Based in Crewe Cheshire Greenoak Equipment began trading in the early 1990's as a manufacturer of electronic products later specialising in agricultural electronic feeding controls for cattle designed by managing director Lall Singh. By 1996 the company were supplying spares for milking equipment and electronic controls to over 100 dealers throughout the UK. In the same year Greenoak acquired the distribution for Surge milking machines for the UK. By 1999 54 milking parlours had been installed. When the Surge business was sold Greenoak were left without a branded milking machine. The company responded by purchasing a retail dealership and with the knowledge gained in milking technology developed its own, Sureline, brand of milking machines.
Today the company operates in the retail sector servicing dairy farmers direct within a 40-mile radius of Crewe. Dealers, who are provided with technical assistance, training and advice on installations, service the rest of the country. In addition a thriving export market has been built up including Greenoak Equipment in Canada to service the North American markets.
Retail sector
Marketing manager Roy Birchall who has many years of experience in the dairy industry controls the retail sector. The company not only installs new parlours but, with their many years of experience, are able to update existing installations to perform as new maximising the use of existing parts. Customers are also offered 24-hour breakdown service, regular maintenance and compliance plant testing.
As Roy Birchall explained, " it is not a matter of just getting a sale we believe that our duty is to assist the dairy farmer to maximise their profits through efficient milking. We look on the whole process as harvesting the milk."
This means that Roy provides technical advice beyond that of a purely mechanical nature becoming involved in dairy hygiene and biosecurity. To this end the company offer a wide range of consumables including disinfectants and teat dips providing a one stop shop for local dairy farmers. The company has worked closely with disinfectant manufacturers Kilco in developing the range of dairy hygiene products which they supply.
Typical of the customers Roy Birchall deals with are dairy farmers Tom, Jean and Dale Whalley of Tabley Hill Dairy Farm. Over the years Greenoak have been involved in updating the milking systems. In 1993 the parlour was updated with new feed managers and electronic feed dispensing including memory feed control. This enabled to feed to yield on a more accurate basis. The parlour was also upgraded with large bore milk and vacuum lines in looped formation to achieve vacuum stability. Also fitted was a split ratio front and rear pulsation system to give additional cow comfort via large capacity clusters.
In 2002 the jar milking system was replaced with direct to line milking utilising all the upgraded equipment previously supplied with the addition of clip-on approved milk recording and extension to a 13:26 milking system.
In 2006 the clip-on milk meters were replaced with Greenoak approved ICAR electronic milk meters and auto ID system. In 2007 an air wash system was installed to decreases the possibility of cross contamination.
The SURE-Line systems offer a range of innovative electronic controls including the milking control meter manager, which has a host of features to enhance productivity with full automation. Standard features of the system include:
• Milk yield display per cow point
• Cow number display when connected to a PC
• Automatic cluster removal function control
• Communication and computerised process
monitor and cow database
• Settable Soft start and Soft take-off facility
• Swing-over function
• Wash mode
To assist with dairy hygiene as an aid in reducing bacterial contamination of milk the Airwash cluster flush system is available. The system is unique in that it can be adapted for all known clusters. The Airwash liner rinsing system is designed to prevent cow-to-cow cross infection. The system flushes out remains of milk and bacteria by using cold water and filtered compressed air. The system can be configured for fully automatic operation by using the end of milking signal of the automatic cluster removal system.
Greenoak is the largest spare parts distributor in the UK for alternative milking machine parts. Over 7,000 parts are kept in stock which can be shipped anywhere in the UK on a next day delivery.
