OHIO

Massillon

Case FarmsTroutman, NC • 704-528-4501

Founded: 1986Poultry production: 1.8 million chickens/weekFeed production: 100,000 tpw at three locationsNumber of employees: 2,500

Key personnel at Massillon:• Paul Leahy, plant manager• Brian Miller, lead operator• Jeff Looney, chief dispatcher

Supplier ListAir compressor ......... Ingersoll RandBatch control system ............. WEM

Automation Inc.Bearing sensors .....Maxi-Tronic Inc.Bin level monitors ..............Monitor

Technologies LLCContractor .. WL Port-Land Systems

Inc.Conveyors ................... IntersystemsDistributor .........Hayes & Stolz Ind.

Mfg. Co. Inc.Dust filter................ Rolfes@BooneElevator buckets ........ Maxi-Lift Inc.Engineering ..WL Port-Land Systems

Inc.Gates/diverters ..Tom-Cin Metals Inc.Hammermill .....Bliss Industries Inc.Manlift ................... Sidney Mfg. Co.Microingredient system .........APECMixer .............Scott Equipment Inc.Motion sensors ..4B Components Ltd.Pellet cooler ..........................GeelenPellet crumbler ........ CPM Roskamp

ChampionPellet mill ................ CPM Roskamp

ChampionScales .. Rice Lake Weighing SystemsScreeners ..CPM Roskamp ChampionScrew conveyors . Thomas ConveyorSteel storage ...........The GSI GroupTruck scale ............................ B-Tec

Case Farms started out in 1986 as a ver-tically-integrated poultry producer in Ohio, but the vagaries of business had the company producing all of the feed it manufactured in North Carolina until last year.

“Previously, we were operating two feed mills in North Carolina, which gave us a strong production presence in the southeast,” says Paul Leahy, plant manager for Case Farms’ new feed mill in Massillon, OH (330-832-0030). Leahy came to Case Farms in 2009, while that plant still was under construction, from a feed manufacturer and grain handler in Nebraska.

Case Farms, which is based in Troutman, NC, has operated complexes in Shelby and Mt. Olive, NC, each with new greenfield feed mills that began making feed in 2006.

However, the company continues to have 135 contract growers around Ohio, and those producers had been supplied with feed from two Land O’Lakes feed mills in the state. While Case Farms had been satisfied with the feed Land O’Lakes had supplied, company production in Ohio had begun to outpace the capacity of those two mills.

In 2009, Case Farms took the plunge with the company’s first completely greenfield mill

Back to the Buckeye StateFOUNDED IN OHIO IN 1986, CASE FARMS FINALLY BUILDS ITS FIRST OHIO FEED MILL

Case Farms’ new 7,000-tpw feed mill at Massillon, OH is the company’s first mill in its home state of Ohio and serves its 135 contract growers located in the state. Photos by Ed Zdrojewski.

Reprinted from Nov/Dec 2010 issue of GRAIN JOURNAL

two finished pellet tanks holding 120 tons, and 16 loadout bins holding 1,200 tons.

In addition to the main concrete structure, the mill includes a small steel elevator for whole grains consisting of a pair of GSI corrugated steel hopper tanks standing 36 feet in diameter and 88 feet tall at the eaves, holding 60,000 bushels each.

The facility is set up to receive corn and soybean meal via both truck and rail, through enclosed steel buildings at 10,000-bph. Incoming corn can go to storage or be diverted directly to a 40-tph Bliss hammermill for grinding.

Mill FunctionsThe Massillon mill runs two shifts per

day, five days per week. All mill func-tions are under the control of a WEM Automation Inc. control system. The mill operator can access the system via a four-screen computer center in the facility’s central control room.

Ingredients are blended in a 6-ton Scott double-ribbon mixer operating at an average of three minutes mix time.

Fat, choline, lysine, and mold in-hibitor can be added at the mixer. In addition, the mill includes two 10-bin APEC microingredient systems for small additions.

Roughly 98% of the mixer’s output goes on to be pelleted on the mill’s single production line. After steam conditioning, mash is fed into a CPM Model 7936-14 pellet mill with a maximum rated capacity of 65 tph. Leahy comments that most of the time, the mill is operated at about 55 tph.

Pellets are sent through a Geelen 70-tph counterflow cooler and an APEC fat coater. Pellets also may be sent through a CPM crumbler located below the cooler, as needed for the formulation.

All finished feeds are loaded out in bulk, and there is no bagging line. The loadout bay loads semi-trucks in an average of seven minutes using a 4-ton certified weigh lorry. The Massillon operation includes a total of seven feed trucks operated 22 hours per day, 5-1/2 days per week.

Ed Zdrojewski, editor

in Ohio, purchasing acreage in an indus-trial park at the south end of Massillon. “The site had good infrastructure,” Leahy says. “It’s close to major highways (U.S. Highway 30 and Interstate 77), and it has access to the Wheeling & Lake Erie short-line railroad, which connects to the Norfolk Southern and CSX.”

To construct the $13 million, 7,000-tpw, slipform concrete mill, Case Farms took bids and awarded the contract to WL Port-Land Systems Inc., Pittsburgh, PA (412-344-1408). Work on the mill began in fall 2008, and it shipped its first load of feed on Sept. 4, 2009.

Mill SpecificationsThe new mill stands 169 feet tall

on a 40-foot-x-61-foot footprint. The structure contains 19 ingredient bins averaging a total of 3,200 tons capac-ity, two mash tanks holding 120 tons,

Paul Leahy

Four-screen control room utilizing WEM software looks out over the mill’s pelleting operation.

Truck and rail receiving shed is set up to take in grain and ingredients at 10,000 bph.

Geelen counterflow cooler is set up to send pellets either directly to loadout or through a CPM crumbler (below).