Over the last 20 years or so, farmers in western Kansas increasingly have switched wheat acreage over to more lucrative and higher-yielding fall-harvested crops such as corn and sorghum.
With higher volumes of grain crossing the inbound scale every year, grain handlers in the region have had plenty of incentive to enlarge their elevators.
That was one reason for Midland Marketing Coop Inc. to double upright storage capacity at its rail-loading terminal on the Union Pacific Railroad in Toulon, KS (785-625-5138), just a few miles from its headquarters in Hays, KS.
The cooperative in 2021 added a row of five McPherson jumpform concrete tanks with a total of 900,000 bushels of capacity, bringing overall capacity at Toulon to 1.8 million bushels.
“We had been turning the elevator 2.2 times per year,” says Central Area Manager Wes Martin. He has been with Midland Marketing for 10 years after earning a general ag degree from Fort Hays State University in Hays. “Now we no longer have to ship all of our wheat out to make room for fall harvest.”
In addition, the cooperative also added a new receiving pit and leg adjacent to the new storage. This additional capacity has sped up truck lines at Toulon, especially during harvest. Now from beginning to end, a truck can deliver a load of grain and be on its way in as little as 10 minutes.
And for now, the project has eliminated the need for a temporary storage pile, which had been averaging between 200,000 and 300,000 bushels most years, Martin says.
To construct the addition, Midland Marketing hired HABCO, Inc., Salina, KS (785-823-0440), as contractor and millwright. The tanks themselves were constructed by McPherson Concrete Storage Systems, McPherson, KS (620-241-4362).
“We have a good working relationship with them for years, as they’ve done other projects for us,” says Martin. “They prepare a uniform site plan. They’re easy to work with, and there’s no problem making changes while construction is underway.”
Groundbreaking on the estimated $6.5 million project took place in mid-November 2020. The new tanks began taking in grain at the start of wheat harvest in July and were expected to be fully operational by mid-November.
Concrete Addition
The five McPherson tanks in the addition come in two different sizes. Three of the tanks hold 200,000 bushels each, standing 48 feet in diameter and 132 feet tall. The other two are only 42 feet in diameter and hold 150,000 bushels each.
The main reason for making two of the tanks slightly smaller was to provide trucks with a little more room for maneuvering their way around the property, Martin explains.
The new tanks are dedicated to storing fall crops, he continues. While fall crops also can be stored in the facility’s old slipform concrete workhouse, that part of the elevator is better suited for wheat, which requires more segregations.
Each new tank has a flat concrete floor, sidedraw spouts, 10-inch Sudenga sweep auger, seven-cable Rolfes@Boone grain temperature monitoring system, and BinMaster radar-type level indicators.
A pair of AGI Airlanco 25-hp fans per tank provide up to 1/7 cfm per bushel of aeration through in-floor ducting.
Grain is delivered directly to the new section through an enclosed 1,000-bushel mechanical receiving pit. A GSI drag conveyor delivers grain to a GSI 19,000-bph leg, which is outfitted with a single row of Maxi-Lift 18x8 low-profile buckets on 7-inch centers mounted on a 20-inch belt.
The leg deposits grain into a Custom Metal Fabricators PowerSelect six-duct rotary distributor with ceramic liner on its higher-wear surfaces. The top of the bucket elevator and distributor is supported by a 12-foot-x-12-foot-x-36-foot APEX Industrial tower that sits on top of the concrete tanks. The distributor, in turn, sends grain out to storage via a set of three GSI 19,000-bph overhead drag conveyors. A fourth 15,000-bph drag runs back to the main workhouse atop an APEX Industrial 6-foot-wide-x-113-foot-long catwalk.
The sweep augers carry grain out to an above-ground GSI 10,000-bph reclaim drag conveyor running back to the new receiving leg.
Outbound Scale
In addition to the grain storage and handling equipment, Midland Marketing also installed a second truck scale. The new one is a 100-foot-long WeighTronix pitless scale for outbound traffic installed by Salina Scale. The scale is run with AgTrax scale automation software, and drivers can pick up scale tickets from a printer next to the scale.
Ed Zdrojewski, editor
Midland Marketing Coop Inc
Hays, KS • 785-628-3221
Founded: 1915
Storage capacity: 12 million bushels at 11 locations
Annual volume: 18-20 million bushels
Annual revenues: $120 million
Number of members: 1,100
Number of employees: 72
Crops handled: Corn, soybeans, sorghum. hard red and white winter wheat
Services: Grain handling and merchandising, feed, agronomy, fuels, service station
Key personnel at Toulon:
- Kevin Royer, president/CEO
- Wes Martin, central area manager
- Dennis Kregar, location coordinator
Toulon Supplier List
Aeration fans • AGI Airlanco
Bearing sensors • 4B Components Ltd.
Bin sweeps • Sudenga Industries, Inc.
Bucket elevator • GSI
Catwalk • APEX Industrial
Concrete • WT Contractors
Concrete tanks • McPherson Concrete Storage Systems
Contractor • HABCO, Inc.
Conveyors • GSI
Distributor • Custom Metal Fabricators
Dust collection system • Donaldson
Electrical contractor • Hammeke Electric
Elevator buckets • Maxi-Lift Inc.
Grain temperature system • Rolfes@Boone
Level indicators • BinMaster
Millwright • HABCO, Inc.
Motion sensors • 4B Components Ltd.
Motors • Siemens
Scale automation • AgTrax
Speed reducers • Dodge
Truck scale • WeighTronix; Salina Scale
