Taking down 2 grain bins... any suggestions?

I am about to buy 2 grain bins. I wanted some advice before I buy them.

Both bins are 21.5' diameter(from what he said, I didn't actually measure them yet) and 8 rings high. I think the rings are 32 inches. One bin has a propane dryer, drying floor with steel supports under it, a top sweep, a center stirring auger, a clean sweep, 6 inch unloading auger, safety ring on roof, ladders inside and out.

The other bin has a drying floor and a 7.5 hp fan, 6 inch unloading auger, safety ring on roof, and ladders inside and out... No stirring auger or any of that.

I can't find anyone with bin jacks, or anyone willing to tear down and reassemble these bins. The only guy I could find willing to do it was from out in Ohio and he wanted $11,400 to take them both down and reassemble and I would have to pay extra for the concrete. He also said he couldn't get to them until november. I found jacks online for $8100.

I really don't want to spend that much as I could buy a new bin for that much with free installation.

How strong are the roofs on these bins? how much do they weigh? I might be able to get a 65 foot, 12 ton crane truck with operator for a few hundred bucks for a weekend. I was thinking that maybe, if the roof was strong enough, and the bin was light enough, I could lift it through the top hole, and unbolt the top 2 rings with the roof, lower it to the ground, then unbolt the roof, then lift it back up, bolt the roof to the next ring, take 2 more off... repeat as necessary... Once the rings are on the ground 2 at a time, I think it would be easy to get them apart sheet by sheet.


Someone told me I could lift the whole bin up by the roof, unbolt the bottom 2 rings, tear apart, then lower the bin, unbolt the next 2 rings, and so on. Is the roof really strong enough to support the whole weight of a 21 foot diameter bin, 21 feet tall? I was also told that the whole thing didn't weigh more than a couple thousand pounds. Are they really that light?

If anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them. Also, if anyone in the lower 48 states has any grain bins for sale fitting the above description, that are already torn down, I might be interested in buying them.

Also... the bins look mildly rusty, they are from 1986, GSI brand, and the guy wants $3000 each, including all the fans and drying equipment. Sounds like a good price for this area, any thoughts?

Thanks,
John

I seriously doubt that you can pick it up by the roof. Maybe with a spreader bar and chains down to the sides. From what I have seen, its almost cheaper to buy new, and doze the old ones, haul them to scappers.

I have built bin jacks, using boat winches and pipe.

They dont weih much ,, but they willl severe a limb if you try to handle it as one piece !! ,,. take my advice ,, YOU WILL NOT KILL NO ONE and damage nothing ,,Take it down in the same order it was put up , GEt some bin Jacks from a bin dealer and hire him or a experinced crew member , remove floor and stirator ,Raise bin off the foundation ,, spray paint number each panel for each ring it belongs to ,and putthe rings back in same order ,if you put each sheet in same order exact ,, the likely hood of boltholes will mate rite back .. you can do this with a letter number system or simply with multi colors of paint on the mating edges of the bin before youtake it apart ,, ,,SOME BINS ARE MUCH HEAVIER guage STEEL on the lowest rinds , remove each ring , and lower it ,, my 1st bin i bought was a goverment bin from the 1930s,,we put new bolts in it,, we considered leaving the top ring and roof intact and hauling it ,, but it was so easy to dismantle the roof and make better repairs we needed to do ,,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoW8HspF_2w

Maybe I'll get these guys to do it...

Be very careful assessing the rust. You could be buying a problem that will only get worse. That would be a pretty high price for a bin of that size in our area, but I am quite a ways from you.

We have moved 2 bins in the last few years. The smaller one, 18', we unbolted the top half and lifted with a truck crane and a lifting device made for that purpose out of a tire. The tire was steel braced and was too big to pull through the top hole. Put the tire in through the side door, hooked the cable to it through the top hole, lifted it up. Needed a crew on scaffolding around the bin taking out the last few bolts and spreading the sheets to release it from the bottom half. Set it on a full-support cribbing structure on a long lowboy, strapped it down, and hauled it a few miles with a tractor. Unloaded the same way. Bisect-braced the top of the rest of the bin with a long thin elm tree cut to length, then lag bolted through heavy plated into the side seams with several lag bolts. Picked with a cable spreader and special brackets made for that purpose. Elm tree kept the shape of the bin. Not as bad a lift, hauled the same way. NO WIND!! Poured the slab ourselves, neighbors borrowed the crane, we moved three that way. Very short haul, though, over back roads, no overheads, could do with tractors so no DOT issues.

The second bin was 21'6". The 6th or 7th person I called finally took the job. The floods here last year caused grain storage issues at the main depots, ethanol plants, and elevators (trains were cut off, two depots in flood area). Everyone was putting up bins, so no bin movers or builders available. We put on a new bottom ring because of some rust on the old bottom ring. It cost 1/2 to 2/3 of new, but it the accessories had been overbuilt when it was new, so we thought it was worth the extra cost. Check your cost of new in your area and add 25% to your original estimate for moving it.

In this neck of the woods there's a guy who can move up to a 21' bin by laying it down on a trailer and driving away with it. He's moved a couple of 16 footers for me. Overhead wires can be a problem doing it this way with a 21 footer.

Like what was said, look for rust very carefully. A bin that's been completely disassembled and reassembled just isn't as good as it origionally was. There's more chance for water leaks and moldy grain stuck to the walls, and that makes rust. Maybe you should price a new bin that holds as much as these two 21 footers. It used to be around $2.00 per bushel for a new 20000 bushel bin with fan(s) ready to go. I'm sure it's quite a bit higher than that now.

