Is Robotic Milking Right for You? - PA Dairy Summit Robotic Milking Right for You? Jim Salfer1 and...

2/9/2015

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Is Robotic Milking Right for

You?Jim Salfer1 and Marcia Endres2

1U of MN Extension, St. Cloud2Department of Animal Science, St. Paul

University of Minnesota

[email protected]

© 2014 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.

New Seat Belt law

This becomes

effective Sept 1, 2015The National Highway Safety Council has done

extensive testing on a newly designed seat belt.

Results show that accidents can be

reduced by as much as 95%

when the belt is properly installed.

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First Robot Milker (1981)

Courtesy of DeLaval

© 2014 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.4

Milking robots are here to stay!

– North American Data

• >2500 AMS units

• >1000 farms

• >140,000 cows

• >381,000 milkings/d

• Avg 2.5 AMS units/farmRodriguez, 2014

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Why robotic/automated milking?

• Improve lifestyle

• Labor management

• Human health

• Latest technology


• Improved product quality and consistency

• Reduce direct and overhead cost

• Improved accuracy and repeatability (cows like consistency)

• Improved quality of work for employees (higher skilled workers)

• Improved workplace health and safety (take over unpleasant, arduous or health threatening tasks)

• Reduced waste and increased yield

• Reduced turnover and recruitment difficulty

Why Industries Invest in Robots

ABB – ten reasons to invest in robots

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Labor on a Dairy Farm

Business management

50-60%

Feeding 10-20%

Reproduction & Health 5-15%

Milk harvesting 5-10%

Milk harvesting 50-60%

or managing labor

Feeding 10-20%

Reproduction & Health 5-15%

Business management 5-10%

Conventional milking Automatic milking


Potential AMS Advantages

Provides Data• Milk production etc

• Over 100 measurements at every milking

• Timely decision making

Other benefits:• Consistent milking routine

• Higher skilled labor

• Never late for work

• Never needs training

• Doesn’t need scheduling or holidays off

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• “Plug and play,” “Plug and pray,” or

“Plug and pay”

• Low Return on Investment? (compared to what?)

• Obsolescence

• Repair costs

Potential challenges

Adapted from Bewley, 2013


Automated/Robotic Milking Systems

Box systems• Lely

• DeLaval

• GEA Farm

Technologies

• AMS-Galaxy

• BouMatic Robotics

Parlor systems• GEA Farm Technologies

• DeLaval

• MiRobot

• BouMatic Robotics

What is the right fit for me?

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Single Box

Systems


Multiple-Box Systems

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GEA Robot for Rotary Parlors

DairyProQFully Automated

Industrial Milking

Slide compliments Greg Larson, GEA

GEA Apollo – semi automated milking


DeLaval Rotary Parlor

Slide compliments Mark Futcher

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MiRobot version 1.0 under cow model Slide compliments David Rubin, Microbot

MiRobot


You must like working with cows

• “Management makes milk – Robots

only harvest it” Doug Kastenschmidt – Ripon WI

• Cow management must still come

first

Keys to success with robots

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Guidelines for Efficiency

Box robots

140-190 attaches/24 hrs

2.4-3.0 milkings/cow/day

Goals for milk per robot

• 4000-4500 lbs – OK

• 4500-5000 – Good

• >5000 - Excellent


Pounds of milk per robot

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

Average = 4,325

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Number of milkings per day

0.00

0.50

1.00

1.50

2.00

2.50

3.00

3.50

4.00

Average = 2.6


Excellent feed management

Survey results

– Feed management ranked 1st

– Pellet palatability and quality ranked 2nd

Nutritionist that like the challenge

of robots


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Goal of every feeding program

1. Meet nutritional needs of cows while maintaining

cow health

2. Optimizing milk and components

3. Economical

4. Labor efficient and cost effective feed delivery

system


Automatic milking system feeding

Additional AMS goal:

• Entice cows to visit the milking station regularly and

frequently

Accomplished through:

