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Pipes along back wall

You may have wondered where Peter Moon went (and that’s a long story for another day) but we have made a considerable amount of progress on our new Paragon Compost System and the next series of Blog Entries will be coming your way at a steady rate.

After pouring the concrete walls, the forms were stripped and the metal wall brackets and minor concrete spills were all cleaned up.  In the photo to the right, you can see the back and divider walls as well as the aeration pipes that lead to each of the three compost bins.  The top pipe extends all the way from the left end of the system to the far right bin, the middle pipe to the center bin and the bottom pipe to the left bin.  Each pipe then splits to deliver air to the two aeration plenums located in the bottom of the respective bin.  It is important to mount the pipes securely to the back of the wall because they will later be covered up with clean gravel to within 6-inches of the top of the back wall.  We use clean rock so that it will drain and prevent the build up of pressure behind the wall.  Not visible here is a buried perforated drain pipe that will take the water from behind the wall to the front right side where it be directed into a drainage ditch.

In this picture, you can also see that the wall has been partially backfilled with gravel. This creates a level area behind the wall that will be used to deliver the raw manure to the bin, taking full advantage of gravity.