Remodeling Takes Facilities From Worst to Best

Kevin Schafer

By Kevin Schafer’s own account, “it was just a mess.” It was a 20-plus year old added-on-to, partially slatted finishing barn with solid wooden fences.

“It was our least efficient building on the farm,” says Schafer, who runs day-to-day operations at Sangamon Prairie Pork in Williamsville, IL. Sangamon Prairie is owned by Schafer and his father-in-law, Charles Burris.

Last year Burris and Schafer overhauled the barn and divided it into two 550-head rooms. They installed a FAST scale in each room using a food court design. Remodeling was complicated. Beyond reworking the barn’s footprint by demolishing about 25 percent where there were no slats, the building had to be gutted and all the equipment and lines were removed.

Farmweld designers helped Sangamon Prairie incorporate the new FAST technology and designed a layout that re-used existing metal gates and Farmweld Jumbo Feeders that had been installed in a previous remodeling.

“Everything Farmweld sent us was labeled down to the hardware bags, the posts and fences. We just followed the drawing, and it all just assembled perfectly,” says Schafer.

Schafer, who ships to Tyson, is very pleased with early results in the FAST facility, especially in reduced sort loss. Typically, the operation averages $1.09 per hundredweight in sort loss. Average shipping weight is 270 – 278 pounds. In the first cut out of the remodeled FAST barn, sort loss dropped to $.37 per hundredweight. Beyond improved sort loss, the barn is easier for loading market weight pigs. With the large pen design, the pigs appear very comfortable.

“We’ve taken one of the poorest barns on the farm and turned it into one of our nicest barns,” says Schafer.