"Made-It-Myself" TMR Mixer Mixes Two Batches At Once

"Made-It-Myself" TMR Mixer Mixes Two Batches At Once LIVESTOCK Feeding Equipment 22-3-11 "There's nothing like it on the market. We can mix up two different rations at once and feed two or more groups of cattle in one trip," says Joel Pominville about the precision mixer wagon he built from scratch. The two-compartment wagon is 7 ft. wide by 21 ft. long with 7 1/2 ft. tall sides. It'll handle a total of 7 tons of feed. It was built out of square steel tubing covered with ply-wood. The axles were fabricated at a local ma-chine shop and are fitted with dual wheels, rims and 16-in. tires off an old Badger for-age wagon. The apron chains and elevator chains in each compartment run independently. Home-built beaters turn on 2 in. dia. solid shafts and Browning gears, chain- driven by pto. He uses an apron chain across the front of the wagon to deliver feed to stalls in his free stall barn. The feed drops into stalls via a rubber truck mud flap mounted directly under the mouth of the cross auger. Pominville typically first loads hay into both compartments, front to back. He next adds corn silage, then grain and minerals on top of the silage. The amount of grain depends on which group of cows is being fed first. For example, up to 20 lbs. of grain per cow is used in one compartment for his high-producing group. The apron chains pull material to the front to the elevator chains which bring the bottom material to the top. The beaters located just behind the elevators mix it all up. His four groups of cows, totaling 200, are fed about half of each compartment twice daily. "It works like a charm," Pominville says. "The elevator chains and beaters are the keys to success. The elevator chains tumble the feed to mix it and the beaters work the grain in for a precisely mixed ration." Out-of-pocket expense was $7,000, including $600 for both elevator chains. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Joel Pominville, RD 3, Box 2755, Middelbury, Vt. 05753 (ph 802 388-7776).

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