hot corn

bradley martin · Jan 13, 2019

I just read on Agtalk that a huge flat storage building containing between 3 and 5 million bushels of corn is burning in Walnut Grove, Mn. Hopefully it can be controlled before it all is destroyed. That would be a lot of BTUs (and$$$) up in smoke!

flying belgian · Jan 13, 2019

Back in 70s I worked for a bto at the time. He had 200 watt light bulb in each bin. We filled one bin right up to peak which surrounded bulb with corn. At some point someone turned on light and forgot about it. Running aeration fan, after about 3 weeks we smelled a burning smell around yard but could not figure out where coming from. Got stronger throughout day until we realized its coming from that bin. As soon as we shut fans off heat rose to the top and warped the roof sheets. We started emptying the bin but the load out sump soon plugged with lumps of charred corn. Ended up cutting hole in side of bin and let it run out. Spread it out in field and had fire dept. spray it down. Next day cattle feeder came and scooped it up and fed it to cattle. Don't know if he had insurance or not. Quite a loss. 20,000 bushel bin.

paul · Jan 13, 2019

My understanding is the 3 million bu or bigger building has a conveyor trench down under the floor to unload. They believe a bearing got hot on Friday when they were using it didn?t know, and smoldered into today when it was noticed.

They dammed up each end with dirt and flooded the trench to get any part of the conveyor, dust, etc drowned out and cold.

Hopefully there are no hidden hot spots above the floor that will flare up again in the next few days. I would sure not sleep easy.......

That big old private elevator that burned down towards Rochester last year in sub zero wind chills.... think it was owned by a hog operation to make feed.

And a few years ago a large commercial metal bin burned, several 100,000 bu size bin, it smoked for weeks I guess, was all charred black when they got it emptied out. By Mountain Lake.

WW2N · Jan 13, 2019

They use to put grains on barges and dump it in the ocean to keep prices up and or ship it to Argentina offload corn or wheat then load back up with corn or wheat and bring it back because commodity traders need to have something to do.. Maybe they just burn it now. Theres corn laying on the ground around all the elevator or tarped cause the bins are full. Just pure speculation on my part.

oldtanker · Jan 13, 2019

(quoted from post at 19:02:50 01/13/19) They use to put grains on barges and dump it in the ocean to keep prices up and or ship it to Argentina offload corn or wheat then load back up with corn or wheat and bring it back because commodity traders need to have something to do.. Maybe they just burn it now. Theres corn laying on the ground around all the elevator or tarped cause the bins are full. Just pure speculation on my part.

Never heard of em dumping grain into the ocean I was told at one time the government bought up stuff to keep farm prices stable. They said that storage was costing the government millions?

Rick

fixerupper · Jan 13, 2019

I have heard a pound of corn has as many BTU’s as coal. In 1974 a neighbor’s corn crib burned, partly full of ear corn. A John Deere 60 was parked in the alleyway and the rear axle housing got so hot it cracked and sagged till the drawbar came down on the floor.

hot corn

bradley martin

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flying belgian

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paul

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WW2N

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oldtanker

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fixerupper

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