Magazine The Ukrainian Farmer #3 (171) 2024
For a trading elevator, control of production indicators is one of the main tasks — the company’s profit depends on it.
The Zdolbuniv elevator “Tradex Agri”, which is part of the TradexAgriGroup group of companies, started its work in 2018 and has worked for a full six seasons to date. Corn, rapeseed, soybean, sunflower, barley, wheat, and oats are accepted here. Depending on the season, the share of different crops can fluctuate significantly, but the majority is always corn and soybeans.
It was no accident that the elevator was built in Zdolbuniv itself. The presence of a hub station nearby ensures an uninterrupted supply of wagons. The site was chosen right next to the railway, on the site of the former cement plant. He left a legacy — two concrete silos of 2,500 tons each and a transport gallery. Despite the 100-year-old age, the buildings are operated after modernization — only the type of products has changed.
Construction took place in two phases. After the start of work, routes were added, some improvements were made. For example, they increased the productivity of railway shipments to 175 t/h. To do this, another noria was installed and the conveyor was replaced with a more productive one (the previous conveyor had a capacity of only 100 t/h). Since then, wagons have been loaded simultaneously from two capacities. Subsequently, a floor warehouse with a loading conveyor was built, and another route is planned for this year, which should further increase shipment productivity.
In peak periods, the enterprise can receive 2,500 tons of grain products per day. Two independent reception lines work here, which makes it possible to work with different cultures at the same time. Pre-cleaning is also separate, so preparing cultures for drying or storage is simplified.
The drying capacity is 1000 tons of corn (from 24 to 14% moisture) per day. They work only on natural gas. The total storage volume is 30,000 tons, including a floor warehouse for 6,000 tons, metal silos and two concrete silos of 2,500 tons each, which remained after the cement plant. Also on the territory there are several platforms for storing grain in silos (40 units of 200 tons each).
The main shipment is by rail. Although there has been a shift towards motor vehicles in recent years, the situation is now returning to normal. The proximity of the station provides its advantages: no more than 36 hours are spent on the shipment of the route, and this is despite the fact that the supply front is only 11 wagons.
Taking into account the significant amount of handling and the wide range of grain quality indicators, close attention is paid to its cleaning. The company operates two OLIS cleaning machines: LUCH ZSO-200 drum separator and HORIZONT K-300 flat screen separator.
The drum separator has been working since the very beginning of the company’s existence. It cleans the wet grain before drying – it separates large and small impurities. Up to 1,500 tons can be cleaned per day under any conditions. Grain moisture does not matter – productivity is practically unchanged. Adjustments are made depending on the content of waste admixture: first, the appropriate sieves are selected, then the optimal inclination of the drum and the mode of operation of the aspiration system are selected.
The HORIZONT K-300 flat screen separator, complete with a closed-cycle air separator VSZ-130 before the sieve body and a VSZM-130 air separator after the sieve body, was installed later – it has been working at the enterprise for two seasons. Before that, there were two BCS separators, but they did not give the desired result, so they were rarely used. When the HORIZONT K-300 was installed, all issues related to additional cleaning were resolved. In general, grain is stored in basic quality and does not require additional actions, however, during loading of silos, self-sorting occurs, part of the grain at the bottom of the silos is damaged. Accordingly, there is a need for additional separation. Also, when customers bring dry grain, it is immediately passed through the HORIZONT K-300 separator.
Experience has shown that the HORIZONT K-300 separator separates different cultures well. There was a case where the sunflower was mixed in with the corn, and with the help of aspiration the sunflower was removed – the performance of the machine decreased slightly, but the quality was excellent. Another example of the wide possibilities of the HORIZONT K-300 separator is the cleaning of soybeans from ragweed. The machine performed this task efficiently and quickly. The LUCH drum separator can also perform a similar job, but with significantly lower performance.
The HORIZONT K-300 separator is able to separate a considerable percentage of garbage impurities. Even when its share reaches 15% and above, it is not a problem to reach the basic 2% in one pass. What’s more, quite often at the factory settings, cleaning occurs to a level below 1% of garbage impurities, and it is necessary to partially change the settings in order not to lose weight and money.
During this time, both OLIS cleaning machines performed well. There were no critical problems. Thanks to timely and comprehensive maintenance, it was possible to keep the machines in working order. Operators carefully inspect the equipment and perform scheduled work on time. Therefore, not a single bearing has been replaced in the LUCH separator for six seasons. The places where the grain is received were lined from the very beginning, therefore, the operation of metal parts is also not observed. There were no problems with the HORIZONT K-300 separator either. Employees constantly monitor the condition of the main bearing and perform maintenance.
AN EXPERT SPEAKS
Yaroslav Wozniak, production director
— We tried to load the LUCH drum separator as much as possible, fed grain with different quality indicators, but the productivity practically did not change. Even in the most adverse conditions, the machine worked only 10% slower. And for the most part, productivity, on the contrary, exceeded passport specifications. Everything depends on the settings: the more precisely you set, the more efficiently the separator will work. For example, certain sieves are not always suitable for a certain culture. The size of the grain may differ from what the sieve is designed for, and this requires an additional one laboratory control. Before installing the sieves, we analyze the grain and select it on laboratory sieves. Then the operators go to the cleaning machine and install the appropriate sieves. On the drum separator, two workers change the screen within an hour. In a flat grate, one person does this work in five minutes.
We installed cleaning equipment from OLIS on all elevators of the company. This decision was made because the machines of this manufacturer are competitive with the best analogues of foreign production. There is no point in buying imported cars if domestic ones work no worse. Both quality and performance are at the declared level, and we are completely satisfied with the overall result.
Volodymyr Cheglatonev, commercial director of the OLIS company
— OLIS has been cooperating with Tradex Agri since 2017. During this time, SKO scalpers, drum LUCH ZSO and flat-screen HORIZONT-K separators were installed at the company’s enterprises. I would like to note that the customer thoroughly approaches the choice of equipment. The professional personnel in the TradexAgriGroup team helped not only to build some good elevators, but they made our cooperation with them beneficial for both parties. We visited them several times with the aim of improving the equipment and finding optimal operating modes. Thanks to constant contact, we managed to improve our cleaning machines and bring them to a new quality level.
TradexAgriGroup elevators accept grain of different conditions, so you always have to be ready for changing working conditions. The LUCH ZSO and HORIZONT-K cleaning machines showed themselves as best as possible, meeting the declared quality and productivity indicators. For its part, OLIS as an equipment manufacturer always tries to find the optimal solution for each customer in terms of equipment and options. If necessary, additional aspiration, lining and other useful things are offered that can improve the convenience and efficiency of operation of the cleaning equipment.
Author: Vladyslav Oliynyk
AGRO TIMES – https://agrotimes.ua/article/yakist-iz-zapasom/
