How much wood per gallon of syrup do you burn?

[deckers007]

Just wondering how much wood you burn per gallon of syrup? if there is such a calculation :)

[red maples]

on average I have low sugar content in sap (which directly effects how much wood I burn) but on average I am approx. about a full cord(128cu/ft) per 10 gallons of syrup. I have a stock 2x6 drop flue with a 4ft flue pan. no preheater, air or anything like that....(yet) and I get rough average of about 37-38 GPH evap rate. somedays If I really push it I can break 40. but I am usually dog tired after those days !!!

there are alot of variables.

Sugar content,
evaporator type,
evaporator size,
evaporator effeciency
size of wood
moisture content of wood
type of wood
RO
Preheater
Forced air
air under fire
air over fire
unforced air draft
and all the little variables
temp
cold sap temp
atmospheric pressure.

The information you get from the Evaporator Manufacturing Co. is usually best case senario, burning Hardwood with perfect moisture % and good sugar content etc. that is if testing were done with sap, but as far as I know its usually based on gallons evaporated per hour or GPH.

[tuckermtn]

running raw sap I used to burn about a cord for every 15-18 gallons (on a 2.5x8 raised flu). With ROing to 8-9% we do about 80 gallons per cord now. with a more efficent arch (mine is stock now) and concentrating a bit higher I hope to get between 120-150 gals per cord next season.

[adk1]

the standard in the NAMPM is 25 gallons/cord. I would assume that alot of it depends on what type. I burn 90% white pine and hemlock. will take more wood then due to less BTUs

[Flat Lander Sugaring]

15 to 20 gal syrup per cord, I have been aver. that for 10 years

red maples says it all, a lot of variables just wish i could do 35+ an hr

[adk1]

guess I better start splitting more. I have maybe 2 cord.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I burn about 1 cord to 15 to 17 gallons of sap but my sugar content is always less than 2% and I usually am around a 50 to 1 ratio and this past year is was 56.42 to 1 ratio. Hope to get it to 25 to 1 with the steamaway.

[cpmaple]

To be completely honest never paid attention to that. but what i had for wood last year and what i made for syrup i would have to say right around 15-20gals of syrup per cord. This year i will have to keep track of that.

[northwoods_forestry]

Pretty much right on the standard of 1 cord/25 gallons of syrup burning a mix of softwood slabs and hardwood chunks. Guess I must just be an average guy.

[Brent]

we RO to 7-1/2 to 8% and have a Steamaway in last year we burned roughly 1-1/2 to 1-3/4 cords making gallons so the number we use is
about 85 gallons per cord. That's pretty loose because we had several small piles of wood and it was our first year with this evaporator and we
had a whole batch we dumped because it got ropy. If we counted all that the number would be closer to 100 Gal per cord.

A 2 x 6 burns virtually the same amount of wood as a Half Pint. A typical 2 x 6 boils at nearly 4X the GPH rate. Big differences.

[deckers007]

Are most of you refering to a Face cord 4'x8'x16" or a full cord, i know this might be a newbie question but i am a newbie at all this.

[Brent]

I think on this forum a cord is a cord.

Face cords almost never get talked about and that changes from 12" to 16" deep depending on who you are
buying from.

[deckers007]

OK, that makes sence.

[red maples]

yes full cord. 128 cu/ft.

I use about 80-90% white pine, the rest is hemlock and spruce. Like I said in the beginning I have very low sugar. I have alot of young (still mostly 10" or larger and smaller are trees to eventually be thinned) crowded red maples so my sugar is usually between 1.25-1.75% its really nice when I hit 2% but its not very often. So thats why I get only 10 gals per cord. just can't wait for my RO in a couple of years then I don't have to worry about having soooooooooo much wood for 60 gallons of syrup!!!!

in order for me to get 40 GPH I have to fire alternating sides every 2-3 minutes with BONE DRY pine ...do that for 8 hrs you will sleep very good!!!! and loose weight!!!

