[Anonymous]

I work for a CPA firm and one of my responsibilities (in addition to normal audit work) is scheduling staff on any incoming inventory observation requests for other firms.

We just got a request to have someone count a grain facility – apparently they have about 200k bushels on hand. What advice do I give my staff? Do you just weigh a sample section and then estimate the remaining amount?

the other tough part is the inventory is in 5 separate bins – 2 hold 150k bushels each, 2 hold 2000 bushels, and the last holds 2800 bushels.

any advice is appreciated 🙂

[peskypole]

My CPA firm only does a small amount of inventory work like that so I'm not an expert. Our client stores some grain/fertilizer products in different elevators of varying sizes. What we do to measure the amount of grain/fertizlier in each elevator is to drop a tape measure down the elavator and measure the empty space. The volume of that elavator is known and doesn't change. For example, say 6,000 cubic feet and it's 30 feet tall. If the tape measures 10 feet of empty space. We figure that there is roughly 4,000 cubic feet of product. If we also know how many pounds are in one cubic foot of that particular type of product, We can then figure out how many tons of fertilizer is on hand and the value of it.

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[hashbrown]

The bigger bins if they are round you will have to measure/calculate the diameter of the bin and measure the grain depth, then convert to bushels. If bins are full you will have to measure/calculate the peak or cone of the bin as well and add to the main bin. If flat storage, measure the length, width and the grain depth, then covert bushels.

You also have to beware of the pack factor. Each type grain and each bin will have a different pack factor.

My guess the smaller bins are scale bins used for loading/unloading trucks/rail as 2000 bushels is only a couple of truckloads of grain and they may very well be empty most of the time.

Usually a grain elevator will have an official bin chart that will show feet per bushel. Drop a tape measure into the bin to measure much feet of airspace and using the bin chart you should be able to determine how many bushels of grain is in the bin. This relates to many of the older concrete elevators you see in the Midwest, they may have a similar chart.

[Anonymous]

hashbrown – thanks so much, that definitely helps! Fortunately my contact at the grain warehouse offered to send me a map like the one you mentioned, so at least we know the capacity of each bin. The bigger bins are round, so I'll advise my staff to go equipped with a tape measure 🙂

[Anonymous]

peskypole – thanks, that really helps too! Thankfully the little “map” our contact sent over has those measurements of the empty bins, so we can back into the on-hand quantity like you're describing

[monikernc]

CubsFan7 – thank you for posting this question. it was an interesting distraction from BEC prep and work today!

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