Grain augers and conveyors are widely considered to be the quickest, easiest and most efficient way to move grain between transfer and storage points.

While both are designed to serve the same general purpose, there are some crops which are better suited to an auger compared to a conveyor and vice versa. 
One such type of crop typically more suited to an auger is wheat.

In this blog post, the experts at Westfield take a look at why an auger is usually the ideal choice for handling wheat.

Wheat is a robust crop

The bulk grain handling sector “grew up” with grain augers. The majority of Australian wheat farmers are highly familiar with using them, whereas grain conveyors are a newer and more modern grain handling alternative offering a number of benefits. So it’s natural that more and more wheat farmers and grain producers are curious about whether it’s worthwhile to make the switch to using a conveyor.

By design, a grain conveyor minimises impact damage to grain during high capacity handling whilst still maintaining the value of delicate and high value commodities. A conveyor carries grain on a belt in contrast to an auger which physically pushes/pulls grain through the auger tube via the spiral flighting. Farmers who require a high seed grade will generally prefer to use a conveyor.

Depending on its end use, wheat may or may not considered to be a high value commodity nor a delicate one. Some wheat is destined to be low quality feed wheat and some will be high quality seed wheat.

Wheat is a monocotyledon seed, unlike dicotyledon seeds which have two seed halves. Dicotyledons, such as chickpeas and lentils, are more prone to damage during grain handling. These types of crops are therefore more suited to a conveyor.

Wheat is more robust and resistant to damage during handling, making augers a practical choice for wheat farmers whose wheat is destined for milling or the noodle market as kernel damage is hardly critical.

On the other hand, a conveyor may be the better option for a wheat farming operation which outputs very high tonnages. Conveyors have a longer service life under heavy workloads and have the versatility to be used for seed, fertiliser and legumes as well as wheat.

Augers can operate at higher angles with less length

Another factor which makes augers a good choice for most wheat farmers is the fact that they can operate comfortably at steeper angles when unloading. A conveyor is generally happiest at 25 degrees or less.

High capacity augers can push dry wheat through the flighting at 35 to 40 degrees, which is much higher than a conveyor can achieve. If a farmer has a tall silo, which is often the case with a wheat operation, a conveyor may not be able to manage it. An auger of the same length will have no trouble doing so.

Additionally, a conveyor needs to be up to 33% longer than an auger to load the same sized bin or silo. In situations where space is limited, an auger can be a more viable solution than a conveyor.

A point to consider – moisture content

Augers tend to cope better with grain that has a low moisture content as dry grain will always flow easier and faster through the flighting. For comparisons sake, conveyors require around half the horsepower of an auger.

An auger will always need more power to move grain with a high moisture content as the auger has to cope with the added friction.

Wheat farmers should always take into consideration their power requirements when purchasing an auger. If it’s likely they will be harvesting wheat with a moisture level of over 12%, they should opt for an auger with more horsepower so they have more versatility.

Tips for purchasing an auger for handling wheat

If you yourself are a wheat farmer, here’s some things to look out for in a high quality grain auger:

Durability

Augers should always be constructed to be durable. Look for thick tubing, high wearing steel as well as flighting with replaceable wear edges.

Capacity

Trucks are getting bigger and labour rates are rising. You need to be able to get trucks emptied and back out to the fields as quickly as you can. So go with an auger that’s up to the challenge and can unload at a rate the suits your operation.

Swing-away functionality

A well designed auger should be easily repositioned from silo to silo. Swing-away augers are a good choice as they allow you to get the truck into position easily, close to the auger. They are designed to remain hooked onto your tractor, so they are ideal for one person operations. The tractor does all the hard work using its hydraulics to raise and lower the auger. If a storm is coming, you don’t want it to be a giant hassle to get the auger off the silo and down into the lowered position.

If you decide on an engine driven auger, it is best to choose a self-propelled model with a hydraulic lift to avoid unnecessary physical exertion.

Looking for further advice on using augers for handling wheat? Talk to Westfield.

Our expert team all come from farming backgrounds, so we have a real understanding of the importance of choosing the right grain handling equipment to meet your needs.

All of our grain augers are built tough, easy to use, have high capacity and are engineered from the ground up so you can get on with the job. Each auger is designed to handle a broad range of grain quality and moisture content to ensure your grain flows smoothly.

To find out more, simply click here to get in touch with us today.

Just like trucks and tractors, transportable grain augers need routine servicing to ensure they are always ready to go when harvest time rolls around. 

Investing some time and elbow grease into your auger will help prevent it from breaking down due to a lack of maintenance and stopping your harvest operations cold. And just like with any other piece of farming equipment, regular service work will also go a long way in extending the service life of an auger.

