Lighting in Confined Silo

I removed my post because I believe that you are incompetent.

A brief review of your past posts indicates this.

Seek professional help. Flour dust is explosive.

Be sure to personally test any lights you buy before asking others to use them.

I have given RAM.. a GA, but there is an alternative. A few companies now have their temporary lighting products ATAX certified for dust environments. You do not need permanent lighting and if you have more than one silo, a single set temporary lights could cover all your silos. Some of these products are florescent but most are LED. Examples of manufacturers, Wolf, Hadar, Larson.

Yes I am looking for ATAX certified temporary lighting fittings including the cable. So your option is good I already selected one product ( with lengthy cable) from one of those manufactures. Thanks.

Thanks I have provided your info for some manufactures so they will provide us correct fittings. Actually this only need temporary lighting so conduiting and switches etc will not be required. Thanks again for info.

Thanks for the spec. I have send the info to some manufactures, so they can provide us the suitable and safe fittings.

FYI, We are looking for temporary lighting solution. So conduiting, cabling or switches will not be needed. Thanks.

Maybe a big solar tube .....

http://www.just-rooflights.com/technical-information-solatube-160ds-290ds-330ds.html

Good option and checked the link. According to them maximum length of solar tube is around 8m, But silos are 50 m deep. Will check with them further for any possibilities. Thanks.

Keep the light source external and use some sort of light tube or fiber to get it inside.

Even the fiber carrying the light would have to be spark-proof (intrinsically safe).

Google explosion proof drop lights. Most this work is done with these. The lamp is on a spool device that is lowered from the top as the service people go down. Or the lamp can be hand lowered.

http://www.larsonelectronics.com/p-49502-explosion-proof-incandescent-drop-light-w-cord-reel-100-soow-cord-class-i-div-i-100-watts.aspx

We went through this at our company, and we have powdered charcoal.....

This site is not for solutions of this nature, just due to the risk, but only direction.

Because its not only lighting fixtures but conduit, switches as well,

So with that said, you need to get someone with knowledge for this.

Why would you make a silo out of flour?

Anyway... portable task lighting doesn't work for you here... like flashlights? How often is the silo cleaned?

Insects are terrible where there's flour around, and maybe they need the light....

Bon Appétit

Agreed. I've never seen a storage silo that didn't have mitigation issues with insects, rodents, birds... and the subsequent presence of predators of those insects, rodents, and birds that were looking for easy mealtime pickings.

in a lot of food products, you are actually allowed (Government Regulatory's) to have a certain amount of ...... how should I say it,...... animal protein in your food supply.

Yeah... once in a while I revisit the FDA Food Defect Level Handbook... I usually don't eat for three or four days after such a review.

Link to FDA Food Defect Level Handbook

Commercial peanut butter, for example, is allowed to contain a sampling average of 30 insect fragments per 100 grams of product before rejection is triggered. Wheat flour is 75 insect fragments per 50 grams.

Mmmmm. Bug parts. Not feeling very hungry right now...

A few years back, my girlfriend (at the time), her friend was a vegetarian.... She said that eating meat was disgusting... I could not help myself but to enlighten her.

I did receive a punch in the arm for that from my girlfriend.... and she told me to stop it..... I told her, she'd be more believable if she wasn't laughing when she be giving me these commands.

After which she hit me in the shoulder again,..... that one kinda hurt... Now that, she thought was funny.

"After which she hit me in the shoulder again,..... that one kinda hurt... Now that, she thought was funny."

Not a funny as watching her vegetarian friend eat that peanut butter sandwich!

I saw an article the other touting the production of certain crickets for food in a survival situation, yes they are edible. I do not recall the recipes for cricket frickasee. I do understand these can be extremely bountiful in the correct conditions, but you have to isolate they babies, as they devour their young.

I forgive you...you couldn't have known I'd be eating a peanut butter sandwich when I read your post!! Won't be eating the other half until very much later though.....

As if the bug parts allowance wasn't enough... Food rejection thresholds list an acceptable amount of rodent excreta as well. Yummy stuff.

I suppose that would be okay for vegetarians to consume.

Just to be clear... food processors (the ones which I have dealt with, anyway) shoot for zero extraneous materials in their products, and most hit that target. The document linked earlier is the upper threshold for rejection. In reality, the extraneous or foreign organic stuff in our foods won't hurt us, it is mostly the 'Ick' factor, or food aversion. But who wants to think about mouse poop or grasshopper toes in their breakfast toast or the jam applied?

"Food rejection thresholds list an acceptable amount of rodent excreta as well."

You mean to tell me that my raisin bran cereal I eat,.... aren't really raisins?........

