The Benson signal., 1915-08-21

A Good Way
Reconstruct
A Pit SiIo

contemplate building silos on their
farms in the near future, and it is
necessary to have silos if the most
is to be made out of dairying, we
give below the description and
method of building an underground
silso by J. w. Adams, Of the
Plains ub-Station, Colorado, pub
lished in the Nebraska farm Jour
nal:
"Where the ground formation is
suitable and there is no danger
from seepage, the pit silo is per-
fectly practical and is in the reach
of many who cannot afford high
sllo. During the summer of 1912
two pit silos were made at the
Plains sub station at Cheyenne
Wells. These silos are 10 feet in
diameter, and ore is % feet deep
aud the other % feet deep. These
silos have proved SO satisfactory in
every way that two more more put
in last winter.
I'm constructing these silos the
fist operation was to bore a hole
atith test auger in the center of
The silo, as deep as the silo was to
be. A pipe was put in the hole
and used as a center, two circles
were marked On the ground. The
inner circle was the diameter of
the silo plus one inch, allowing for
plaster. The outer circle was E
inches outside Of this. Then with
tiling spade we dug out the space
between these two circles to a
depth Of / foot, taking care to
keep the inner side of the trench
thus formed smooth and perpendic-
ular. This trench was then filled
with concrete.
I'm digging the rest we left an
inch or two around the side to be
cut down with the trimming tool.
This tool was made by boiling an
IL shaped knife to the end of a
2x4, then measuring from the knife
half the diameter of the silo, then
by bracing, the 2x4 is held in a
horizontal position and by swing
ing it around the pipe the walls
will be trimmed perfectly smooth
and perpendicular. The edge Of
the knife should be set to draw in
to the wall slightly. In ordinary
soil the trimming is an easy job but
if you should find the ground too
hard to trim with !. the knife,
then use it as a guide to trim
with the pick. We were obliged
to do this the last 4 feet of our
last silos.
"For hosting the dirt, we erect
cd crane and placed it SO the arm
would swing over either Of the two
silos and then swing outside to de-
posit the dirt. We used tub made
Pfrom a half of a coal oil barrel
We had the blacksmith put heavy
band of iron under the tub extend,
ing up three-ifths Of the way On
each side. The ends Of this band
were formed into eyes for the bail
| The bail was made from 8-inch
round iron and was large enough
so that the tub could tun bottom
up inside of the bail.
1--WE attached a hook to the
back Of road scraper SO we could
use the same team to haul away
the dirt that we used to hoist dir
out of the silo. We would load
the scraper, then attach the rope to
the hook On the back Of the scrap
er, then drive the team up until the
tub was above the silo, then swing
the tub out and dump it, swing ii
back over the silo, release the rope
from the scraper, and let it down
by hand. In this way one man and
team can keep two men busy digg-
ing even when the dirt spades cas-
lily.
"* = We plastered as we
went down. We would dig or 7
feet then plaster allow time for
the plaster to set We mized the
plaster I of cement to 3 Of sand.
We would plaster 3 or 4 yards
then go over it with second coat.
This is in effect two coat work
but by putting both coats on at
once it makes better work. When
the plaster is hard enough SO it will
not be marred by the brush we
give it a brush coat of pure ce-
ment and water mixed as thin as
paint. This is applied with a
whitewash brush. The brush coat
should be applied before the plaster
is too hard to absorb the water from
the cement. The plaster should
not be allowed to dry for several
days. If it dries too soon it will
not he so hard and is liable to