To avoid your transportable auger becoming the weakest link in your harvest, follow this 8-point service checklist:

Free Download: STX2 Series Transportable Auger Brochure

1. Inspect the auger flighting

Be sure to periodically inspect the grain intake and main transfer points of your transportable auger. Inspect all flighting and replace wear edges as necessary, remembering that worn flighting leads to poor performance and increased grain damage.

When you first run a transportable auger with grain in it after a previous harvest, the auger should never loudly bang or violently shake. If this does occur, it probably means the flighting was damaged or the centre flight pipe was bent during the last harvest. In such case, the flighting will need to be repaired or replaced. If removing flighting, also be sure to check the flighting bolts.

2. Inspect your PTO shaft 

Greasing the crosses and yokes of your PTO shaft and making sure all the guards are in place is pretty common practice. A servicing task that is often overlooked is to make sure you have the right shear bolts in the PTO.

PTO shear bolts are specific to the PTO shaft’s horsepower rating. It might seem OK to replace a sheared bolt with any you have on hand during auger use, but PTO shear bolts ensure the PTO doesn’t transfer too much or too little horsepower to the equipment. It is bad for the equipment and potentially unsafe to the operator to do so. Consider having some of the correct shear bolts on hand so you don’t have to compromise.

3. Check the gearbox oil 

The oil in the gearboxes of most transportable augers doesn’t require frequent changing, but you don’t want too little or too much. Consult your owner’s manual for the proper gearbox oil type and to find out how much is enough. Gearbox oil level requirements do vary somewhat based on gearbox mount position.

4. Inspect and tension truss cables

Longer transportable augers typically have truss cables along the tubing. Inspect them for cuts or fraying or any other form of deterioration. Make sure tension is evenly distributed between all the available auger truss cables.  When you sight up the tube, the auger should be straight from left to right and have a slight bow upward towards the discharge end.

Properly tensioned cables help your transportable auger run quieter and increase the lifespan of the tube and flight. Once the cables are adjusted, verify that all cable clamps, nuts and bolts are tightened sufficiently. Inspect the lift cable and replace with the correct cable if there is any sign of rust or corrosion.

5. Inspect all guards

Guards are for your protection. Ensure all guards are in place and in good working order. Pay particular attention to the intake flighting guards and pulley guards.

6. Inspect the tyres

After pumping tyres to the correct air pressure, remember to inspect the condition of the tyres. Sun and weather can make your tyres brittle. Check for cracks in the sidewalls or cords showing through in the tread area.  Replace tyres if you see either of these flaws. You don’t want your tyres to fail while you are moving a transportable auger. The tyres bear much of the weight from a loaded auger, so make sure they are up to the task. Also periodically check the condition of the wheel bearings.

7. Inspect any hydraulic lines and cylinders

If there are any leaks, replace the cylinder or put a seal kit in it. Inspect the connections of all hydraulic lines for leaks and hydraulic hoses for any cracks or holes. Replace as necessary.

8. Grease everything

It can be a pain to get the nozzle of the grease gun on some of them, but don’t neglect the grease fittings on your bearings and chain and sprockets. Don’t skip any. Those grease fittings are in those locations for a good reason. 

Regularly greasing these parts is one of the most important things you can do to maximise the life of your auger and minimise component failure. There are typically grease points on all PTO shafts and bearings, but don’t forget chains inside any drive boxes, fittings on gearboxes and even on parts of the auger’s transport gear and all pivot points.

Free Download: STX2 Series Transportable Auger Brochure

Want more tips on how to maximise the life of your transportable auger? Talk to the team at Westfield Augers. 

Westfield Augers is the largest grain auger manufacturer in the world and we’ve built our reputation on reliability, performance and support. With over 68 years’ experience as a dedicated grain auger manufacturer, our augers offer a long service life and high resale value.

Simply click here to get in touch with us today.

An auger is an auger is an auger, right? Well, not exactly.

Not all augers are designed and built the same. A high quality grain auger will have hard-wearing features for maximum longevity and ease of use.

Grain handling equipment represents a significant investment for any sized farming operation. It’s natural to want to get the most value for your money by purchasing equipment with guaranteed dependability and durability.

So what sets a high quality auger apart from a so-so one? Let’s take a look.

Single seam tubing

A well-made auger should be as smooth internally as possible in order to reduce grain damage and resistance to flow. 

Spiral welded tubing is fairly common in grain augers. This is because it’s cheaper and easier to manufacture.

What you should be looking for instead is tubing which has a single seam along the top of the tube. This provides significantly less internal resistance to grain flow, contributes to gentler grain handling and a longer auger life. 