I should stress a couple of points. The 18' bin move I described was pretty unique. We would not try that with a larger bin, or one that needed to move a longer distance, or one with any overheads that were of concern. Also, we had special equipment for that type of move. Don't forget to use all new bolts and rubber-backed washers for the rebuild.

There are bin movers that have sprecial trailers, they rear up & strap to the bin, tip the bin on side, and down the road you go.

How far do you have to move, on what roads? Rented 3 bin jacks from the coop, got a Dewalt electric hammer gun, person on the inside with a wrench, person on the outside with the gun, took 2 rings off, lowered onto a car trailer, and drove home. Did 2 bins in one day with a crew of 5 people, only 1 of us had ever done this before. Put a 4x4 across the top and chain down hard to the trailer, soit's clamped down.

You'll likely need to pull the drier stuff out, that might not travel well as is?

--->Paul

GSI brand is a cheaper brand grain bin. I almost fell off of a neighbors GSI bin when the handle on the roof pulled through the thin roof tin. It was just a few years old.

$3000 each is too much to pay and have to still move them. The 6 inch unloading equipment is worth zero on resale. 21.5 foot bins are small ones too. They would not bring much around me here in Iowa. I have seen them sell at sales and they usually bring $1000-1500.

As for lifting them you DON"T lift them by the roof. You go down through the center hole and then have chains hooked to the sides. Then you need cross bracing to keep them from pulling together. I have moved two that we just lifted with a crane. The crane guy had a single ring that had four chains on it. We made angle iron attaching points that we attached to the sides under the bin section bolts. Then we cross braced with 2x6 lumber nailed into an angle shape. We took them into two sections. To get them apart you have to remove all of the bolt around the bin plus two row of the vertical bolts to let the over lap come apart.


I have move several where we just rented a set of bin jacks. We then just took them clear apart just like you would put them up but in reverse. For bins the size you are talking about it will take 2-3 days each to get them down. Then about that to get them back up. That is with 3-4 guys working together. It will take a good long day to get the floor out, fans off, and the bin jacks set. Then it is jut raising it up a little and removing bolts. The roof is the hardest part to take apart or reassemble. You really need a roof jack top do that with safely.

If I was going to move one today that I had to transport very far I would rent jacks and take it back apart. Then buy a new bolt kit and seal kit. The new bolts have plastic covered heads and they don't rust. The seal kit is new tar/rubber seals. If you do this then the bin will be just about as good as new less any rust they may have.

I would not reinstall an 6 inch unload system. When you have the floor out it is simple to update to a larger 8-10 inch unloading system. When we have to load at a slow loading auger with the semis we charge $50 bucks a hour after the first hour. With one hour minimum after the first one too.

For what it's worth, after my father-in-law died, we sold a couple of bins to a State Senator and large farmer, now also deceased.

He and his brother disassembled them to move them, then reassembled them. He told me after the fact there was no way in he11 he'd ever do that again.

I moved two 24 ft dia by 18 tall bins using a crane from the local precast concrete company. Used an old combine tire and rim in the center hole to lift the roof and two rings. (pull most of the bolts out of a vertical seam to allow it to pop over the bottom rib)

Made some brackets to bolt to the side of the bin to lift the remaining rings. Used 4 inch channel iron, some 1 1/4 pipe 4 inches long, split in 1/2 and the pieces were then welded to the channel iron at the rib (or corrigation) spacing. Drilled some holes below each pipe (3 pipes used, top, mid, and near bottom) to fasten the bracket to the bin sheet. Welded some eyes to the inside of the channel iron for lifting.
After the 4 channel iron brackects were bolted to the bin, used some long 3/8 wire rope to make some fairly long slings. Attached one end to the channel eyes, the other to the hook. Did not need to brace the bin as the slings were long enought to not side load the bin sheets very much.

Transport....used an old trailer house frame and made a cross beam. That way, the sides of the bin were supported as well as the front and rear.
Used the lifting brackets to bolt the bin to the trailer frame to prevent the edges from rolling under and bending. Also attaches the bin to the frame so it wont slide off.

You could also use a squirt boom fork lift but you would have to come-a-long the combine tire up into the roof on disassembly and let it down on reassembly.

I used a crane to disassemble and a forklift to assemble. Do it again? forklift for both......

I've helped move a couple unless they are very new they won't be worth the trouble and expense.

I would say they would be worth about 1000 a piece. Maybe less since they are starting to rust. Its going to be a lot of work to disassemble and move.

We have moved several 18 footers by taking them down to the last one or two rings and the roof. Set it on a donahaue trailer and went down the road. Saves a lot of time not to disassemble the roof. Plan on all new bin bolts so thats an expense plus your concrete. Next year you will have to paint them too. We have bin jacks that are A frames with hand winches on them. Ended up using 3 tractor endloaders to lift and lower... much easier than jacks so you just need an attachment bracket to attach to the bin and a chain to the bucket.

Good luck. Its going to be a busy summer.

A friend of mine just had 2 harvestors taken down . The guys that did them put a cable on the top , came down and took the bottom 2 rows out about 3/4 around and then pulled them over.

Chopper is a lot faster. Back in the 70s when the Government sold their bins, a lot of them were
moved here by chopper.