Releaser not dumping

[Dave Y]

For a week and a half now I have been fighting with my releaser. It froze a week ago Sunday and has not worked since. I Have change o-rings and the piston. I have oiled it. If you wiggle the cylinder some times it will dump. I can hear it leaking vacuum in the cylinder, but can not tell where it is at. Any suggestion would be appreciated.

[Typical8]

I don't know what you have for a releaser but I had the same trouble with a double vertical last year. My was the flap seal on one side on the inside of the canister was broke. Take the top of the releaser off and make sure you are getting a good seal where the sap enters into the canister.

[Dave Y]

I have a Continuous vac releaser

[sapman]

What's a continuous vac releaser, Dave? Is it the big horizontal mechanical?

[Grade "A"]

Mine was doing the same thing, I lubed it up and still stuck. I found that when it froze the sap got to the parts that had lube on it and made it tacky. I wiped everything off good re-lubed it and it worked fine after. Hope this helps.

[Dave Y]

Tim, the continuous vacuum releaser is a double horizontal. when it dumps it closes the top chamber and keeps vacuum on the lines while it is dumping. It eliminates back flow when dumping

[Brent]

I got three new Bernard releasers at the beginning of last year and had trouble with all of them. The float would got up, trip and release and not go down, or not go down all the way. I kept adding weight to get them tripping. Put a cup or two of rice in the float. It helped but did not totally stop the problem.

At the International meeting last fall I found a factory rep and asked him about it. He said their plastic supplier had changed a the material in a part that was causing the problem. If your vacuum is over 20" the problem is worse.

There is an lever arm that the float pushes up and down. The arm has a small O-ring that slides on a peice of white plastic with 2 ports in it. This is the culprit. He told me to use a utility knife and scratch a small groove in the white plastic to the top hole. This will allow a tiny air leak when the arm is in the upper position ( only during the actual dump ).

I've only got one releaser up and running this year. Took some weight out and started it. Same as last year, it was hanging up. Then i cut the little scratch in it and it has not hung up once since.

Hope this helps

[Amber Gold]

Brent, three releasers? After having all the problems I have this year with my single vacuum system, I wouldn't want to touch three of them.

[Brent]

Josh
Mine are all single releasers. Since I scratched it, it has not hung up in 4 days of running. Last year, before I hung the extra weight on they would hang up in 10 minutes or so. After adding the weight to the float they still hung up once or twice a day.

Fingers are crossed.

[gmcooper]

Dave, Not sure but your issues sounds just like my old CDL horizontal machanical releaser. It kept vacuum to the trees at all times. Mine started freezing up one year then it progressively got worse. I finally couldn't get it to work. I sold it back to the dealer I bought it from. He sent back to CDL to rebuild it. They then tossed in the dumpster! If you have the same unit news isn't good. They changed the design because they had too many problems with them a few years into use. The problem with mine and a couple others were they had multiple leaks that were small but just big enough to create a cold draft that would begin to freeze incoming sap. I new I had one o ring that was bad on the bottom flapper. I replaced that one twice but at the end couldn't get another from them. The day I bought the new releaser I could barely hold 15" on the CDL. 10 minutes later with the new Laperrier I was holding 25".