2X4 capacity

[georgie]

Have approx 150 taps on buckets. Looking at a Mason 2X4 with a pre-heater, blowier on the door and only burn hard maple, oak, and hickory. Will there many 5 hr burns???????????
Thank you

[xyz5150]

georgie

2X4 capacity

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Have approx 150 taps on buckets. Looking at a Mason 2X4 with a pre-heater, blowier on the door and only burn hard maple, oak, and hickory. Will there many 5 hr burns???????????
Thank you

No not many 5 hr burns at all most will be 10-24hr burns. I did 40 taps on 2x4 flat pan with a full time job and that was all i wanted. You always figure 1 gallon per tap for sap flow. 8-12gph evaporation rate is is reasonable for that setup. So if you get 150 gallons of sap and you boil at 10gph you have 15 hrs invested. Now when you get a heavy runs say 2 gallons per tap or 300 gallons you need 30 hrs to catch up. There are some guys on here doing that many or more taps on a 2x4 flat pan but i haven't figured it out.

[hooch]

We have a 2x4 set up on homeade arch, eevap rate 10 ph we burned 2 weekends 24 hrs each and made 10 gals. that is on 78 taps we gave away and dumped about 200 gal of sap and pulled tapped

[MISugarDaddy]

I have been using a 2' X 4' for the past four years and the best you can expect out of your unit is close to 15 gallons per hour. As the previous posts have said, during good sap runs you will be boiling 10 hours a day plus time for startup and shutdown each day. I have done that several days in a row, but that is because I have a very supportive wife who normally does all the collecting by herself.

[nymapleguy607]

Personally I would go with a 2x6 evaporator. Even then on good sap flows you will probably be boiling more than five hours. My evaporator will boil off between 40-45 gallons an hour. I would definitly get a hood and preheater as well.

[adk1]

that is about what I will ahve overall, I will be primarily on tubing. I ahve a Leader 2x6 and can expect 25GPH. that is a 6 hour boil..

[Brent]

PS the boil rates of 10 GPH or more on a 2 x 4 flat pan will eat wood like you wouldn't believe.

A 2 x 6 with flues will use the same amount or less wood and give you a lot more sleep time.

We had a Half Pint and I lit the fire before I made breakfast coffee and let the fire die a midnight. When you're going on that cycle you never get to the bush, seldom have time for a meal and after a few days get so whacked that it isn't fun and you start making mistakes .... scorched pans etc.

Get the right size or don't bother tapping all those trees. You'll ruin a great
hobby.

[Greenwich Maple Man]

Have approx 150 taps on buckets. Looking at a Mason 2X4 with a pre-heater, blowier on the door and only burn hard maple, oak, and hickory. Will there many 5 hr burns???????????
Thank you

The saying bigger is better is very true when talking sugaring. I have a friend who has a 2by4. He spends alot of time boiling and gets sick of the season very quickly. If I was you I would go to a 2by6 with a 4ft.flue pan and a 2ft. syrup pan.The flue pan is the work horse and with that size evaporater you shouldn't have any problems with to much syrup in the syrup pan.If you can always go bigger. Can always tap more trees. Most everybody gets bigger not smaller.

[steve J]

I have that same evaporator with the blower and I tapped 200 last year. But I was not able to keep up at the peak times was forced to dump some sap. I did get 17 gal per hour out of it for a bit but I was running dangerously close to melting down the stack so had to back off and found 15 gal per hour to be the best I could do safely. I was running 6 inch pipe rather I could have faired better with larger pipe I don't know.

[Farmboy]

If you don't have a day job get a 2X6. If you do you might want to go bigger. I had 150 taps on a 2.5X8 and I had a lot of 5 hour boils last year. With out a blower I was getting 50 gph with a blower I was getting 55gph + last year was my first year with it so I should be able to do a little better this year. 150 taps was giving me 275-300 gallons on good runs which I had alot of. 6 hour boils got old after a while because I don't get home from school til 2:30 I wasn't done collecting till 3- 3:30 so I wasn't finished boiling till after 9 then I had to bottle and clean up in the house then get up at 5:30 for school and do it again started to get old. This year I'm keeping 150 taps next year I'm gonna do more though.

[smokeyamber]

2x6 dropflue Mason with the blower and you would be ok... otherwise you are gonna be like me with 23hr boils... someone told me a good rule of thumb was multiply the dimensions on a setup to get rough boil rates... 2x6 flat is 12gph , with flues it seems to double ? I love the Mason 2x6 myself and if I wasn't so cheap that would be my rig !

[wiam]

2x6 dropflue Mason with the blower and you would be ok... otherwise you are gonna be like me with 23hr boils... someone told me a good rule of thumb was multiply the dimensions on a setup to get rough boil rates... 2x6 flat is 12gph , with flues it seems to double ? I love the Mason 2x6 myself and if I wasn't so cheap that would be my rig !

Mason's 2x6 drop tube is way under rated. Mine has very aggressive blower. Way too many sparks. Internal stack temp of 1400. Yes I go thru a lot of wood, but I get 55 gallon per hour evaporation. Last year I made 400 gallons with 6 cord. Around 10% most of the time.

[ahowes]

I am ordering a new 2x4 pan w/baffles and have a pretty good homemade concrete arch. I have a fairly flexible full time job (could work more hours on days where there's no sap flow, so that more boiling hours are available on good days), and will boil weekends.

I'm in southern Indiana where sap flow may be questionable. Last year, I got a whole lot of mini-flows and it was hardly worth firing up the evaporator. (I just evaporated a lot in the pole barn on the old electrical stove.)

My guess is that if I were farther north, I should go with 40-45 taps. Since sap flow may be limited due to locale, should I go with 55-60 and know that I may have to dump some sap? Thanks...

[adk1]

Interesting. MY 150 taps on smaller lesser maples with my 2x6 should be ideal. Its scary to think that I am worried that I wont have enough sap from my trees!