NORTH MANCHESTER, Ind. — Two hog barns designed with state-of-the-art ventilation technology are expected to be ready for use on a Wabash County farm by mid-summer.

 

The first barn should be able to house hogs beginning in April; a similar building next to the first is on track to be finished by summer, said Jeff Dale, co-owner of Cinder Trail Farms south of North Manchester. The buildings feature a ventilation system designed by AirWorks, a division of Whiteshire Hamroc. The system’s air ducts distribute fresh air over and down onto the hogs. The buildings have slat floors, which allow the air, dust and pathogens to escape to the manure pit below.

 

The Dale family and AirWorks hosted a tour of the new barn on March 24. Before deciding to construct the facilities for his farm’s wean-to-finish operation, Dale spent five months working for Albion-based Whiteshire Hamroc to learn about the AirWorks system.

 

“The technology pretty much sold itself,” he explained. “I went in thinking I was going to be a skeptic. I was going to tear (the technology) apart. But I saw it produce; I saw it working. I feel these barns are so far ahead of their time.”

 

The layout of the barns allows for better pig flow, Dale noted. “You can get more pork out the door. I also noticed the environment was better for me – I wasn’t coughing while working inside. There’s an energy savings. These are all big players.”

 

The buildings are divided into several smaller rooms. Each room is no wider than 40 feet, a design element needed for use with the AirWorks ventilation system. The completed barn will have nurseries in four of the rooms; the rest will be for growing and finishing. The structure is 400-by-107-foot and has 20 rooms.

 

A key component of the ventilation system is a two-chamber air duct that runs across the middle of the ceiling in each room. The top chamber of the air ducts provides fresh air while the bottom releases air that has gone through the building’s heat exchanger, said Andrew Lemmon, director of AirWorks. The ducts throw air 20 feet to the left and to the right.

 

Some ventilation systems don’t spread the air evenly, resulting in pigs of varying size, he noted. “The smaller, less healthy pigs go for a smaller price,” Lemmon said. “With this system, there isn’t a pecking order. Every spot in the room is covered, which means uniformity and good growth.”

 

The AirWorks system provides continuous fresh air and a 60 percent better cooling effect, he said. Buildings fitted with the AirWorks technology may cost 5-20 percent more than traditional tunnel barn construction, Lemmon said. “There isn’t a cookie-cutter cost. Producers would need to be sure it would make sense for their pocketbooks.”

 

Whiteshire Hamroc’s CEO, Dr. Mike Lemmon, started looking at ways to improve barn ventilation decades ago. He is a veterinarian and Andrew’s father. While studying pig health, monitors noticed hogs raised in traditional tunnel barns had more lung problems, Mike said. The monitors also collected dust, bacteria and gas samples.

 

“In a tunnel barn, if one pig gets sick, 35 seconds later, it’s spread across the barn,” he pointed out. “People have a hard time understanding airflow. With this system, you’re able to control the air better. If disease does break out, we can control it faster.”

 

The system’s heat exchanger uses a quarter of the propane of a tunnel barn and 75-80 percent of its electricity,Mike said. Buildings with AirWorks technologyhave also been constructed in Canada and China.The buildings will also include technology from Chore-Time (bins, flex auger, power units) and Fancom (fans, controls, feeders, temperature sensor).