• Partial mixed ration (PMR) at bunk

• Additional concentrate at the milking station

• Series of selection gates in a guided flow system

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Feeding to meet the farmers

goalsBalancing energy in AMS vs. bunk

• high forage/low energy TMR drives cows to robot – may limit milk production

• high energy TMR – increase late lactation “lazy” cows

How much concentrate to feed through AMS

• increase risk of acidosis and lameness

• off feed problems

0

5

10

15

20

25

0.7

0.7

25

0.7

33

0.7

41

0.7

48

0.7

53

0.7

57

0.7

62

Perc

ent

laz

y co

ws

Bunk ration energy, Mcal Nel/lb

Lazy…

Rodenburg, 2008


Daily robot concentrate

Free flow Guided flow

Average, lbs 11.2 7.9

Minimum, lbs 2.0 2.0

Maximum, lbs 25.0 18.0

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PMR balance vs milk tank average1

Free flow Guided flow

Average 20.0 12.3

Minimum 10.0 9.0

Maximum 30.0 20.0

1Bulk tank average milk – PMR balanced milk


Voluntary and Involuntary milkings of

cows fed at two concentrate levels

6.6 lbs

AMS pellet

17.6 lbs

AMS pelletP-value

Total milking/d 2.6 2.8 .13

Not fetch cows 2.4 2.7 <.05

Bach, JDS 2007

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Milking frequency of high starch

vs. low starch pellets1

23%

46%

27%

4%

High Starch Pellet2

2 X

3 X

4 X

5 X

35%

38%

15%

12%

Low Starch Pellet3

2 X

3 X

4 X

5 X

1 Avg consumption – 11.9 lbs of pellets. 249% starchy grain, 325% starchy grain. Halachmi, et al, JDS 2006

Average:

3.39 visits

78 lbs

Average:

3.31 visits

79 lbs


Pellets vs Meal

Pellet vs meal effect on visits

Item Meal1 Quality pellet

Visits/cow/day 3.57 3.93

Milkings/cow/day 2.35 2.50

Milk/cow/day, lbs 53.6 57.2

Rodenberg, 20041 49% distillers grains, 49% cracked

corn, 2% molasses, 0.1% flavoring

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High vs low quality pellet

Pellet quality effect on visits

Item Low Quality High Quality

Visits/cow/day 3.40 4.04

Milkings/cow/day 1.72 2.06

Fetched cows, % 16.0 7.1

Milk/cow/day, lbs 54.5 55.6

Rodenberg, 2002


Feed Costs of Robot vs. Conventional

Total Feed Cost

Production Parlor Robot

120 lbs $8.87 $9.40

90 lbs $7.53 $7.85

70 lbs $6.80 $6.50

50 lbs $5.63 $5.18

AVG $7.21 $7.23

**Ration data from 5/1/12

(CS-$50/ton, Hlg-$60/ton, HMSC-200/ton,

SBM-$430/ton, Cottonseed-$300/ton)

Slide compliments – Chad Keifer

http://fyi.uwex.edu/news/files/2013/11/Ripp_dairy_cow_feed07_2727.jpg

http://fyi.uwex.edu/news/files/2013/11/Ripp_dairy_cow_feed07_2727.jpg

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Barn design

• Cow comfort

• Access to robots

• Minimize lameness

• Labor saving design



Free flow system

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Free Cow Trafficwith split entry

Automatic

Milking

SystemFeeding

Area

Resting

AreaFetch

Pen

http://www.dairylogix.com

/ http://vetvice.nl/

Fetch cows

Sort

Pen

Slide courtesy D. Kammel


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Directed Cow Traffic

“Feed First”

Automatic

Milking

System

Selection

Unit

Holding

Pen

Sort

Pen

Resting

Area

Feeding

Area



Guided flow - Milk first system

Photo courtesy Erica Kiestra, KIE Farms

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Directed Cow Traffic

“Milk First”

Automatic

Milking

System

Feeding

Area

Resting

AreaSelection

Unit

Holding

Pen

Sort

Pen



Free Flow vs Guided Flow

Item Free Flow Guided Flow

Fetch rate (labor) 16%1 8.5%1

Initial

investment

lower higher

Level of mgmtcomplexity

lower higher

Feeding

complexity

higher lower

1Rodenburg, 2007

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Other keys to for successCow Comfort

