrade, we had to use every leg in the facility to load railcars, Ortmann comments. If a truck brought in a second commodity during rail loading, we would have to shut something down before the driver could dump.
• Installed a 40,000-bph GSI enclosed belt conveyor to carry grain to the bulk weigh loadout scale.
• Replaced an old 30,000-bph bulk weigh loadout scale with a new 60,000-bph CompuWeigh scale. The scale’s Grain Management System software controls the scale via a CD 4000 controller. The controls include CompuWeigh’s SmartLOAD option, which allows the scale to line up accurate drafts before the railcar is in position. Ortmann comments that the new bulk weigh loadout system will allow Kokomo Grain to load 85- car shuttle trains for the Norfolk Southern (NS). (The elevator is located on the Central Railroad of Indiana, a short-line connecting to the NS near Marion, IN.)
• Replaced an old office building with a new two-story brick structure. The second-story scalehouse allows operators to see down inside of incoming trucks. Ortmann says the old office building was prone to basement flooding.
• Installed a new 70-foot Brechbuhler B-Tek pitless truck scale with a Gamet truck probe.

“We’re still working out a few bugs, but overall, everything is working pretty well”, Ortmann comments. Harvest went more smoothly than we expected.

Ed Zdrojewski, editor

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