Iam new to this forum. Just bought a 323 one row new idea picker already had a wagon and have a friend that is going to plant the corn for me next spring. Iam wanting to build a wooden corn crib to hold around 800 bushel of ear corn. Does it matter which way you face the crib( like north to south or east to west???) Also were do you find the wire mess to put on before the wood planks that goes on the sides? Or do you really need the wire mess?
There are several plans available on the Internet for constructing a wood corn crib. You can modify the designs to meet your needs. Hope this is helpful!
Basic rules of thumb is no wider than 4'. Many are wider at top to help rain from getting to it.
If you have mice around (u do), then you want wire.
I build a crib last year and filled it full of corn. I posted pics on here earlier this year. I made it 6 ft wide and just used boards to wire. The corn keep very good just got done grinding the last bit a few days ago. Had a few small feild mice in it put not many no rats. Corn keep very good with very little damage due to mice.
Old rule of thumb is the further north you go the narrower the crib. Ours was 6' wide all boards. The belief is that the old drying wood draws moisture out of the corn.Further south with more drying wind you could go up to 8'.I was told below 30 % but use it fast. Some guys had ventilators in the crib so air could circulate better and help dry the corn. Some actually had fan systems similar to what is used on shelled corn now to help dry .Plus rats dont like the breeze.I usually started picking with my new idea #7 at 24-26 %. The newer fuller season corns were made for combining and shell over the snapping rolls easier so i would lose about 14BPA . The dryer it gets the worse it shelled for me.I bought a dearborn mounted picker on a wd45 that i hope to use in the future with the new idea for a back up and on the part i want to plant in narrower rosws.The old wood cribs that were wider at the top and narrow at the bottom were called Keystone cribs.