– Overcrowding limits cow movement

– Lameness decreases visits and increases fetch

rates (Bach, 2007) (Borderas 2008)

Excellent ventilation and fly control to minimize

bunching


Lameness prevalence

Stall surface Lameness

Severe

Lameness

Sand (14) 22.5%a 4.3%a

Waterbed (7) 35.3%b 10.2%b

Mattress (22) 40.9%b 8.5%b

Mattress + pasture (5) 21.5%a 2.7%a

Bedded pack (3) 19.0%a 1.7%a

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Labor savers - drovers lanes & split entry

Labor savers - strategic gates

Compliments David Kammel

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Labor savers - headlocks

Special needs/treatment pen??

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Where should the footbath go?


Pre-fresh feeder for heifers

Will this improve training of heifers

• Possibly improve visits of heifers

• Is it worth the cost?

• How much time to you spend training pre-fresh heifers

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Labor comparison

• AMS dairies (all single box units)

– 485 to 1410 lbs milk per man hour

• Parlor dairies

– >500 cows, 772 to 922 lbs milk per man hour

– 100-300 cows, 551 to 771 lbs milk per man

hour

Caution Preliminary survey results

Unpublished, Piktaranta, 2014


Stocking Rate

- In 13 herds with 34 to 71 cows/AMS, higher

stocking densities were associated with lower

milking frequency. (Deming 2013)

- When there are more than

• 60 cows per AMS,

• the number of fetch cows

• Increases (free flow).

• (Rodenburg and Wheeler, 2002)

Fig.1.voluntary milking and cows per box

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

20

45.0 50.0 55.0 60.0 65.0 70.0

cows per milking box

% l

azy

% lazy cows

% lazy milkings

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Enjoy technology

• Use the information available to

optimize performance and cow

health



Focus on maintenance

• Equipment is expensive

• Downtime is more expensive

• Be prepared for higher repair costs


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Start up & Dealer support

• Use proven tactics at start up

• Successful start up minimizes

financial stress

• Good dealer support is essential



Requires excellent business and

management skills

• Higher management than

conventional system

• Mindset to maximize output/robot


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Mindset Change• Focus on milk per robot per day

• Maximize milk per minute of box time

– Cow milking speed

– Machine settings and maintenance

– Minimize prep time and attach time

• Cow cooperation

• Teat placement and udder balance

• Singe udders

– Minimize percent free time

– Optimize refusals

• Each 5 seconds more/milking = one less cow


Milk per AMS

Biggest factors

• Percent idle time

• Milk flow rate per minute of robot use

Balance:

• Milk/cow/visit (milking permission)

• Milkings/cow/day

• Milk/cow/day

• Number of cows/robot

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Cull RateTypically 0-3% (Rodenburg, 2002)

AMS cannot milk some udder conformations

– Crossed rear teats

– Real deep udder

– Severe reverse tilt

Cull for optimum robot performance

– optimum box time (milk per minute of box time)

– milking speed

– behavior

– attach time


Milking time, speed, robot use

Milking time

(minutes)

Milking

speed

(L/min)

Robot idle

time (%)

Average 5.5 2.8 19

Minimum 4.5 2.3 8

Maximum 6.3 4.7 66

Reduce box time by 1 minute/cow increases capacity by 12%

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Economics


Cost/ValueExpensive – compared to what???

Family dairy looking to expand

Trade offs

– labor (hired and family)

– capital investment

– lifestyle

Choices:

– low cost parlor – hired/family labor

– modern parlor – hired/family labor

– AMS – family labor

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Slide complements of Tranel & Schulte, 2013


Inputs – Two robots

• 144 cows

• $200,000/robot

• $21,600 barn cost

• 5.0% opportunity cost

• 10 year’s of loan

payments

• 15 year robot life

• $25,000 residual/robot

• Increase milk 5 lbs/c/d

• Decrease labor 5 hr/d

• Decrease SCC 10%

• $17.50/cwt milk price

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Outputs

Robotic milking system economic analysisby William Lazarus and Jim Salfer Most recently modified 12/1/2013

