surge alamo pump help

[mountainvan]

any info on this vacuum pump is appreciated. thanks[/i]

[Parker]

I run 2 surge alamo 76 vacume pumps,,is that what you have? They pull 32 {I think} cfm,,work very well as long as you keep oil to the bearings,,I have spoiled 2 of them caus of lack of oil,,you can get the main bearings at Sanals,,not much to them inside,,if it has not be run for a while I would dump some mystry oil into the intake and turn it over slowly by hand ,I am pretty sure there are 3 vanes inside,,as long as your vanes are dropping and your bearings are good you should be all set (will pull 18" of mercury all day) make sure you use a large vac. regulator,,,,,I have had a 3/4 spur line come apart and still had 11" vacume on the rest of the system,,I power mine with 5 horse hoda engines,,hope this helps

[mountainvan]

how many taps do you have on each pump? do you use a reclaimer or just add oil every day? thanks

[Hal]

Somebody has a manual for that on Ebay right now

http://cgi.ebay.com/Surge-ALAMO-series-Vacuum-Pump-Manual_W0QQitemZ7557626834QQcategoryZ66896QQssPage NameZWD1VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

[mountainvan]

yep, saw the manual. don't have the pump yet and want to know from experience how they work. thanks

[Parker]

I had 400 on one and 700 on the other, at 32 cfm it should handle 3000? (1 cfm for every 1000 taps, is that right?),,,They are set up with a reclaimer but I hang a jug of hydraulic oil in a tree next to them and run a line to each bearing (One on each side of the pump),,on maplerama I saw one that was set up with a "flood" system,,had a large reclaimer off to the side with an automatic transmission raideator in line and a filter in line then a resivior and back into the pump,,,,,,looked like that would work well.....

[mountainvan]

I take it that the vacuum regulator steps down the 32 cfm to 400-700 cfm for different bushes? thanks

[brookledge]

Vacuum regulators are designed to keep a constant vac. on the lines. During the course of the day the amount of vac. needed changes. When the sap is not flowing or flowing slowly the regulator will be letting in more air. As the flow increases the regulator will close to maintain the set amount of hg. in inches. If your vacuum pump can't maintain the desired amount usually 15" to 20" then either your pump needs rebuilding or it is under sized for the amount of taps you have.
Keith

[Maple Hill Sugarhouse]

post edited

[mountainvan]

thanks for education. :)