how much heat?

[supersapper]

:confused: i had a friend make me an evaporater pan. 2'-2'. i am boiling on a twin burner, 60,000 btu cooker. the pan is 8" high with 4-6" of sap. why won't it come to a boil? it is down to 3" after 3 hours. any advice?

[PerryW]

Try running shallower. Most people run a flat pan at between 1 and two inches deep.

[supersapper]

thanks for the info. i am new to this and i only do about 120 gallons of sap a year. i used a single burner last year and i thought that a double burner would be the ticket.

[mathprofdk]

You might also be losing a ton of heat. Try wrapping some ceramic insulation around the base of the burner and your pan - you'll need to leave some space for airflow. This easily doubled my evaporation rate on a turkey fryer this year.

I'm also just starting, and hoping to build an arch next year. Even with this upgrade, this took forever!

~DK

[3rdgen.maple]

Run the pan alot shollower and it will boil. Just keep replacing the sap as the level drops. When I was like 14 I had a stainless steel pot setting on the corner of my flat pan and I drilled a hole in the bottom of it and put a nail in the hole so it would keep up with the evapotation rate. I went through a half dozen nails before I fond the right size that allowed the proper aount of sap to trickle in. 1 to 1 1/2 inches and your good for level. Oh just dont walk away from it and expect to have anything that resembles a pan when you get back.

[Haynes Forest Products]

Take that tank and pile wood around it and never let up with the wood. Thats how I started out and we ran the sap 12" deep boild sap kept us all warm and the animals stayed away:)

[supersapper]

i saw a plan for using a 55 gallon barrel where you cut a hole for the pan to sit in and build the fire inside. propane is too expensive to use. wood is the way to go. now i just need to find the plan again.

[sk8heaven]

I bought a twin burner (54,000 btu each burner) this year and it would make the sap steam but not bring it to a boil. I went down and bought a 0-25 psi high pressure regulator and replaced the 5 psi regulator that ws on it from the factory. I hardly needed to use any of the range of the new regulator - I am guessing I am at about 7 to 8 psi supply pressure.
I now boil easily on a 2x3 pan with 3 to 4 inches of beginning level - about 5 gallons per hour evaporation. They tend to give you a lot lower pressure set regulator than what you need for boiling. Remember - each inch in your 2x2 pan is around 2.5 gallons (231 cubic inches per gallon - 24x24 pan = 576 cubic inches. If you can evaporate an inch an hour you are doing okay - inch and a half an hour is really good with that surface area.
One more thing to check - if they have one of those connectors on the hose that threads on the outside of the propane bottle connection - you may want to get rid of it as that often contains a protective device to limit gas flow.
I actually have made a hose manifold where I connect two 100 lb propane cylinders together and that manifod then provides fuel for the two 54,000 btu burners and one 40,000 btu burner. I have processed over 120 gallons of sap and am still on my first two cylinders.

[michiganfarmer2]

Take that tank and pile wood around it and never let up with the wood. Thats how I started out and we ran the sap 12" deep boild sapme too. Well, our 3x3 pans were only 8 inches deep but we boiled them hard with wood

[aeautodetailing]

I burn a lot of cedar log home ends split into 4s, and hardwood on top. I run 6-8" deep in a 4x1.5 pan evaping 5-7 gal/hr on cinderblocks. An upgrade from my 12 gal washtub the last 3 years! New but learning!

[SDdave]

sk8heaven-What kind of material is your pan made of? If stainless, do you know the gauge? I ask because I have a SS bulk tank that I just could not get to boil. I think what you have done is what I'll be doing this summer with my burners.

SDdave

[sk8heaven]

sk8heaven-What kind of material is your pan made of? If stainless, do you know the gauge? I ask because I have a SS bulk tank that I just could not get to boil. I think what you have done is what I'll be doing this summer with my burners.

SDdave

SDdave -
My pan is 22 gauge stainless - probably quite a bit thinner than yours if I remember your previous posts. Even with your thicker pan, I am pretty sure you could get a good boil if you increase your pressure and get rid of the restrictions (this is all safe - as long as you have good hoses and are sure to leak check before each light-off - I had the local propane plant develop both the manifold for my hundred pound tanks and tell me what to do for pressure). My pan will come to a boil (2x3) within 15 to 20 minutes with 3 inches of 35 degee sap.
If you want any more info / pics just let me know. I am pretty excited about how well this new setup is working out as last year I had too many long boils using just a 20" x 20" pan on a single turkey fryer burner.... 2 gallons an hour evaporation when you are getting up to 50 gallons of sap a day is just too long! Between the two pans I am now evaporating closer to 8 gph and could probably get more if I made a "psuedo-arch" like some others have done (putting firebrick/etc around the burner up to the pan)/

Sk8heaven

[supersapper]

by looking through some of these posts, i gather that my pan was made alittle on the heavy duty side. 2x2, 8" high, 12 ga 304 stainless. a freind of mine made it with some "scrap":D steel at his work.

[supersapper]

will this pan be ok as is? is there something i should do to improve it?