Farm Information Dan Dairyman, 11/8/13

Partial budget analysis (before-tax)

Positive Impacts: Negative Impacts:

Increased Incomes: Decreased Incomes Expected: $0

Increased Milk Production $41,580 Increased Expenses:

Increased Milk Premiums $2,737 Increased Repair and Insurance Costs $16,000

Increased Cull Cow Sales (minus = decrease) $0 Change in Feed Quantity Due to DMI Change $10,417

Software Value to Herd Production $5,040 Extra Cost to Pellet the Feed Fed in the Robot Booth $5,227

Total Increased Incomes $49,357 Increased Cow Replacement Costs (minus = decrease) $0

Decreased Expenses: Increased Utilities and Supplies $972

Reduced Heat Detection $2,190 Increased Records Management $3,942

Reduced Labor $27,375 Capital Recovery Cost of Robots (Dep & Int) $38,537

Reduced Labor Management $0 Total Increased Expenses $75,095

Total Decreased Expenses $29,565 Total Negative Impacts $75,095

Total Positive Impacts $78,922 NET ANNUAL FINANCIAL IMPACT w/o Housing = $3,827

Capital Recovery Cost of Housing (Dep & Int) $1,405

Total Capital Recovery Cost of Robots & Housing $40,618

NET ANNUAL FINANCIAL IMPACT with Housing = $1,746

Robot's salvage value at the end of its useful life:

Estimated value at end $50,000 Annualized PV

Estimated value at end, present value (PV) at 5%/year, $24,051 $2,317

NET ANNUAL IMPACT with with Robot's salvage value $4,063


Sensitivity AnalysisImpacts of varying key variables over a range of values, showing breakeven points:

-$40,000

-$30,000

-$20,000

-$10,000

$0

$10,000

$20,000

$30,000

$40,000

0 2 4 6 8 10Imp

act

Projected Change in Milk lb/day

NET ANNUAL IMPACTIm

pac

t

NET ANNUAL IMPACT

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Sensitivity AnalysisProjected Change in Milk lb/day

-$40,000

-$30,000

-$20,000

-$10,000

$0

$10,000

$20,000

6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20

Imp

act

Years of useful life

NET ANNUAL IMPACT


Scenario’s

Enter scenario descriptions here=>Increased

investment Less Pel lets

New Barn

($12,000 s ta l l )

No reduced

labor

Lower ini tia l

mi lk and no

more mi lk

Current Last Alternative scenarios

Enter input data for alternative scenarios to compare Data Entries 1 2 3 4 5

Estimated Cost per Robot $200,000 $200,000 $220,000

Related housing changes needed/cow $150 $150 $500 $100 $7,222Increased Insurance Value of Robot & Housing vs.

Current $400,000 $400,000 $440,000 $1,400,000

Anticipated Change in Hours of Milking Labor 5 6 0

Reduced Hours for Labor Management 0 0.6 0.0

Lbs of Milk per Cow per Day, Past Year 75 75 60

Projected Change in Milk Production 5 5 5 16 0

Estimated Percent Change in SCC -10 -5 -15

Pellets Fed in Robot Booth 11 11 6

Total investment for the robots and housing $421,600 $512,000 $414,400 $1,439,968 $421,600 $421,600

NET ANNUAL IMPACT $4,063 $4,426 $16,405 -$17,915 -$23,456 -$18,170

RecalculateReset

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Summary

• Milking process fits well with robotic technology

• Most current users are satisfied with their decision

– Dairies can expand w/o hiring labor

– Producers can have more flexible schedule

• Whole system approach for best success

• Must make the cash flow work!

• What is the return on investment?

• Requires excellent management!

•


Summary

• Adoption rate in U.S. will depend on:

– Availability of labor

– Cost of labor

– Cost of technology

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Acknowledgements

• Dairy producers

• Lely & DeLaval for assistance with our

project

• GEA & BouMatic

• David Kammel, UW-Madison

• Kelly Froelich

• Lucas Salfer, Tyler Evink, Michael Schmitt,

Andrew Plumski, Nathan Bos


Jim Salfer E-mail [email protected]: 320.203.6093

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