Star of the West had an existing flour conveying system connecting the flour mill to an adjacent production facility. This system wasn’t meeting delivery expectations, so Star of the West was instead loading trucks with flour and driving product across the parking lot. Using trucks was inefficient in multiple ways: time lost in loading, fuel spent driving, and lost sales opportunity for sending flour trucks to regional production facilities.
Star of the West contacted The JDI Group to analyze the system and help the mill reach its goal of 66,000 pounds of flour delivered each hour. As a first step, our team helped Star of the West re-purpose the existing system and bring the system to half capacity. Our engineers recommended removing elbows and sharp bends and re-routing portions of the pipe to work with the existing under-sized blower. After this was completed, the mill was able to deliver 30,000 pounds an hour.
As a follow-up, JDI essentially divided the system into two parts, adding a second blower approximately halfway along the 600-foot pipe. This helped maintain pressure in the second half of the system and achieved the client’s goal of 66,000 pounds of flour per hour.
