|
Bin prices
Sept 20, 2023 16:37:26 GMT -6
via mobile
Post by meskie on Sept 20, 2023 16:37:26 GMT -6
We did pretty much what you said. No problems with it yet. Some bins only have 6” of base gravel in spots. Just the way it worked when we did the final grade. I prefer smaller pit run for on top of the clay Also going to matter how your clay is. Ours is good solid clay with stone in it and a layer of gravel also. When they put the highway through the foreman told grandpa that was the some of best clay he had ever used to build a road with.
|
|
|
Bin prices
Sept 20, 2023 17:15:26 GMT -6
via mobile
Post by Oatking on Sept 20, 2023 17:15:26 GMT -6
Ordered a couple 10,000 hoppers with skids. What does a guy need for a base under that? I’m thinking of going down to the clay, then a layer of oversized rock then a foot or so of A base. Would that be sufficient? I’ll get some specs on what I need from the guy, just thinking ahead. Eventually put them on cement but that won’t happen this year. 18 inch solid concrete pad . Think the one pad I had a problem with was the concrete was kinda like honey comb. I think that is what they call it. So far it’s still useable and will last my farming time . I haven’t had problems with sinking or the bins moving . All I have done for my hoppers is by simply put down 2 inch down limestone and pack it overtop of our clay top soil . To be honest I do have two small Behlen hoppers that have tilted just a bit. Dad said it was because after the 1979 flood they were built on a filled in pond . Next year I might try a company from winkler that drills holes in the concrete and injects an epoxy sand mixture to lift the bin and level it. Pads are in good shape . Might give it a try.
|
|
bigal
New Member
Posts: 37 Likes: 26
|
Post by bigal on Sept 20, 2023 21:47:52 GMT -6
Ordered a couple 10,000 hoppers with skids. What does a guy need for a base under that? I’m thinking of going down to the clay, then a layer of oversized rock then a foot or so of A base. Would that be sufficient? I’ll get some specs on what I need from the guy, just thinking ahead. Eventually put them on cement but that won’t happen this year. 18 inch solid concrete pad . Think the one pad I had a problem with was the concrete was kinda like honey comb. I think that is what they call it. So far it’s still useable and will last my farming time . I haven’t had problems with sinking or the bins moving . All I have done for my hoppers is by simply put down 2 inch down limestone and pack it overtop of our clay top soil . To be honest I do have two small Behlen hoppers that have tilted just a bit. Dad said it was because after the 1979 flood they were built on a filled in pond . Next year I might try a company from winkler that drills holes in the concrete and injects an epoxy sand mixture to lift the bin and level it. Pads are in good shape . Might give it a try. You might want to give Sentry Concrete Lifting a call. They use a high density foam in a similar way to lift and level concrete. www.sentryconcrete.com/
|
|
|
Post by Oatking on Sept 20, 2023 21:55:23 GMT -6
18 inch solid concrete pad . Think the one pad I had a problem with was the concrete was kinda like honey comb. I think that is what they call it. So far it’s still useable and will last my farming time . I haven’t had problems with sinking or the bins moving . All I have done for my hoppers is by simply put down 2 inch down limestone and pack it overtop of our clay top soil . To be honest I do have two small Behlen hoppers that have tilted just a bit. Dad said it was because after the 1979 flood they were built on a filled in pond . Next year I might try a company from winkler that drills holes in the concrete and injects an epoxy sand mixture to lift the bin and level it. Pads are in good shape . Might give it a try. You might want to give Sentry Concrete Lifting a call. They use a high density foam in a similar way to lift and level concrete. www.sentryconcrete.com/Thanks big Al !
|
|
joru
New Member
Posts: 22 Likes: 7
|
Post by joru on Sept 21, 2023 6:18:23 GMT -6
We have used this company out of Winnipeg. www.muddruckers.ca/ They told me they have done big grain bins in the past. We have used them for a small concrete pad with a 1500bu Hopper on top. It worked out really good and goes quick.
