S4E15: Sponsor Spotlight: Midwest Ag Risk Kontrol LLC

Recorded: 2/6/2026 

When a fire emergency happens on the farm, it is important to be prepared to stop the fire at the source! In this episode, we discuss Enforcer One fire-control systems with our sponsor, Mark Twenhafel of Midwest Ag Risk Kontrol LLC (MARK). 

Hosts: Ryan Spelman and Justin Brackenrich
Guest(s): Mark Twenhafel 

Photo credit: Mark Twenhafel 

Links:
Enforcer One
Fire Demonstration
Midwest Ag Risk Kontrol 

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Transcript

Ryan Spelman (00:19)
welcome to the Agronomy Highlights podcast. I'm your host, Ryan Spelman, and I'm joined with my lovely co-host, Justin Brackenrich. So Justin, today we have our first ⁓ sponsor interview. ⁓

Justin Brackenrich (00:30)
Day

for us. mean, in the genesis of podcasts and transformations, we're excited to have someone on that wants to be a part of this with us.

Ryan Spelman (00:40)
Yeah, that's right. mean, I'm really excited to kind of open up our sponsorship era and ⁓ it's great. One of our first sponsors that we're going to introduce here is Mark Twenhafel of Midwest Ag Risk Kontrol LLC. Now, Mark had reached out to me and he was a listener. So for anyone out there who's a listener of the show, we appreciate you listening and we even appreciate it even more when you come to us and say, I want to sponsor it. So it's great to have that feedback loop.

So, we'll jump right into it and I'll let Mark introduce himself. So, Mark, do want to introduce yourself and what you do with your company?

Mark Twenhafel (01:18)
Ryan and Justin, thank you for having me on. I'm just like all the other listeners here. I was born and raised on a farm. We grow soybeans, corn, wheat. I see the same things what you guys do. And the one thing that we had a problem with was fires on the farm. Had it on combine, shredder, anything that produced heat had the opportunity to catch fire. Seeing neighbors do it and all that.

And what we had available at the time just didn't work, not for the environment that we're in. So I went out looking for a company that had a product that worked and I was lucky enough to find them. The company is Enforcer One and that is the only thing that I do with Midwest Ag Risk kontrol and that's control with a K. Yeah, it does spell Mark. It answers to it the same as I do. But I just look at keeping

We've worked so hard, so long. My family's been farming since 1910. And just in a split minute, everything can go up and. It's just too long to fix it back to bring it back. Time iron. And even people safety, so that's what I focus on only and. That's what I want to tell the listeners and anybody else.

Just send me a text, I'll get in touch with ya, from a phone that works and the guys know what's going on with that.

Justin Brackenrich (02:47)
So Mark, tell us a little, obviously in that statement, you're very passionate about fire control and what you're doing in your company. What kind of, I don't want to say lit the fire, not to be too punny, but what kind of, boy, that's really bad. What promoted you to like say, fire safety is something we need to be passionate about and we need to take seriously.

Mark Twenhafel (03:08)
Well, it was actually combined catching on fire shredder catching on fire, seeing our neighbors stuff catch on fire the same way. It that's what just got me passionate on it is I don't want to see people's stuff burn up. It's our livelihood. It iron can be replaced, but somebody can get hurt real easy. it, it's just

It's something that was not out there readily available and to work. So the company that I deal with, they actually started with the fire departments, the gentleman that started over 30 years of experience. So he knows what's going on and everything that's built is built for the fire departments and what they go through. But the lucky thing is it's not super high dollar priced.

that everybody is at on a fire department. This is affordable. It's easy to carry. It's reusable. So I hate to say safety is what got me into it, but that's what makes me passionate about it. I don't want to see people get hurt or their property.

Ryan Spelman (04:20)
Yeah, definitely. mean, the kind of safety element, it speaks for itself, right? When we have something that we care about, we want to preserve it. And when we have people we care about that are working around things we care about, right? It becomes a really important conversation. So I think you teed this up perfectly. Why don't you talk a little bit about the Enforcer One firefighting systems and kind of what they are. I know you've mentioned before that they use a type of compressed foam. So if you can kind of introduce that, what this product is.

⁓ and go from there.

Mark Twenhafel (04:50)
The Enforcer One system is that it is a system. So you have two different parts of it. Fireball is the chemistry. So what that does is it's a concentration where you can dilute it down. I keep it real simple. It's 1%, 3%, or 6%. So that's what you mix it in with the water. And it is a water-based system.

So at 1%, that's gonna cover your class A fire. So we're talking crop residue, rags, anything like that. 3%, that'll put out all of the oils, your hydraulic oils, your engine oils, your diesel fuel. It'll take care of that, even gasoline. 6%, that's gonna get into your magnesium, your lithium, or if you're around like the E85 that has a higher flames.

or more volatile, that'll lock that down and keep that. So now what Fire Bull does, and whenever we was getting ready, we was talking about the fire triangle. So everybody understands that and agrees with it. You have to have a fuel, you have to have air, and you have to have heat. And the traditional AB fire extinguishers, the powders, or even the heavier gases.

