Milking Pipeline - Setup

Setup

In small dairy farms with less than 100 cows, the pipeline is installed above the cow stalls and the cows are milked in sequence by moving from one cow to the next down the row of stalls. The milking machine is a lightweight transportable hose assembly which is plugged into sealed access ports along the pipeline.

In the United States, for farmers that participate in the voluntary Dairy Herd Improvement Association (DHIA), approximately once a month the milk volume from each cow is measured using additional portable metering devices inserted between the milker and the pipeline.

In large dairy farms with more than 100 cows, the pipeline is installed within a milking parlor that cows walk through in order to be milked at fixed milking stations that do not move. In this case the milking machine is fixed permanently in place, and because it is stationary, it can include additional fixed equipment such as computerized milk-metering systems to measure milk volume at every milking, which would be cumbersome to use all the time with portable milkers.

In both cases the pipeline is constructed out of stainless steel which does not easily corrode and is resistant to most chemicals, though larger operations may use larger diameter pipes in order to handle greater milk volumes flowing through the piping.