|
|
|
Post by kevlar on Oct 31, 2023 20:37:10 GMT -6
Gotta say, these guys are lot more committed to their jobs than I would be! They showed up Saturday to start building, it’s been cold, crappy, snowy and windy since they started, but they are doing a good job. They took the morning off today and by 4 o’clock started putting the first bin on the cone, I thought they’d call it a day after that. Took the kids trick or treating and when we got home they had the second bin on the cone and were bolting it down, at 9:30 they are still out there. Just have to finish up the steps which I assume they will do in the morning.
|
|
|
Post by northernfarmer on Nov 1, 2023 3:53:23 GMT -6
That does not look like good working conditions for anyone that has to take their gloves off to handle cold steel hardware, I have no idea how they can deal with that. I am curious as to what crane that is, is that a type of commercially built crane as its certainly not a westfield design and probably would never have the rating anyway to lift a bin like that. Is that crane hydraulically lifting the bin with that long long ram or is there a winch system as well that I can't see. Assuming its being lifted by the roof lid area, I am surprised it can withstand that load from a bin that size. I am guessing the hoppers on bases and any aeration system installed and were already skidded into place before this bin crew came along or did they do that as well. In any event there are your two bins and am assuming by sometime today they will be ready to use.
|
|
|
Post by kevlar on Nov 1, 2023 7:02:10 GMT -6
It’s a crane that a Coop had in southern Manitoba, a farmer bought it and rents it out to the bin crews. The hydraulic cylinder lifts the crane, the cylinder is off a end dump trailer, works pretty slick except the oil is cold in the morning and they have to heat it with a torch to get things going. My brother and I built the flat bottom 10,000’s and the crane we used had a cable and I think this one is a lot more stable without 30 feet of cable blowing in the wind. I’m not sure but this might be as big a bin that can be lifted by the roof, to get it on the cone there was only a couple feet of room between the tires and the cone.
They didn’t leave until 10:45 last night, I know he said they had a few more jobs to do yet before winter. We’re going to get them each a gift card or something for having to work under these conditions.
|
|
|
Post by kevlar on Nov 1, 2023 7:29:41 GMT -6
I forgot to mention, the cones came with the air already installed, we built the pad and have one tamped down, never had time to get the second one done but also wasn’t too eager to do it in case we had to move it a bit. Kind of impressed by myself, levelled the pad with our loader and the tilt cylinder seems to have puked out a seal so wouldn’t hold its position, making the job a lot tougher. Dragged the cones onto the pad, one only had to come up a couple inches on the south side, level east to west, the other cone dragged some gravel under one side when we moved it so shuffled it back and forth a few times and it’s only off a couple inches as well! All this was done by eye and no laser level!
|
|
|
Post by meskie on Nov 1, 2023 7:29:53 GMT -6
They used a westeel style crane for our 2406 bins this summer.
|
|
|
Post by northernfarmer on Nov 1, 2023 18:36:07 GMT -6
It’s a crane that a Coop had in southern Manitoba, a farmer bought it and rents it out to the bin crews. The hydraulic cylinder lifts the crane, the cylinder is off a end dump trailer, works pretty slick except the oil is cold in the morning and they have to heat it with a torch to get things going. My brother and I built the flat bottom 10,000’s and the crane we used had a cable and I think this one is a lot more stable without 30 feet of cable blowing in the wind. I’m not sure but this might be as big a bin that can be lifted by the roof, to get it on the cone there was only a couple feet of room between the tires and the cone. They didn’t leave until 10:45 last night, I know he said they had a few more jobs to do yet before winter. We’re going to get them each a gift card or something for having to work under these conditions.