What they say is we're going to interrupt that triangle. And as soon as we interrupt that, the fire is going to be out. And sometimes it is. So you spray that AB fire extinguisher and it shoots out the powder everywhere and the flames go away. We've all seen it do it. I've even done it multiple times. And then what happens? A little bit, the fire comes back. Well, why did it do that? Well, all is that powder did was

interrupted the triangle, it displaced the air. So the fire went out, but it didn't do anything for the heat. And that's why it came back. Fireball can be put in a spot sprayer at 1%. So if you're going to be doing a controlled burn and you want to protect it, sprayed around there, that fire will not cross that line. But if you got something on fire, it got hot. A bearing got hot.

A belt slip caused friction. It got hot. Something on the engine sparked. That little thing fell down somewhere that it wasn't supposed to go. Created heat. Now you got a fire. You get to it early because early action makes a difference. And these are portable. They're built for it. So it's right with you. You hit it with that fireball. Fireball lays down a blanket.

and it immediately pulls the heat away. Also when it's doing it, it's laying down a foam. Now that's what the enforcer systems do. They are compressed air foam system. Now on combines and a lot of times around the farm, we may have seen those silver tanks. Some people call them water cannons or whatever. they're whatever the volume is. It can be one gallon, two gallon, three gallon.

But the problem is it is a single cylinder. So you're immediately going to be changing volume for air. You can't fill it up all the way, put a little bit of air in it and do anything. The Air 3, the one that's more popular with farmers, is two cylinders that are three gallons in volume. One is dedicated for nothing but the liquid. Now you mix it up. If you're only going to have the crop residue, 1%.

If you have the oils, the fuel, the hydraulics, something like that, mix it at 3 % or 6%. And that's all. You don't have to top 6%. Through the compressed air foam system, it takes full three gallons, full three gallons of compressed air. You just charge it with your air compressor. 120 PSI. This will shoot 40 feet. Now,

You're not necessarily going to be at the fire 40 feet away, but everything around the combine, everything around the sprayer, anything around the equipment, they all got those safety shields around them to make sure that you don't get into anything when it's moving and get hurt, which is perfect. But what happens when that fire is behind there? You need to have the force and the power to get to it. And that's what the enforcer systems, they have the power.

They have the strength to get that foam behind it. It immediately stops the heat. It pulls the heat away. And then it lays that blanket. So that stuff's not going to come back and reignite. Now, you guys seen the presentation that I did. And I did something with a rag that was soaked in gasoline. Ryan, do you want to tell them what I did?

Ryan Spelman (09:49)
Yeah, sure. ⁓ You lit it on fire and then you used the fireball and the compressed air system to put out the fire and then you went and relit it with a torch and it didn't relight. That's what I saw in this video and if you want to share that we can put that video in the link below as well for the listeners.

Mark Twenhafel (10:10)
Now, Ryan, whenever I had that rag and I went to light it back up, where did I have that rag?

Ryan Spelman (10:17)
That's a good question, I don't remember, but I think you picked it up and were hanging it from your hand.

Mark Twenhafel (10:22)
Yeah, I held it in my hand and I had that torch blowing right on my hand. My hand did not get hot. That fireball protected it. And that's the important thing. And that's the difference. Everybody thinks, oh, the fire is what is the damage. Well, it is. But the fire is not the problem. The problem is the heat. And as soon as we get that heat eliminated, we're not interrupting the heat.

We're eliminating it. That changes the outcome.

Justin Brackenrich (10:56)
So Mark, I like this slogan that you've got and what we've been kind of working on is control the heat, control the outcome. Yes. I want to jump back a little bit to what you had mentioned there kind of in the beginning, right? We're talking about this idea of 1%, 3%, 6%. So I've got your product line kind of pulled up here on my screen looking at it. When you're talking to a group of producers and you're saying like, this is kind of your general all purpose

utility type application. Are you working more in the 1 % to 3 % or the 6 %?

Mark Twenhafel (11:30)
Most of the time I'm running 3%. OK. Because let's be honest. Now see, and here's the thing too. I always say early action changes the outcome. And with this system, I have ours mounted right on our auger wagon. Because our auger wagon is with the combine 95 % of the time. So last year, we

Dad was out combining our auger guy was sitting there and all of a sudden he gets on the radio and he says, uh, Glenn, I'm seeing fire come out on the side of the head here. Um, you need to pull over and dad responded, okay, I'll, I'll just pull over here in the side and we can look at it. Well, that's a cleaned up version, but the guy was right there with the auger wagon and instantly had

the Air 3 system that was already charged with air. All he had to do was turn the knob, nothing fancy on it, and he was right there. So Mark, because when

Justin Brackenrich (12:36)
So if you've got the Air 3 product, you've got your tanks mixed up, you've got 3%, 120, how long can that stay charged and how often does this need to be inspected and maintained?

