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Feed weighing systems

by Lukas Bruijnel and Tim Broeke, KSE Process Technology

he design of a premix, compound

feed or petfood production facility has
one main goal: how to get all the raw
materials into the end product(s); of
course in an accurate, time- and costefficient and flexible fashion with the
desired capacity and footprint, while
respecting any contamination groups.
And last but not least, within budget.
So theres of course a lot more than just the one goal while
designing the ideal process. That always makes for an interesting
discussion on how to approach the design, since everyone
in the production process has his or her own approach and
requirements. Perhaps the three most important are nutritionist
requirements, production requirements, and (of course)
commercial requirements.

Nutritionist requirements

Nutritionists need a wide variety of raw materials to be

available 24/7 to dose a large selection of recipes automatically
of course with minimum manual interferences and maximum
accuracy. This allows the nutritionist to produce specialised
formulas without manual dosing, and a lot of different materials
readily available.
Developments in nutritional science are producing more
efficient compound feed and feed additives (premixes). They are
also however increasing the demand for faster, more accurate
and cleaner dosing, transport and mixing equipment. Generally
speaking, there are nowadays more ingredients and often small
doses.

Production requirements

Process requirements depend strongly on the type of production

facility. Whereas a compound feed facility may focus on
output and efficiency, a dedicated premix facility might focus
on maximum flexibility in exotic or customer-specific premix
production to serve demanding (niche) markets. This may allow
longer batch times, but require more ingredients per dosing
installation, and the ability to dose small and large components
from a single silo. Flow characteristics of ingredients are often
poor, and hygroscopic materials need to be treated carefully.
This indicates different design parameters for storage and dosing
equipment. Additionally, these ingredients often are considered
difficult for health and safety and should be handled with much
care. Minimal operator contact is therefore another issue to face
when design a best in class plant.
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Many larger compound feed facilities are adding a dedicated

premix line, bringing the supply of the most popular premixes
in house and thus creating flexibility for themselves. That not
only shortens lead time, it also provides a significant economic
advantage. Depending on demand, in-house production can also
dose in-line, dosing the various additives directly into the mixer.
Some plants find it more efficient to create larger quantities of
premixed additives and carriers in one go. Doing so allows larger
dosing sizes, and the production of premix when time is available
(not inside the batch time of the main process). Additional storage
might provide a challenge here, but again each different process
and facility will have to prove which way works best.

Commercial requirements

Commercial requirements include delivering a range of

products with as short a lead time as possible, with low capital
and operating costs, and without compromising quality. In
our experience, the best starting points for a process design or
redesign are a thorough analysis of (realistic) wishes, with a
good balance of nice-to-have features and future-proof design.
Dont overdo the nice-to-have and future-proof parts, though. The
optional extras might tick all the boxes, but blow up your budget
all the same.

Weighing-design

It appears that also the design of a weighing construction needs

much attention in this process. It still happens frequently that
not all the products end up directly on the scale, but (partly) on a
funnel to the weigher. This gives false measurements and product
mix up in the process.
The weighed product should be dosed directly on the scale, and
in such a way that there will be no leverage effect. Leverage

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will occur when, for example, the product
arrives on the extreme side of the scale,
by which the scale exerts a torque on a
load cell. And of course, a scale should
have sufficiently weight before the product
is weighed. That sounds obvious, but in
practice it is sometimes forgotten.
In our years of experience, we have seen
it all from dosings of <1kg on a 2000
kg scale to influences of hammer mills
vibrating the weigher up and down to even
ladders or equipment hanging directly on
the weighing surface.
The most common error, without a
doubt, is insufficient ventilation. The air
which is moving by the to be weighed
product, must be able to escape without
disturbing the weighing. A flexible sleeve
of filter cloth (which is often nearly
closed) is insufficient for the venting. By an influx of for example
50 kg/s wheat, 75 liters/s = 270 m3/hour of air must be drained.
Otherwise this will again give over pressure in the weigher and
give an under dosing or very long dosing time. Another important
design point is the emptying of the scale, which should be smooth
and complete (without residue).