I wonder if that is a one off crane or something that was certified in some form or another and a few produced. I assume since the ram does the lifting, that means the bin is moving towards the crane wheels as the bin goes higher ?. We had some bin issues happening on some small hopper bins due to aeration use, peas was the worst offender of trying to pull a bin down with wheat the next in line as some of these bins of the past were never designed strong enough for the forces of shrinking grain and peas caused some of the corrosion factor at the bottom of the bin wall to hopper bolt ring. Anyway it seemed very hard to come by a bin crane as UFA used to own a few of them and they sold them all off years back because of liability reasons I was told as well as the higher ups coming up with some major check list they would have to go through each and every time they rented one out. So we bought a used westeel unit that a farmer had up for sale two years ago on his retirement auction and he bought it years before from a coop that sold it so he could put some existing flat bottoms onto hoppers.
I know there were some copycat units out there that looked a bit like a westeel but were even more questionable, certainly the westeel cranes lifted a lot of smaller bins over the years but somehow I did not think they were rated for lifting bins this large. Do you recall if the unit you used had two winches, one that was only meant to bring the crane up into working position and a cable looped around on ears on the main frame to support the actual weight of a bin lift, and the other winch then ran the main lifting cable and used a travelling block ( another words a large snatch block ) to double the power and half the cables stress. There was an early version out there that they made that had one winch and it had to be used to put itself into lifting position and then do the lifting, it was not near as user friendly and I used one of those years back. Both had extendable axles that have to be extended to make them so called "safe" to lift a bin. Its all rather nerve racking because of being so vulnerable to wind when building a big sail that is not bolted down to an anchor. We still have this westeel crane here, just curious what it can be safely pushed to in bin size and to reach up high enough to get on a hopper. Any idea just how tall your two hopper bins are in their finished state ?
|
|
|
Post by northernfarmer on Nov 1, 2023 18:48:36 GMT -6
They used a westeel style crane for our 2406 bins this summer.
Do you have any idea what the weight is of a 2406, and I assume those bins went onto hoppers ? . I am just surprised it could lift it high enough or have the reach and not hit the bin eve when lifted all the way up ?
We had even contemplated buying a new crane if we could not round up one although we did not want to get a new crane for the limited amount of use we had for one, and westeel as I found out sold their plans .. jigs or anything they had to a company called CIM industries which makes grain truck boxes, gravel boxes, trailers and so forth. They don't have a call to build that many cranes anymore but that was the only company I was steered towards that anyone I talked to knew of. Of course a large picker truck/crane would be the ultimate answer but a few hours of that on standby and could buy a new "farm grade" bin crane !.
The westeel crane was sort of a green, very close to the wheat pool green colour. The CIM crane I believe is blue, its not that special green colour anyway.
|
|
|
Post by kevlar on Nov 1, 2023 19:12:53 GMT -6
It’s a crane that a Coop had in southern Manitoba, a farmer bought it and rents it out to the bin crews. The hydraulic cylinder lifts the crane, the cylinder is off a end dump trailer, works pretty slick except the oil is cold in the morning and they have to heat it with a torch to get things going. My brother and I built the flat bottom 10,000’s and the crane we used had a cable and I think this one is a lot more stable without 30 feet of cable blowing in the wind. I’m not sure but this might be as big a bin that can be lifted by the roof, to get it on the cone there was only a couple feet of room between the tires and the cone. They didn’t leave until 10:45 last night, I know he said they had a few more jobs to do yet before winter. We’re going to get them each a gift card or something for having to work under these conditions.
I wonder if that is a one off crane or something that was certified in some form or another and a few produced. I assume since the ram does the lifting, that means the bin is moving towards the crane wheels as the bin goes higher ?. We had some bin issues happening on some small hopper bins due to aeration use, peas was the worst offender of trying to pull a bin down with wheat the next in line as some of these bins of the past were never designed strong enough for the forces of shrinking grain and peas caused some of the corrosion factor at the bottom of the bin wall to hopper bolt ring. Anyway it seemed very hard to come by a bin crane as UFA used to own a few of them and they sold them all off years back because of liability reasons I was told as well as the higher ups coming up with some major check list they would have to go through each and every time they rented one out. So we bought a used westeel unit that a farmer had up for sale two years ago on his retirement auction and he bought it years before from a coop that sold it so he could put some existing flat bottoms onto hoppers.