Mark Twenhafel (12:49)
Well, with anything, you need to inspect it once a month. Just the first of the month, you go through and you're checking your things. I go through and I make sure that that dial is showing that. I haven't had mine sit for any length of time because I'm showing people. But I've talked to people that's had them, that's purchased them from me, and that dial has not moved at all.

Justin Brackenrich (13:11)
So what is the weight of one of these systems? think it's pretty statistic. We know we have an aging farm community, right? I don't think that's a shock to anyone. And so if we've got a full Air 3 system charged up, ready to go, ballpark a weight for us.

Mark Twenhafel (13:25)
It weighs about 45 pounds. Okay. Now what's also great is it does have available a strap and that's what I use because I don't want to have the air three in one hand, the nozzle in the other because immediately I've lost hands. So I'll throw it over my shoulder on the strap and it's easy to carry. It doesn't weigh anything. You know, once it's on a shoulder strap and now I got one hand free. So if I need to move something,

I can do it. There is also a backpack available. So, you know, if you're going to be out somewhere and you know you need to have, you know, don't want to have it going over the side. It is a backpack available for that too.

Justin Brackenrich (14:05)
So Mark, can you tell us a little bit about the proprietary or the chemical makeup? But you know, we're talking about the ABC and the powder and that just kind of disrupting the air part of this triangle. Tell us a little bit about the...

Chemical part of what you're dealing with it actually cools the site down as well as disrupting the triangle

Mark Twenhafel (14:26)
That's a good question. And I can tell you this. It is a fluorine free chemical. That means it does not have the stuff that causes all the cancer. It is green screen silver rated. Now that doesn't mean that you can drink it, but it does mean that it is as safe as it can be to do the job that it needs to do. I spray my hand down. I spray my hand down a lot.

whenever I'm showing people. It doesn't have anything that is going to hurt you, hurt your machine. We've sprayed the ABC fire, the powder around, and what does that do? It gets into all the wiring harnesses. It gets into the bearings that there was nothing wrong with it before. And it can actually cause as much or more damage than what the fire did. This is safe. It's water soluble.

It washes right off afterwards. I've sprayed the side of my truck to show people that it's harmless on stuff. There is a slight film that it leaves. It's the product that's there, but it is not harmful.

Ryan Spelman (15:36)
Yeah, I think that's a great point. one of the things that you mentioned to me earlier as well, that it's not as persistent and it's a little easier to clean up and a bit safer. And so I guess we're moving towards a wrap up here. So is there anything else that you want to cover before we end here?

Mark Twenhafel (15:55)
Well, guys, I do appreciate the time and I look forward to speaking with you earlier. The biggest thing is I am easy to get a hold of. Send me a text to my phone. It's 618-521-6805. Send me a text. I'll respond whenever I can. The guys will tell you, unfortunately, in this country area, cell phone reception is horrible.

⁓ but I will get text. If you want to email me, we'll link my email, hopefully down on the bottom, shoot me an email. I can respond to that too. I'm a farmer like you guys. I've seen the same things you've seen done some of the same things. I'm here to help, reach out to me, ask me questions. If I don't know the question, I'm going to go to somebody that does know.

I'm going to learn from it and I'll get back to you with what is going to be right. There's several different systems that this company has. They have the three gallon, is the one that most people use because it's portable. have a 10 gallon that can mount onto a side by side or even mount onto the tractor. We have 30 gallon, a 60 gallon, even up to a 200 gallon. If that's something that you need, call me. We will look.

and talk about what is right for your farm to make it to where it is going to be the safest that it can possibly be. That's what I want to do.

Justin Brackenrich (17:25)
So, Mark,

what areas are you servicing? Is there a way that if someone's in a different area, because we have folks from all over the country, how would they best connect to get this product to someone that's local so that they could see these demonstrations like you're doing?

Mark Twenhafel (17:38)
Reach out to me, give me a call. I have a YouTube channel that I'm working on. I will video anything, send it to you. Whenever I get the product, I get it directly from the manufacturer. It will be sent directly to you. Whenever you get it, give me a call. I'm gonna work you through everything.

Ryan Spelman (17:59)
Well, great. Thank you, Mark. We really appreciate you taking the time to share with us your product and your sponsorship. Now, I will also link into the bottom of this episode ⁓ the Enforcer One website so that people can look at some of these products for themselves as well. And then you gave them your contact information so they can reach you as well. So, Mark, thank you for coming onto the show. We really appreciate it.

Mark Twenhafel (18:25)
Brian and Justin, thank you for taking time to let me be on your show and reach out and talk to everybody across America.

Ryan Spelman (18:32)
Of course. Thank you.