SCREENMASTER® CS Bar Screen to the Rescue at a Commercial Composting Plant

A commercial mushroom composting company in Pennsylvania needed help with a problem in their compost production process. The compost, made from hay, straw, horse manure, chicken litter, corn cobs and more, is processed on an eight-acre concrete slab, also called a wharf. The runoff from the rain and water used during the compost process washes off the wharf and into a pit and then travels through a pipe that carries it to the two-million gallon lagoon behind the wharf. From there, the company recycles the water by pumping it back to begin the process again. Unfortunately, the process wasn’t as smooth as they had hoped. Sediment and pieces of the organic material were continuously washing down into the pit and traveling to the lagoons, causing major clogs. This presented a serious issue for the company as it was slowing down their process, causing downtime, and making a mess of their lagoons. That’s when they contacted Franklin Miller for a solution.

At the suggestion of Franklin Miller engineers, the company installed an all stainless steel mechanical bar screen called the SCREENMASTER® Model CS, which would automatically remove the debris. The unit was set up in the pit, screening the debris before it could get to the lagoons. “Before we had the SCREENMASTER, all that junk went into the lagoons,” said Andy Jones, who started this business over 25 years ago. “It was impossible to stop all that sediment from getting in there. It kept clogging the pumps and impellers.” “Now it stays nice and clean,”  Jones said. “We’ve had the SCREENMASTER CS for a few years now and we have no problem with the pumps at all. It’s simply a wonderful piece of equipment.” The SCREENMASTER CS features a series of rakes mounted on oversized perforated rake baskets that clears solids from a stainless bar rack and lifts them up out of the channel. It’s easy to install in new or existing channels.

The SCREENMASTER  installs at a 75° inclination so it has a very small footprint. The design features a simple, continuous rotary motion. As the rake head passes through the bar slots collecting debris, it travels up the unit’s dead plate until it reaches a special scraper supplied with a dash pot for smooth operation. The screenings then drop out the unit’s discharge chute into a bin, conveyor or SPIRALIFT® CS screenings washing system. The unit is available in a variety of widths up to 78” (2 m) wide and for a lift height of up to 38 ft. (11.6 m).

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