Electronics

The quality of a weigher in electronic aspect depends on the

quality of the applied weigh cell (load cell or force transducer)
and invertor (digitiser or indicator). In both cases you need
to pay attention to the sufficiently large weight range (taking

into account a certain overload) and distinctiveness. This

distinctiveness determines the smallest possible weighing unit.
A distinctive character of for example 3000 steps take into
account 20% overload 2400 steps remains for the actual
weighing range. This is for a 100 kg-weigher a weighing unit of
42 grams. In practice, in this case, they will often choose to go
down to 2000 steps, which create a better workable weighing
unit of 50 grams. A large number of weighing units (slabs) arent
able to give all the information and therefore its possible to
receive false accuracy. Its the combination of the mechanical and
electronic properties of the weigher which determines the actual
accuracy.

DESIGN
BUILD

Norwood and Company

EXPAND
With four generations of experience in the grain, feed,
flour milling and wood industries our family would be
more than happy to help you design, build, repair or
expand any new or existing grain facilities
We also offer a large variety of new and
used grain equipment to help meet your needs
norwood_hp.indd 1

REPAIR
Contact us on:
Fred Norwood, President; Tel: +1 405 834 2043
Brandon Norwood, Vice President; Tel: +1 785 822 4109

www.norwoodandco.com
Milling and Grain - August 2016 | 10/02/2015
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to connections with stabilisers and flexible cuffs. Yet it happens
that this is correct, and then a stepladder is placed against the
weigher or spilled product is hinder the weigher. Other
external influences should be avoided whenever
possible. Think of vibration, buckling floors or
supports, compressed air leaks and wind,
but also to over-or under pressure due
to aspiration, pneumatic conveying or
product movements in connected silos.

Quickly and accurately

Signal latency

Signal delay (latency), the time which elapses between the

signal of the weighing unit and its processing by the controller;
is by dosing weighers a misunderstood problem. The signal
latency arises at electronic filtering and averaging to improve
the stability of the signal. But also the delay through the network
between weigher and controller should not be underestimated.
A process control will calculate with outdated data because
of signal latency. It is therefore more appropriate to speak of
backlash instead of for lash. The weight should constant be
long enough for the final determination. The pitfall here is an
electronic created stability that doesnt match with the reality.

External influences

A well-designed weigher doesnt guarantee a proper weighting.

There are also external factors that can affect the weighing result.
It is obvious that the scales should be free from interference due

58 | August 2016 - Milling and Grain

A good scale alone does not guarantee

a correct dosing; the weigher is limited to
establish how much is dosed. All systems
of the triangle Weigher-Controller-Dosing
Tool are in business by proper dosing,
in which these systems are optimally
matched. The controller uses the information
from the weigher to control the dosing tool.
The dosing tool is able to work with a
fixed or a variable dosing speed. With
a variable speed its possible to realise
more accurate and faster dosing. The
exit point (trail) is standard corrected so
that the final standard weight usually is within the tolerance.
A variable dosing speed is only fully utilised as the settings
(turning points of dosing speeds) are constantly optimised.
This is a labour-intensive activity, which mostly results in
disappointing results. Modern software makes it possible to
automate this optimisation, whereby the quality of the dosing
strongly improves.

What your design will need to consider

Studying the process will tell you the best equipment and
batch size for a specific project. You can gain insight by
analysing the required production capacity for each of a
selection of representative recipes. This can be a complex
calculation, though. Process related variables include number of
ingredients, batch cycle times, collection and internal transport
times, and mixing times. Broader considerations include
working hours, physical space, seasonal production peaks, and
available budget.
Once youve decided on the key process equipment and how
to set up the process itself, next is to fit all equipment within the
available footprint and height. In existing buildings, adding or
extending production lines is often a challenge and needs creative
design by experienced process engineers.