Czech Republic Poultry Feed Mill Cuts Pellet Moisture to 12.4% and PDI to 96.1% with Hongyang SKLB Counterflow Cooler

The Czech Republic sits among the more mature feed and poultry markets in Central Europe. According to FAOSTAT, chicken meat production in the country reached 160 thousand tonnes in 2024, slightly above the prior year, while total poultry meat output stood at 173 thousand tonnes (source: FAOSTAT, “Poultry Meat Production in Czechia,” February 2026). The Czech Statistical Office recorded 28.4 million broilers processed by slaughterhouses in recent quarterly reporting, with corresponding poultry meat production of 46,876 tonnes in a single quarter, an 11.3% year-on-year increase (source: Czech Statistical Office, Animal Production report).

The compound feed market reflects this maturity. Animal feedingstuffs production value reached 36,090.7 million CZK in 2025, up from 35,475.8 million CZK in 2024 (source: CEIC, “Czech Republic Agricultural Production: Value: IN: Animal Feeding Stuffs,” data from Czech Statistical Office). The Dutch-owned De Heus operates the country’s largest independent feed manufacturer at Marefy near Bučovice and Běstovice near Choceň, with approximately 300,000 tonnes of annual capacity serving poultry, swine, ruminant and aquaculture customers across Czechia, Slovakia, and Hungary (source: De Heus Czech Republic, company profile, energyspetfood.com).

For mid-sized regional feed mills, the operational challenge is no longer expansion—it is quality differentiation in a consolidated, EU-regulated market. Czech poultry integrators demand pellets with consistent moisture content, predictable durability, and long shelf life under the warm, humid conditions that can prevail in summer storage silos. Cooling is the post-pelleting process that determines whether these demands are met.

MORAVIA-FEED (name anonymized at client request) is a family-owned compound feed producer in the Vysočina region, supplying approximately 38,000 tonnes of broiler feed annually to four integrators across Moravia. The mill operates two pellet lines running SZLH420 ring-die pellet mills at roughly 8–10 t/h each, producing starter, grower, and finisher broiler feeds with fat levels ranging from 3.5% (starter) to 6.5% (finisher).

Prior to 2025, the mill relied on a horizontal belt cooler installed in 2014. By late 2024, the operations team began to see three recurring problems:

• Summer moisture spikes: Pellet moisture at load-out averaged 14.6% between June and August 2024, against a 12.5% internal target. Laboratory analysis confirmed that the horizontal cooler could not consistently push the moisture differential low enough when ambient temperatures exceeded 28 °C. (source: Feed Strategy, “Pellet quality: cooling and drying”).
• Pellet cracking from thermal shock: Pellets leaving at 80–86 °C entered high-velocity cross-flow air, producing surface cracks on 4–5% of product. PDI averaged 92.3%, below the 95% threshold.
• Quarterly mould claims: Three pellet batches were returned in Q2 and Q3 2024 due to visible mould growth. (source: cpshzy.com, “Counterflow Cooler Technology: Why It Matters for Pellet Quality”).

Hongyang’s technical team proposed the SKLB8 counterflow cooler based on the mill’s throughput profile and pellet specifications.

3.1 Equipment Specifications

3.2 Why Counterflow

The counterflow principle avoids the thermal shock that occurs when cold air strikes hot pellet surfaces directly. The octagonal column geometry addresses “dead zones” common in square coolers, ensuring uniform air distribution. For high-fat broiler finisher diets, the SKLB8′s longer cooling residence time (8–10 minutes) is required to draw internal moisture to the surface where it can be removed. (source: cpshzy.com, “Counterflow Cooler Technology”).

The SKLB8 was commissioned in March 2025. After a 90-day performance verification, the following results were compiled:

4.1 Moisture and Temperature Control

Pellet outlet temperature stabilized at ambient +3 °C. Moisture at load-out dropped to a 12-month average of 12.4%, with a CV of only 0.5 percentage points. In July 2025 (31 °C ambient), the SKLB8 held moisture at 12.6%, showing incredible stability compared to the old unit’s 2.1 point seasonal spread.

4.2 Pellet Quality Gains

PDI rose from 92.3% to 96.1%. Fines at load-out dropped from 5.8% to 1.9%—a 67% reduction. Most importantly, the mill recorded zero mould-related customer returns across Q2 and Q3 2025.

4.3 Energy and Operating Cost

The design translated to an 18% reduction in main fan power consumption, saving approximately 38,000 kWh annually (roughly 110,000 CZK). Spare-parts consumption also dropped by an estimated 40%.

A pellet mill can produce pellets with high starch gelatinization, but if they leave the cooler with internal moisture gradients, downstream performance suffers. Pellets exiting above 13.5% moisture have measurably higher rates of mould development. The counterflow design addresses this by providing uniform residence time, making it the baseline for quality-conscious production in warm climates.

The cooler—the unglamorous box at the end of the line—often determines whether the mill’s overall product meets the integrator’s specification. Hongyang’s SKLB8 delivered precisely the moisture and PDI performance the integrator contracts required. Cooling is the final process that defines pellet quality. The right cooler is the difference between pellets that look good at load-out and pellets that perform well through storage and on the farm.