[caption id="attachment_2849" align="aligncenter" width="1014"]
New broiler house, Netherlands[/caption]
-By OPTICON AGRI SYSTEMS, Netherlands
The project of New broiler house is owned by the Family Bram and Koos Akkerman in the North East of The Netherlands. 
Via dealer Veldman/Eshuis BV, Opticon AGRI SYSTEMS has finished a new broiler project.
The total projects consist of 3 broiler houses. Two houses of Mr. Akkerman are already equipped with Opticon products several years ago. Mr. Akkermans selected Veldman/Eshuis as his supplier because of reputation and best equipment.
The new barn is 90 meters long and 25 meters wide and has a floor space of 2,250 square meters. Now the total production capacity is 108.000 birds. They supply the birds at weight of approximately 2 kg. Mr. Akkerman has also 150 hectares of farmland and produces all the wheat for his own poultry farm and also other products.
Outside of the house. See the horizontal panels to prevent direct wind influence via the air inlets.
Climate control The houses are equipped with side air inlets and wind protection panels. The air inlets are separated in 4 zones and controlled at each side with two electrical drive units. 
Each zone has its own temperature sensor. In this way the temperature will be equal in all zones and the same at both sides and there will be a perfect airflow pattern.
Detail of the air inlet valves with one of the four drive units. The valves are quite large and provide good air flow toward the center of the barn.
During summertime, when there is a lot of heat, the high pressure fogging will be activates. In front of every air inlet is a nozzle installed. Then the inlets will be in the complete open position and the air will be directed towards the birds.
This negative pressure is very important to get the right airspeed in the air inlets in order to bring the fresh air to the centre of the building. This is especially important with a wide building as this one of 25 mtr. wide.
This is the dust cover behind the barn. The dust cover is provided with a light trap. There is no daylight in the barn. 
When later during the growing period, the fans turn on one by one, there will be no additional light inside the barn. In the other stalls you see the chicks scared at times when a fan is turned on. This affects the distribution of the chicks. Then the last feeding pans remain unoccupied for a while.
Heating
During cold weather and young birds, a central natural gas hot water boiler will be activated. The barn is equipped with about 12.000 mtr of floor heating tubes.
This will give a constant heat with low water temperature, which reduces wet litter and zero CO2 production. For extra heating capacity some heating tubes are installed along both side walls.
In this new barn they have also the ability to cool the floor. To make this possible, an additional source was beaten. During hot days, they can cool down a few degrees.
A heat exchanger is installed. The tube from the exchanger arrives in the ridge of the barn. Through the support of fans, the conditioned air is blown through the barn.
Here the warm inside air is sucked to the heat exchanger.
Automation system
All measurement and controlling functions are done by the Opticon MCC-10 poultry computer. 
This unit is easy to use and incorporates all the necessary functions to operate a modern broiler house. With the ability for the installer to set up the controller in such a way that only selected functions are visible, in another words Opticon’s unique “what you see is what you use” programmable system. This simplifies the operation for the farmer. This avoids scrolling through a menu or functions that are not relevant to his application.
These panel boxes are custom made. All necessary safety devices are built in the panel box. In case of an malfunction, the farmer can manually turn on the desired functions. Indication lights give a quick overview of the actual status.
Alarm
A complete independent alarm system is installed also the MCC-10 can triggered the alarm. In the house you have a high/low thermostat which is connected to the independent alarm unit OKA-20.The farmer will set the high/low setting at approx 4-5 degrees above & below set point, which will trigger the alarm if house temperature is too high or low. The OKA-20 has build in rechargeable battery with 2 trigger inputs; dialer and 12v dc siren output and operates on trigger, power failure with siren test button. Also a Single temperature stat is uses as a manual back up fan stage, set 4-5 degrees above set point temperature.
Bird weighing
The objective is to achieve target body-weights throughout the life of the broilers. And to ensure the correct growth and development, within the flock period. In practical it is not possible to get this vital information by manual bird weighing. Therefore Mr. Akkerman decided to install the Opticon DWS-20 bird weighing system. Now he can spend more time to the control and the management of his birds. The birds will be weighted from the first day till the end of the flock period. The farmer has continuous control about the performance of his birds. Two weighing platforms / scales are located, one at each side of the barn. The system gives actual average weight of the birds.
On the site are two large grain silos. They can store 600 tons of wheat. "We feed wheat for many years. In this way we keep everything under control and there is no loss of margin, "says Bram Akkerman.
The brothers have a wheat crusher purchased. This enables them to use broken wheat for the younger birds. "The broken wheat is better absorbed and digested. That leads to drier litter, "says Bram Akkerman.
A batch feed weigher is installed to mix, distribute and monitor the feed. In combination with the automatic birdweigher, Mr. Akkerman will be informed in detail about the feed conversion.
In the barn Landmeco feed pans are installed. 
These pans are easy to clean. A tilting system makes it is possible to drop the feed beside the pan on the paper. In this way they can stimulate the start of the day-old chicks and this saves on labor.
Lighting
The broiler farmers opted for LED lighting. Only 8 LED lights are installed. The alternative was to install sixty fluorescents fittings. A uniform light distribution in combination with cost savings was the reason to choose for LED lighting. The lamps are slightly more expensive, but their installation is cheaper. However, the expected savings in electricity costs is considerable. We think a yearly savings of € 2,400 on electricity cost.
Drinking system
Detail of one of the water lines. The water lines are equipped with the latest-Lubing nipple drinkers (Twin Clean Line). The water is circulated continuously, and does not stand still, so the risk of contamination is small.
Comment Now