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| July, 2006 | |
| Move Into West Kansas Scoular Co. Does a Substantial Upgrade After Acquiring Sullivan Elevator |
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| For Immediate Release July, 2006 |
Ed Zdrojewski For Grain Journal |
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The Scoular Company Key personnel at Coolidge: Supplier List A little over a year has passed since The Scoular Company purchased its Coolidge, KS grain-handling facility from Sullivan, Incorporated. But what a year it’s been. Located on the Kansas-Colorado state line, the Cooledge facility has undergone a major transformation, emerging as an upgraded facility capable of loading or unloading 110-car shuttle trains on the BNSF Railway. According to Scoular Senior Vice President Chuck Elsea, “The renovation of the Coolidge facility enables our company to provide better service and more consistent markets to area country elevator and producer-customers. “Our ability to load out shuttle units provides our end-user customers in both the United States and Mexico with an additional reliable source of quality wheat and sorghum. And we also have the capability of serving dairy and cattle feed lot customers with inbound shipments of corn.” Scoular added 480,000 bushels of upright concrete storage and related grainhandling equipment, a 60,000-bph bulk weigh loadout system, and an approximately one-mile-long rail siding adjacent to the BNSF line. The company brought in HABCO Inc., Salina, KS (785-823-0550); McPherson Concrete Storage, McPherson, KS (800-999-8151); and Watson Electric Inc., Salina (785-827-2924), as contractors on the project. “HABCO and Watson Electric have both completed various jobs for Scoular over the years,” said Jim Foltz, Scoular’s senior operations manager in Coolidge. “They have the size, capability, knowledge of the industry, and a history in western Kansas. The quality of McPherson tanks is well-known throughout the area.” Work on the facility got underway in May 2005 and was completed by the following October. Upright Storage The tank has an in-ground 30-degree concrete hopper bottom, which is outfitted with a 24-inch HABCO-manufactured unloading auger. The tank has no grain temperature monitoring system, but it is outfitted with Monitor level indicators and a set of four 40-hp AIRLANCO centrifugal fans capable of supplying 1/5 cfm per bushel worth of aeration on small grains. Rail Loading The leg empties into a series of two-way diverters, which allows it to reach the new tank, the new bulk weigher, or a new 50,000-bph Hi Roller enclosed belt converyor running out to the existing concrete structure. An existing 12,000-bph leg also can send grain to the bulkweigher. The 60,000-bph InterSystems bulk weigh loadout scale is equipped with an InterSystems MasterWeigh Millennium controller and is capable of loading a 110-car train in about 12 hours. Foltz notes that Scoular has loaded several trains at Coolidge since the project was completed. The company brought in RailWorks Track Group, Jacksonville, FL (866-905-7245), to build a milelong siding track adjacent to the BNSF main line from used 112-lb. rail and wood ties. The siding is long enough to hold an entire unit train without decoupling. Also built adjacent to the new tracks is a 190-foot Fall Protection Systems trolley unit spanning the length of three covered hopper cars. “We’ve had to do our share of finetuning and personnel training (on the new construction),” Foltz says, “but for the most part, it’s worked out real well.” |
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