delaval 78

[MillbrookMaple]

I am looking into using our milker pump for a sap vac. Its a 16 year old Delaval 78. It was used everyday for 4 years then we used it about 1 week a year since. Once in a while a heifer freshens before sale. If I use this for a sap vac what would I need to do to it to make it work well? We will plan to keep it in the barn and run a line out to the bush to a releaser down at the bush.

[Dennis H.]

High Vac!!! above 20"

So if you are going to use it for both you will have to have a way to adjust/switch between low vac for milking and high vac for sap sucking.

A few ball valves and some line and I can't see why it will not do both.

[brookledge]

really all you will need is a releasr or a vac. tank. Most dairy pumps are set up to run around 15"Hg. for dairy. In maple it has been determined that higher levels are benificial. But running at 15" is better than none. you might be able to use the glass releaser from the dairy set up in the maple if you want to adapt it. Otherwise once you have your releasr set up you are good to go.
Keith

[MillbrookMaple]

I figured I would make a separate connection for using it for sap. Then I can connect it back when an "emergency" arises. My father-in-law is just about ready to give up on dairy heifers anyway. I'll do some research on what it would take to adjust the vac level. Our barn has a huge tank with a flapper on the bottom out in the alleyway which I think is a moisture trap, I'll have to ask for clarification from the boss. I'm not sure if I should make my connection after that tank or right at the pump. I don't plan to run the sap through the glass releaser that we have since then we would have to pull the sap uphill for about 1600 feet of line. I figured the vac 1600 feet down to the releaser and tank would work well but asking it to pull the sap 1600 feet and up hill about 50-100 feet of elevation would be a little much.

[MillbrookMaple]

The other thing I was wondering is how this pump handles constant use. Back when my father-in-law was milking he ran it about 3-4 hours at a clip. Can this pump handle 24 hour use with no modifications? Thanks for everyone's help with this one.

[Dennis H.]

You can use the moisture trap at the pump or/and put a moisture trap at the releaser. to be on the safe side you shouldn't connect directly to the pump with out some sort of moisture trap.

You shouldn't have any trouble running it for long periods of time as long as you keep oil going to it and that you can keep it cool. The cooler the better.

[Haynes Forest Products]

Pumps are stupid they dont know how long they have been working. Now if you reach the max temp of the pump and motor after an Hr then it wont matter. If it climbs as the day goes on then you need to change the cooling system.

[tstew]

I ran the same pump on my lines this year sometimes 24hrs a day for days in a row. I was running 19" on it with no problems. My pump sat outside so plenty of air movement. The only modification I did to it was to add a reclaimer and get rid of the drip oilers. I think I could even run it a little higher with no problems.

[MillbrookMaple]

That is good news

[arcticmaple8]

delaval 78 pumps are good pumps but the oil will get too hot at 20", Unless you have a way to cool the oil i wouldn't run over 16-17 inches. The big tank above your alley is probably just a balance tank to equal out the vac between the line in the barn and act as a resivoir for when units are put on and suck air. The trap is mounter on the reciever with a piece of stainless pipe that is shaped like a horseshoe to keep splashing fluid from getting into the trap. The balance tank is not protected by the trap, only the reciever and ss pipeline. Also i am assuming you have a reclaimer on the exhaust, otherwise you will be blowing a ton of oil on the ground, the oilers should drip 1 or 2 drops every five sec, if you bump up the vac turn up the oil a little, a lot of people run the oilers wide open with 20 plus inches as we did this year, but our oil kept getting too hot so we made a cooler to keep temps reasonable. But alot of oil does not mean it will cool the pump better because you are just recirculating it through the exhaust reclaimer so you will just heat it up quicker. Your running temp is mostly determined by the amount of air going through the pump (cfm) as in leaks in the line or the vacuum regulator. Alot of 78 pumps run for 8 hours on farms at 15" so constant use should not be an issue.

[Haynes Forest Products]

When it comes to cooling a pump you can only remove the heat from the pump so fast. Oil will remove the heat faster than air. Oil will absorb more heat than air and the more oil the better. Oil drippers in a dairy type pump is more for lubrication than cooling YES i know that friction creates heat and at the lower HGs less heat is created. The more oil the cooler the pump.

[Dennis H.]

Also the more oil the cooler it will run and then you will only have to try and catch blown liquid oil. Trying to catch an oil mist is much harder.

[Haynes Forest Products]

You have that right Dennis. My Massport was pulling a constant 26 HGs and even with the exhaust going into a reservoir tank and then up into a coalescing oil reclaimer I had more like smoke puffing out the exhaust. It had a blue tinge. I didn't use much oil from the tank and only 2 quarts over the 4 week period. The pump ran at a touchable temp

[MillbrookMaple]

What do you guys suggest we do to modify the pump to better cool it at higher vac levels. I'm willing to put some money into it to make it run to it's full potential. I would imagine modifing a "low milage" vac in hand will be much cheaper than investing in a new maple dealer unit. Thanks agian!

[arcticmaple8]

Haynes - how do you have your exhaust plummed? What is the purpose of resivoir tank on the exhaust, what type of reclaimer and how much oil does it hold? Just curious, we have 2 massports and a alamo, when we first tried to run our small massport which has a surge reclaimer on it we were running about 22 inches for a few hours and the sightglass melted off the side of the reclaimer. So we decided to run the oil through a copper tube in a 15 gal barrel of cold water and we recirced the water though an old radiator with a harbor freight pump and a house fan blowing on the radiator, kept the water about the same as outside temp and then we were able to run 24hrs a day. We also took out oil drippers to get more oil recircualting through cold water. Running our other massport we have never had good luck running more than 20 inches it gets too hot and has seized up a couple of times from heat even with full stream of oil. Thanks