Plus, a tube with a single seam makes for easier dent removal when an accident occurs, such as a reversing truck damaging an auger.

Heavy gauge, replaceable flighting

The flighting is the most important component in your auger. It’s where the grains’ journey begins and is the part which wears the fastest.

Auger flighting should be made from heavy gauge steel. 14-gauge material is common, but what you really want is 12-gauge which is thicker, more robust and will last much longer.

To ensure you get the longest possible life from your equipment, you should choose an auger which has an extra layer of steel welded to the edges on critical wear points such as the hopper, the intake boot and the swing tube flight. This ensures the flighting lasts longer and needs to be replaced less often – saving you time and money. Such augers can survive farm use for up to 30 years and longer with their original tube and flighting.

When the time comes, the flighting with the wear edge should be easily replaceable without having to weld or replace the entire length of flight.

Also, check for square flighting joints as these will contribute to smoother running and proper flight alignment.

Steel trussing

To ensure additional longevity, steel trussing rather than cables is ideal on augers longer than 24 metres.

Steel trussing provides superior support along the auger tube for rigid alignment with no sag under the load.

Keeping everything aligned and true in this way means significantly reduced wear and greatly increasing the life of your auger with less strain on bearings and flighting joints.

A Frame undercarriage

An A Frame is superior than a scissor lift undercarriage system for three main reasons:

Transport

Using an A Frame means that your auger is far more stable in all configurations. When transporting, the overhanging tube is supported by the A frame’s lower reach arms. Additional tube support is provided by the heavy lifting track welded to the underside of the auger tube.

Positioning

An auger with an A Frame will be more stable when backing up to silos as the auger is raised. The A Frame allows for less sway left or right, making it easier to position and line the auger spout up with the silo inlet.

Operation

When the auger is in the raised position, the combination of the support arms of the A-frame and the heavy track on the underside of the tube gives the auger tube superior support, with limited bowing under load. This reduces stress on the flighting drive line, flight connection and bearings.

An A frame lift system, coupled with steel trussing to support the tube, is an unbeatable design combination leading to a far more stable auger and longer design life.

Thrust adjusters

If you need a larger auger, it’s important to make sure it has thrust adjusters to share the load between the upper and lower bearings during operation.

This helps to extend the life of the lower boot bearing as well as extend the overall life of your auger.

Sealed top drive box

At the top of your auger, the top drive box should be sealed and filled with grease.

The top drive boxes on inferior augers are often not sealed and lubricated, resulting in the chain and sprockets being exposed to rapid wear.

Having to routinely change the chain and sprocket of an auger with an unsealed top drive box, means higher maintenance costs and more downtime.

Brass bushing in the hopper

Bearings are commonly used in grain augers in the hopper, however these can lead to the premature failure of components at the intake end.

Brass bushing is the superior alternative and more effectively prevents the ingress of water, dust, grime and heat.

Availability of spare parts

There’s nothing more frustrating than purchasing a piece of equipment and then being unable to source spare parts when something needs repairing or replacing — especially if there is a problem at harvest time when the pressure is on.

Manufacturers of high quality augers will have a network of reputable local dealers with centralised spare parts warehouses, so it always pays to check whether you can quickly and easily access spare parts before investing in a new or used auger.

Looking to purchase a high quality grain auger? Talk to the team at Westfield

Westfield Augers is the largest grain auger manufacturer in the world and we’ve built our reputation on reliability, performance and support. With over 68 years’ experience as a dedicated grain auger manufacturer, our augers offer a long service life and high resale value.

Simply click here to get in touch with us today.

Grain augers and grain conveyors are both designed to serve the same general purpose – moving grains, legumes, rice, nuts or dry bulk commodities

So while they are both capable of handling conventional types of crops (e.g. wheat, barley, sorghum), there are some crops which are better suited to a conveyor compared to an auger.

One such type of crop is the humble chickpea. 

In this blog post, the experts at Westfield take a look at why a conveyor is the ideal choice for handling chickpeas compared to an auger. 

Grain conveyors, also referred to as grain belts or tubeveyors, are widely known to be the gentlest means of handling high value crops. By design, a grain conveyor minimises impact damage to grain during high capacity handling whilst maintaining the value of delicate commodities such as chickpeas.

Chickpeas, being a dicotyledon, have two seed halves and are more prone to damage during handling. They can also be quite tough and abrasive by nature and will therefore shorten the life of a grain auger quite dramatically.

