|
nw NC | I have covered silage in an upright concrete stave silo ( 16 feet diameter) a few times . I cut three strips of plastic about 4- 1/2 feet wide , total length of the strips added together equal being long enough to go around the wall and lap each other 1- 1/2 or so feet. Blew a load a day, leveling and tramped until it settled very little overnight. Put in another load leveled and tramped, then trenched out from the wall about 10 inches and 15-18 inches deep. Dad held the plastic against the wall and I laid the plastic in the trench with some of the plastic folded toward center of silo in the bottom of the trench. Back filled the trench and packed it with my feet as we went around the silo. We laid a sheet of plastic that had been cut 16 feet square with corners trimmed (to help make it more nearly circular shape) on the surface of silage which was as smooth as we could make it. Then we put the wall plastic on top of the surface plastic taking care to fold the wall plastic over on itself every couple of feet (as you are putting a square thing into a round shape). Then laid another sheet of previously used plastic for the top surface sheet and weighted it down with tires ( not steel belted) that had been split into at center of tread. Tire halves laid touching one another all the way around the wall with a few scattered over the center of silo surface . Practically no spoilage when opened in January. Sounds like a lot of work , but really did not take that long . I know it was worth it. Silage did settle 2 feet more but plastic did not pull away from wall as it was locked in place by having some of it buried in the bottom of the trench.
For many years we nailed individually cut-to-fit sheets of smooth roll asphalt roofing to the doors ( about 4 inches wider than the door and lapped a few inches over the door beneath it) to seal up the air entry which caused spoilage around the doors. No spoilage around doors when we did that. Smooth roll roofing was no longer available but grit coated was. It worked but was more brittle and cumbersome to handle. Then we used roofing felt paper but it was not stout enough and some of it tore from the doors as silage settled . The original silo doors were built of two layers of tongue and groove lumber in a cross ply manner. They were not very air tight. I built new ones some years ago out of two layers of three quarter exterior grade plywood . They are air tight except for the crack all around them where they fit in the door frame. I do not cover them with any roofing as there is minimal spoilage.
Edited by WJKEIGER 1/6/2012 21:23
| |
|
kQuestion for upright silos guys.