I know there were some copycat units out there that looked a bit like a westeel but were even more questionable, certainly the westeel cranes lifted a lot of smaller bins over the years but somehow I did not think they were rated for lifting bins this large. Do you recall if the unit you used had two winches, one that was only meant to bring the crane up into working position and a cable looped around on ears on the main frame to support the actual weight of a bin lift, and the other winch then ran the main lifting cable and used a travelling block ( another words a large snatch block ) to double the power and half the cables stress. There was an early version out there that they made that had one winch and it had to be used to put itself into lifting position and then do the lifting, it was not near as user friendly and I used one of those years back. Both had extendable axles that have to be extended to make them so called "safe" to lift a bin. Its all rather nerve racking because of being so vulnerable to wind when building a big sail that is not bolted down to an anchor. We still have this westeel crane here, just curious what it can be safely pushed to in bin size and to reach up high enough to get on a hopper. Any idea just how tall your two hopper bins are in their finished state ?
If I remember correctly it just had one winch and cable, winched it up to the height we needed, looped a cable over a hook that held it at that height, then let the cable out to put put into the bin. The bins we just put up are 2406, they said with that crane they could have gone one more ring. I thought they were lifting by the roof but he told me today that they only do the first 4 rings like that then they used lifting cables inside, not sure how that works?
|
|
|
Post by kevlar on Nov 1, 2023 19:26:24 GMT -6
Also wanted to give a shout out to Certified Grain Bin Builders out of Killarney Manitoba. This crew did an incredible job, especially under the conditions they had to work under, cleaned everything up really nice and were just great people to talk to and work with. I was expecting them to want me to help doing some things like moving the tractor or running the loader to move stuff around. Just before they came I got the loader going and brought over one roof but just left it on the forks because I wasn’t sure where they would want it. I ran home for a little bit and thought I’d notice them come in the yard then go help them get started. Guess I missed them come in then went out and could hear them. I went over and they already had everything moved to where they wanted! Then a bit later they had the tractor going and hooked up to the crane, they had everything plugged in when they left for the night. I literally didn’t even need to be in the country for them to do this. I told them to help themselves to anything in the shop they needed. Turned out they needed a tiger torch so they found it and got it done! Really nice when someone takes full control and you don’t need to worry if something goes wrong because you know they can handle it. Already told them to come back next summer to do a couple floor sir kits we have for our other 10,000’s. Good job guys!
|
|
|
Post by northernfarmer on Nov 1, 2023 20:12:19 GMT -6
It is very possible it was one of the older westeel cranes you used or one built similar to that concept. Then they did that redesign to make it possible to reset the crane height as long as there was no weight on the main crane winch cable and just a lot easier period to go from low height transport behind a tractor to lift position. Also in that redesign they added a jib to the top, it looks like a beak sticking out as one way of explaining it, that allows it to reach out just a bit further when the crane is set in the lifting position. The axles sliding in and out are the worst part to deal with but those can stay out if on gravel roads going a short distance. I will say though that my bit of experience towing them and talking to a bin building outfit down in southern Alberta that had one for sale on an RB sale confirmed how it is, they are not nice to tow at any speed if there is any roughness at all to the road and imagine it has to do with the fact that there is almost no hitch weight in transport. He said with his newer half ton ford pickup because its lighter due to being aluminum was just down right scary and just about had a bad accident as it was pushing him around after hitting a bump. Of course packing weight in the back of any pickup would help but pulling it with a dually for example and crap in the box or a deck with stuff on it would tame it down. Hard to find any smooth pavement around here it seems !.
I am not sure either how that works with lifting cables inside, I would think they would have to either have quite a few cables attached all around the bin or a cable lifting from two points on opposite walls with a pole across the bin to keep the bin from collapsing. Too bad you were not able to see that but I know how it is, one can't be standing there breathing down their back as they have a job to do and can't be distracted.
Also any idea what they used to work off of to reach the hopper cone edge to wall seam bolts inside the bins ?
|
|