A conveyor carries grain on the belt in contrast to an auger which physically pushes grain through the auger tube via the spiral flighting. This means that with an auger, there is a risk of mechanical damage being caused to the grain such as chipping to the seed coating or cracked and broken kernels.

A well-made conveyor should be as smooth internally as possible in order to reduce belt friction, lower power requirements and reduce grain damage. This can be achieved by using tubing that has one seam along the top of the tube, rather than a spiral welded tube.

The seed coats of grain legumes, particularly chickpeas, are vulnerable to weathering once the seed has reached physiological maturity.  Hence rain falling on a mature crop can lead to a high amount of splitting if the crop is moved with a grain auger when harvesting recommences.

Lastly, while the capital outlay for a conveyor is higher than an auger, there is definite value in the additional outlay when growing and handling chickpeas. Gentle handling with a belt conveyor means less seed coat damage, less splitting, less admixture and generally higher value grain.

The following is a handy graphic which can be further used to weigh up the pros and cons of using an auger compared to a conveyor for different types of grains.

Looking for further advice on using conveyors for handling chickpeas? Talk to Westfield.

Our expert team all come from farming backgrounds, so we have a real understanding of the importance of choosing the right grain handling equipment to meet your needs.

While gentle on grain, our grain conveyors are built tough and engineered from the ground up for a long service life. Each grain belt is designed to handle a broad range of grain quality and moisture content to ensure your grain flows smoothly.

We have also designed the belt return to be carried on special belt support rollers which reduces friction on the return side to the absolute minimum.  This leads to a longer belt life, minimal stretching and less need for adjustments.  The longer the conveyor, the more important this becomes.

To find out more, simply click here to get in touch with us today.

Over the years, there’s been a noticeable trend in Australian grain farms consolidating and increasing in size and output.

In the past, the average sized farm could get away with using an 8 or 10-inch grain auger at harvest time and still get things done efficiently.

But harvesters are now much bigger. Capacity has increased across the board. B doubles are now used in the harvesting process rather than single semis and road trains.

While the rest of the processing chain has become more efficient, many farms which have scaled up are still relying on 8 or 10-inch augers. As a result, these farms are experiencing significant bottlenecks. Smaller augers just can’t keep up with the increase in capacity and pace of a modern harvest.

It’s all well and good to invest in a big harvester that can thresh up to 800 tonnes a day, but if your auger is flat out processing 70 – 80 tonnes an hour, you’re going to end up with a line of idling trucks, unable to quickly unload at your silos.

Every delay in the processing chain results in wasted time and increases in operational costs.

So your auger really is as important as your harvester. And there are significant benefits to investing in a larger auger, regardless if you own your own harvester or rely on contractors.

If you own your harvester…

A big capacity harvester can set you back $400K to $800K, which is a significant expense for any farm.

But a big capacity harvester needs a high capacity auger to keep your harvest running smoothly. Otherwise, you’ll end up burning money caused by bottlenecks.

When you consider that a high capacity grain auger will cost approximately 5% to 10% of the cost of your harvester, it certainly makes economical sense to invest in a piece of equipment that will be able to keep up with your harvester output.

If you hire a harvester…

When you pay for a harvester by the hour, time really is money. And a good contract harvester can be hard to find during busy harvest seasons.

Contractors want to get in, get it done, get out and move on to the next job.

If you’ve got a small auger which can’t load your silos quickly, you might find it hard to keep a good contractor on your books. They may not want to come back for another season if there are recurrent delays in your harvesting process.

Essentially, the more efficient your operation is, the happier everyone is.

Here’s a good rule of thumb for determining what size grain auger you need

Depending on your travel distance, your auger needs to be able to process at least 4 times as fast as your harvester. This will ensure you achieve a smooth and efficient operation.

Take the following comparison to use as a guideline in your thinking…

A 13-inch auger can shift up to 300 tonnes of wheat per hour (depending on moisture content). This will move mountains for the average sized Australian farm.

Whereas a big 16-inch auger can shift up to 600 tonnes of wheat per hour (depending on moisture content). So an auger of this size is much more suited for use on large farms and commercial operations. 

Another thing to consider are the drive options for your auger

Even the most powerful petrol engine drive model can only reach around 38 HP. For high capacity augers, engine drive just won’t cut it.

For example, a 13-inch auger needs between 100 HP and 185 HP, depending on the length, to reach full capacity. Larger augers can easily achieve the required HP with the use of a tractor with Power Take Off (PTO).

Want to learn more about using using a high capacity auger to improve the efficiency of your harvest? Talk to the experts at Westfield Augers.

We’ve helped farmers all over Australia remove processing bottlenecks and reduce operating costs.

Simply click here to get in touch with our friendly team.