[ennismaple]

I think we were about 55-58 USG per cord this year but our sugar was poor and we didn't push the RO too hard. We burned mostly softwood and pine this past season so i expect far better numbers in 2012 when we burn hardwood!

[Russell Lampron]

I get close to 100 gallons of syrup per cord of wood. Most of my wood is pine limb wood with some hardwood limb wood mixed in. I have a 2x6 raised flue evaporator with a blower, preheater and steam hood. I also concentrate to the upper teens with my RO. It's the long slow boils on Maple Weekend that bring down my average.

[maple flats]

The past several years I've averaged 22-24 gal/cord from 2-2.25% raw sap. This year with 8-10% RO'd concentrate I expect 100+ gal/cord.

[adk1]

Cant say what I will get. I ahve about 2 cord of wood stacked. Mostly white pine/hemlock. DO have some hardwood mixed in. I am really curious as to what I will get overall for sugar content this first year with my not-so-ideal maples that I will be tapping. Some on the small side, most do not have nice crowns (woods trees) and some are reds..

[red maples]

Cant say what I will get. I ahve about 2 cord of wood stacked. Mostly white pine/hemlock. DO have some hardwood mixed in. I am really curious as to what I will get overall for sugar content this first year with my not-so-ideal maples that I will be tapping. Some on the small side, most do not have nice crowns (woods trees) and some are reds..

Know one knows what they will get its almost like betting on the superbowl or world series before preseason.

so basically all your taps are gravity correct. what is your ratio of reds to sugars that will make a big difference. that and weather. Weather being your #1 concern during th season if the weather is perfect even reds that you don't normally get alot of sap from will run pretty good. your sugar will be higher with gravity /buckets vacuum brings a lower sugar %. If I were you I personally would have more wood than 2 cords ready. but thats just me. In my opinion I would say 3-4 cords just to be on the safe side.

I have just under 300 reds on vaccuum and I have 11 cords ready this year as last year I ran out of dry wood!!! which was 6 cords...just had the time space and wood to do that much and what ever I don't use is ready for the next season!!

[sapman28]

I made 140 gallons this year on a 30"x6' raised flue with forced air, not air tight, and a Hero RO. It a little machine but it brought me from 2%-4% cutting my time and wood consumption in half. Used 3-4 cords of wood making it 35-45 gallons per cord. First year with the RO couldn't be happier and it was very easy to use.

[Flat Lander Sugaring]

Know one knows what they will get its almost like betting on the superbowl or world series before preseason.

so basically all your taps are gravity correct. what is your ratio of reds to sugars that will make a big difference. that and weather. Weather being your #1 concern during th season if the weather is perfect even reds that you don't normally get alot of sap from will run pretty good. your sugar will be higher with gravity /buckets vacuum brings a lower sugar %. If I were you I personally would have more wood than 2 cords ready. but thats just me. In my opinion I would say 3-4 cords just to be on the safe side.

I have just under 300 reds on vaccuum and I have 11 cords ready this year as last year I ran out of dry wood!!! which was 6 cords...just had the time space and wood to do that much and what ever I don't use is ready for the next season!!

you are rt there around 15 to 20 gal a cord or should be 300x.25+=75/15=5 all numbers are approx nothing written in sap

[Hal]

Dad used to say 20-25 gallons/cord, with dry split hard wood. With the airtight arch and pre-heater hood, I get about 25 gallons/cord, with whatever wood I can scrounge up. That also includes about a cord used pre and post season for heating water for cleaning. Because I have reduced the number of taps, with the same size rig, I am giving up some efficiency by short boiling sessions. The wood used to heat the arch initially is the same, whether you shut down in three hours, or run it around the clock. On the other hand, I can live with that, as I am not nineteen years old any more, and I don't need to be boiling until omigod o'clock in the morning.

[michiganfarmer2]

I have a 3x12 drop flue. No pre heater, no RO. I boil raw sap and get about 10 gallons of syrup from a face cord of wood. and most of my sap is riht at 2%

[tapper]

33 gallons per full cord for this past season.