Belt feeder vs. Board/chain feeder

[ihredtilldead]

Me and my dad feed about 140 cattle a year, and need to replace our old auger feeder system on our main lot. At this time we do not really have any need to split feed and we are looking at either a dutch prairie chain conveyor, or a demuth belt feeder. Any opinions at all would be greatly appreciated thank you. please suggestions between the two, i know the best option is a mixer wagon with drive along bunks, but at this time we are positive we arent going to go that route. Thank you

 

[footballjdtractor]

We had a 100' demuth feeder it was a nice unit. We never had any problems with it. We used it for about 5 years until we converted to feeding with a mixer wagon. If you can find a used harvestore model 500 they are better than the demuths.

 

[ihredtilldead]

Thanks for the reply, we just went and looked at a double chain deal work yesterday. It was nice I'm just still not convinced the belt feeder isn't a better deal. What sells the chain conveyor is that it is "maintenance free". But it's louder, almost as expensive, and I think the belt feeder is faster, and if you split feed a belt is what you want and i think if we don't eventually go to a mixer set up we will eventually need to split feed. And the demuth was recommended by the harvestore dealer we can ask him to look for a used one, but if not I think we will go with demuth.

 

[larryshoat]

I've got a patz belt feeder that's run every day for the last 26 years, it takes very little power compared to an auger.

Larry

 

[Kingfisher]

Can you show us your operation and how you use this equiptment? Thanks in advance.

 

[footballjdtractor]

If you are even thinking about converting to a tractor/mixer setup I would recommend not buying any feeder and putting that money towards the conversion. Dad and I went through the same thing, we always talked about changing over to a mixer wagon but kept putting it off. We finally did and are real glad with the decision. The money that we spent in that feeding room on belt feeders, unloaders, belts, conveyors, and our stationary mixer would have come near to buying the feed bunks. Used horizontal mixers are reasonably priced and you probably already own a tractor that can run it. Speed of feeding is another plus for mixer wagons we are now feeding 300 head in the same time it took us to feed 150. Stop and think about what you want to do in the future before you spend any more money I wish we would have.

 

[ihredtilldead]

We already have a horizontal mixer, we decided to go ahead and put the demuth belt feeder in and tried it last night, and i gotta say im pretty impressed... the problem i see with going to a mixer set up is that youve got to go out start a tractor start a loader sometimes in -20* weather, and if your skid loaders down, well you cant feed, if the mixers down, you cant feed, as to where if we feed with a belt feeder we can run our old horizontal for a few days if we really have to because we can run feed out of the side of the feed room. we can sit in our feed room flip a few switches and feed about 400 cattle if we wanted to if we made the belt longer... and another reason is we feed a haylage/corn diet to our cattle for a few reasons both not having to buy protien, and breaking up the work load of harvest. i think, scratch that, know that we can keep better feed in a harvestore than a bag/concrete bunker can. For us it just works out better. They can make this feeder 150' long and feed split lot and id say that would be enough for 200 cattle on either side of the bunk... if we decide to go any bigger than that, ill probably just put up a bunker silo, and just build a whole other lot for feeding with a mixer. But our main lot right really wasnt built for a mixer set up.

 

[novaman]

i think, scratch that, know that we can keep better feed in a harvestore than a bag/concrete bunker can.

I do believe that is the first time I have ever heard someone make that statement. All the harvestores in this area are used only to hold fuel for wind generators.

 

[ihredtilldead]

we've done both a bag, and obviously our harvestore, and i would say without a doubt the feed coming out of the harvestore is of higher quality...