Grain Dryer Upgrade Gets Family Ready For Corn Harvest

By: Lon Tonneson

A grain dryer and grain handling upgrade made a big difference in how smoothly corn harvest goes for Todd, Wade and Wayne Heinrich.

Brothers Wade and Todd farm with their father, Wayne, near Dickey in south-central North Dakota. They raise corn and soybeans. They usually haul soybeans to town at harvest and dry and store their corn on the farm for later delivery to ethanol plants and other markets.

Two years ago, the Heinrichs replaced a 20-year-old Farm Fans dryer with a new 2420 stacked dryer from Grain Systems Inc. The old dryer could dry about 840 bushels of corn an hour, depending on the corn moisture level. The GSI 2420 is rated for about 2,010 bushels per hour.

The Heinrichs increased the size of their wet bin conveyor, too, to keep up with the capacity of the new dryer.

Because Todd, Wayne and Wade each farm separately, they have multiple wet bins so they can keep corn from different fields separate during the drying process. With multiple wet bins, they also can separate corn coming in from the field at significantly different moisture levels

“If one field is at 19% and then we move to a field that is at 25%, we can keep them separate so we can watch the drying system and make sure that it adjusts correctly,” Todd says.