New Sugarhouse

[pamaple]

I have started building a new sugar house and wow this site is just busting apart with great info to help me out if I could ever get enough time to read through it. I am going with 24x32 pole building frame and then covering it all with 50 year steel. Is that big enough? I keep reading about people building and then adding on several times so I would like to build it big enough the first time.

I have been reading about air over/under fire and I currently have a small fan that just blows air in the side of the ash pit but it doesnt really seam to help much. We are building a new arch out of brick when the new building goes up and would like to put some kind of air system right inside the firebick/firebox anybody have any diagrams or layouts with pictures I could try to work off of? From all the reading there is so many different methods with air blowing all different directions. Well back to fixing the fire any help will be greatly appriceated.

[Bucket Head]

That would be a decent size for a sugarhouse. However, you have to try and look into the future and determine what you might be doing in there 2,5,10,15 years from now. How much equipment will you have? Any plans for a kitchen area? Retail space? What about open houses? Visitors need space to move around and you don't need people elbow to elbow with you while your tending the evaporator. Bigger is'nt always better, but it is the motto to remember when building a shed, garage, workshop or sugarhouse. With these types of buildings there is no such thing as too big. I'm sure many others here will tell you the same thing.

I have no experience with a brick arch. My masonry skill set is very limited, lol. I saw an old blacksmith shop that had a brick fireplace with a big hand-operated bellows that provided forced draft. That would work, right? Just kidding! A "modern" forced draft unit is what you want. Hopefully some other folks here will have some ideas on how to plumb that. Good luck with it. Post pictures of it too!

Steve