Case Study: Milk production monitoring at a dairy farm

Aug. 31, 2021

This flowmeter application involves measuring the total amount of dairy farm milk being produced and stored in tanks.

During the different shifts at a dairy farm, the cows are brought into the staging areas where the milk can be collected using vacuum pumps. After the milk is pumped from the cows, it is piped through stainless steel pipes to a bulk holding tank, which is kept at a chilling 4ºF until it is picked up by the milk haulers.

Flowmeters are needed between the pumps and the storage tanks to determine the exact amount of milk that is being produced each day and to monitor productivity for each shift throughout the day.

The products supplied include TA3-250-200-1 Sanitary Turbine Flow Meters and RT-50-B-0M5 Battery-Powered Local Flow Transmitters.

The challenges

This application poses a few challenges. First, this process is already in operation, which means that the system will need to be shut down to install the necessary inline flowmeters. The next issue is that the tank itself can be used as an estimate, but because it is sealed, there is no good way to determine the exact amount. In addition, the bulk tank is being emptied relatively frequently, and if all the product is not emptied, it would throw off the total amounts.

Another challenge with installing a meter to collect the dairy production data is that the transmitter needs to have power run to it. Lastly, the meter needs to be 3A certified because it is going into a sanitary food and beverage application.

The solution

Figure 1: RT-50 Transmitter and TA3 Turbine Flow Meter

AW-Lake’s solution was to use 3A sanitary turbine flowmeters with battery-powered transmitters. The selected turbine, the TA3-250-200-1, has 2½-inch Tri-clamp fittings and a flow range of 40 to 400 gallons per minute.

The transmitter chosen for this application, the RT-50-B-0M5 battery-powered transmitter with local display, offers rate and total measurements. It also comes standard with Bluetooth capabilities that allow the unit to be connected to a phone or tablet.

The TA3 turbine flowmeter meets all sanitary requirements, which makes it suited for this dairy application. It is also compact — making installation simple. This installation required two cuts and a small section of pipe removed to install each meter.

The RT-50 simplifies further by not requiring external power, so no wires or conduit were needed, saving time and costs.

The results

This sanitary turbine flowmeter installation satisfied the customer’s needs and was easily and cost efficiently implemented. The price point to implement the sanitary turbine with battery-powered display was at least 65% less than the alternative sanitary Coriolis meter, which does not account for the costs of running the necessary wire conduit. So, not only is it less expensive, but it is also quicker and simpler to get up and running.

The RT-50 tracks accurate totals of milk being collected into the bulk holding tank. It has both a total and grand total tracker. This allows workers to record totals from specific times or groups of cows and to keep track of overall totals for the week or month. This will help the farm track when the cows are at peak production to help optimize production at each pump. These totals may also be used to compare the product further down the process to determine how much product loss is occurring between the raw product and the finished goods.

Coltan Antoniewicz Aw Lake 611a6fbc99c69

Coltan Antoniewicz is an application engineer with AW-Lake. He has over 10 years of experience in fluid measurement. Working in both sales and technical service gives him an excellent knowledge base not only for choosing the proper equipment but also in knowing the intricacies of the products themselves. Antoniewicz holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from ITT Technical Institute.