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Drying Soybeans
Good quality soybeans should be dried to 14% for winter storage and 11 to 12% for summer storage. If quality is poor, the moisture content should be reduced an additional percentage point.
Too much heat, while high temperature drying soybeans, causes seed coat cracking, which results in splits. Some people recommend keeping the air relative humidity above 40% when drying. This limits the heat added to less than 20 degrees, since a 20 degree temperature increase cuts the relative humidity in half. Avoid dryers that re-circulate the beans during drying, since this increases the potential for splitting.
Natural air / low temperature (NA/LT) drying is a good option for drying soybeans. The equilibrium moisture content (EMC) of soy beans with air at 40 degrees and 70%relative humidity is 13.6%. Warming the air five degrees reduces the relative humidity to 58%. The EMC at 45 F and 58% RH is 10.9%. Minimum airflow rates are 19% 2 cfm/bu.,18% 1.5 cfm/bu., 17% 1.25 cfm/bu, and 16% 1.0 cfm/bu. Drying times will be 20 to 30 days. Higher airflow rates result if the grain depth is reduced, so this should be considered to increase drying speed. NA/LT drying becomes inefficient as average temperatures drop below 40 degrees. Beans can be cooled to about 25 degrees, stored over winter, and dried in the spring.
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