CHAPTER XV 

 THE CONCRETE STAVE SILO 



The concrete stave silo is patterned after the wood 

 stave silo, and has been developed in an attempt to 

 introduce some of the elements of ease of erection and 

 low cost of the wood silo, combining with them the 

 features so desirable in concrete. 



These silos are built up of members resembling 

 staves, and erected and held together in the same 

 manner. It would manifestly be impossible, however, 

 to make them in such lengths as are handled in wood, 

 so that the length of the concrete staves is limited 

 usually to 28 or 30 inches. They may be either made 

 on the job, or shop-cast and moved to the place of erec- 

 tion. In this latter case they can usually be cured 

 under better conditions and there will not be the dan- 

 ger of hurrying them into the structure before the 

 proper curing has taken place. These staves are usu- 

 ally poured of slush concrete in multiple steel molds. 



The staves are generally made in a width of about 

 10 inches and are cast flat. The usual thickness is 

 about 2% inches. All types have some method of giv- 

 ing the staves a vertical joint, and some of them also 

 provide a horizontal joint where the ends of the staves 

 come together. The joints are filled with mortar. To 

 still further safeguard the structure against air and 

 moisture, the inside may be plastered or given a wash 

 coat of cement. 



In constructing the silo the staves are assembled 

 with staggered joints, the first row of staves consist- 

 ing of alternate full length and half length staves. 



(125) 



