Have an old woodstove, evaporator??

[GramaCindy]

I am new to this wonderful addiction and would like to know if any of you have had success with converting an old airtight woodstove into an arch? We would have to cut the top off and add a "back area" not sure how to go about this. I see the evaporators out there and look at this unused old stove and just have to wonder….?

[Ausable]

I am new to this wonderful addiction and would like to know if any of you have had success with converting an old airtight woodstove into an arch? We would have to cut the top off and add a "back area" not sure how to go about this. I see the evaporators out there and look at this unused old stove and just have to wonder….?

Hello GramaCindy and welcome. Remember the old saying - that a picture is worth a thousand words - A picture of the stove in question would help. Also - what is it made out of - cast iron? sheet steel? etc. The larger the surface area - that a pan would sit on - the better. Here is a basic question - if You put a flat - open pan on the top of this stove - with - say two inches of water in it - can you build a fire in the stove that will bring the water in the pan to a rip - rolling boil - cause that is what we are after. Get the water out of the sap and reduce it to maple syrup as quickly as we safely can. -- Mike --- lol-- a Great-Grandpa (7 times)

[eschoon]

I am in the process of building the same type of arch right now. I started with an old wood stove that was built from 1/4" steel. It had a heat "reclaimer" on the top which I cut off. Next I cut down the corners so I could spread the sides a couple of inches to create a 24" wide arch. I also cut the back of the stove off at the height where I wanted the "arch" to start. Next, I fabricated the "arch" portion from some steel and angle iron I had at hand (farmers tend to have lots of "iron" around). I made the top rails from angle iron. The next part I build will be the tapered base stack. I built it to fit "standard" 24" wide pans. If you already have a pan, build to fit. I had to order my pans so I could not determine the width for my top rails until I had the pans ordered.

We boiled on a block arch last year & had enough fun that we decided to build a "real" evaporator.

A look through the "Homemade Maple Equipment" section of this forum should give you lots of ideas.

Good Luck & most of all HAVE FUN!

[killingworthmaple]

I cut the top off a Ashley style flat top stove last month and made one. It has a 16 x 20 pan stainles pan and boils great. I have pictures but don't know how to post them in this reply. Email me and I can send them to you. I am looking to sell it if any one is interested $250. I also have more pans and sheets of stainless and an arch front for sale.

Nathan in CT
nthhea@aol.com

[GramaCindy]

Not sure how to upload a pic either, as everytime I try the photo is too big:mad:…I went yesterday to see a friend's operation and think we may go with a block arch this year to start. My husband wants to jump in full bore, but I will be doing all of the sap collecting and some boiling myself during the week and he will only be able to help on the weekends. I made my sap storage area yesterday, under the roof of the woodshed on the east side of the garage, buried sanitized containers in snow. Now I just have to hope that the snow lasts! :lol: Fired up the stainless coffee maker yesterday to make sure it would keep or reheat the finished product to 180* for bottling, All's good there. Today I am going out to officially "Mark" my trees for tapping. I have waypointed them on my GPS, but have 50+ trees marked and only 40 taps. I will decide which of them looks the best for tapping and access. I am a geocacher, so I fully understand waypoints and finding them again. I hope!:rolleyes:

[Dill]

That's how I built my first evaporator, in fact its still my profile pick 3 rigs later.
We cut the top off of ashley woostove that was 2x2, and cut a oval hole in the back. Got a 2x2 syrup pan to fit on top of that. Than found a 2x3 flat pan for the back. And cut the bottom 1/3 of a 33gal drum for the back of the evaporator. Welded in some bed rails to hold that pan up, and than used a hot air duct to make the 90 for the smoke stack. Also welded 2 diagonal supports to hold up the rear of the pan. Sounds confusing really simple. I bricked up the wood stove and filled the bottom of the drum with sand. It wasn't light so I also welded chain hooks to the side so I could pick it up with my tractor.
If your using on the wider woodstoves check out Bascoms for a cross flow pan you could probably find one to fit the top and they aren't terribly expensive.