"You mean to tell me that my raisin bran cereal I eat,.... aren't really raisins?..."

Well, most of them are raisins... prolly.

I don't want to think about what the charms in 'Lucky Charms' breakfast cereal might be.

Knew a guy who worked in a corn canning factory. Guess what they did with the corn that fell on the floor?

I have relatives who worked for Green Giant for years decades.

This is why I home can as much stuff as I do.

If it was like at a cheese Plant I was in about 30 years ago when a pile of curd fell on the floor, they went and got a scoop shovel, and put it where it came from.

Things aren't that way today,.... that I noticed..... :/

Anyways, talking about fresh cheese curds^{...(uhmmmm, munch, munch, squeak, squeak)} , or fresh baked potatoes you take off the line before packaging (potato chips too) , or cherries coming off the cooling pad for pitting or anything else of that nature...... nothing better, You just can't eat just one.

Why do you think they almost all call it "enriched" flour. Look at all the extra protein from the insect parts!☻

Think of them as tiny lobsters!

I must caution you here... We have recently come across...

Certified lighting product advertised and sold as being suitable for an explosion proof environment only to find that... the product was certified to a standard that clearly indicated that "product certified to this standard is NOT suitable for use in a hazardous location".

So... once you identify a product for this purpose, you might want to check carefully into its certification.

Thanks for sharing, I will follow up.

When something goes wrong in a flour silo the evening news shows dead people being hauled away.

Perhaps asking strangers on the Internet is not the best way to deal with this.

You can use LED lights, Now LED lights are available at 1W, 3W, 5W & so.. on.

Go to your local supplier or look on the internet for a supplier of coal mine cap lamps. These lamps are normally certified intrinsically safe or flame proof. It comes complete with a fitting for your hard had and high Ah battery.

The military had trouble with effectively destroying terrorists in mountain caves.

Conventional explosives lose power when turning sharp corners,so the caves were designed with many right angle turns to thwart rocket attacks.

The military experts designed a "dust bomb".

The rocket released a cloud of dust that penetrated every crevice and after a certain time delay it was detonated.

The result was total destruction of the contents of the cave.

Anyone not directly killed by the blast died because their lungs collapsed due to the pressure,or because of the ensuing vacuum and lack of oxygen that followed.

The lesson here is never underestimate the power of a dust explosion.

Can you spray water down from above or insert clean-in-place nozzles? Dust explosions can be incredibly powerful. All it takes is a spark if the conditions are right. Also, you need to follow confined-space entry procedures... breathing-air, stand-by, rescuer equipped with breathing air, body-harness, etc. It's nothing to take lightly. Confined spaces are dangerous places without adding explosive dust to the equation. The best procedure is to find a way to clean the silo without entering it.

Agreed.

Acoustic cleaning might be a better choice.

These silos are made by concrete, will acoustic cleaning work, and suitable ?

Thanks.

Yes, if properly sized and utilized, acoustic cleaning is quite effective on concrete silos.

This doesn't address you original question about intrinsically safe illumination.

Thanks I understand.

I hope you find what you need for the job, but remember that static discharges can initiate dust explosions as readily as a spark in a switch.

Good luck -- GH

Thanks for reminder. Yes important, static discharged can initiate dust explosion. Can experience when use vacuum cleaner, discharging flour from the bulk tankers. Must be properly grounded and should check periodically for safety.

Basically you can design a low voltage lamp using 12Vdc or 24Vdc voltages with halogen lamp or just use the some car head lamp with 12Vdc. Proper handle must be made to hold the head lamp. I had design few set of hand held lamp for our caster to enter the cooling chamber voltage by a 24Vdc with 2 halogen lamp install inside the square sport light fitting.

That's a sure way to get someone killed!!!!

For maximum safety, and the total avoidance of any electrical equipment, I would recommend you try these: Glow sticks. You can use your imagination to find them on the internet. They come in various colors including near white glow, and also green for maximum visibility of the light. Since these are contained in plastic, I would be forewarned of the possibility of static charge build up on them, so you should actually consult with the manufacturer to see if these have an intrinsically safe rating or not.

This would also go for any other gear you take into the silo, including your clothing, any ladder, climbing ropes, carabiners, etc. All tools also must be spark proof, and you probably need a grounding lead attached to you at all times while inside.

If this is inspection work, any imaging equipment lowered into the silo must be instrinsically safe from producing any form of spark.

Only way around all this would be to completely remove oxygen from the inside of the silo, and good luck with that, as I believe this to be completely impossible, even with slight positive pressure purging with nitrogen, or CO2. Any entrants would then have to be in SCBA breathing.