revamp my vac system maybe down the road

[maple36]

i have a 3500 tap surgar bush i purchased that has three vacums set up for the 3500 taps three diferent gathering stations the property is 98 acres 80% of it being the sugar bush widest part of the bush is 250 to 275 yards wide but is very long. it is slope slightly up hill in the begining and levels out to the back. the sugar house is in the front part of the bush. question is can i run all 3500 taps to my sugar house with vacum system and can i keep the vacum levels where i need them. any input would be helpfull thanks in advance.

[Sunday Rock Maple]

We faced the same question on 2,500 new taps last summer but with a flatter slope. Long story short, we went with one 60 cfm 5hp flood with cooler at the shanty based on Leaders reccomendation and had 26" at the farthest point in the bush. --- the best decision we made on the whole installation.

[delivron]

In general if your runs are exceptionally long consider doing two thing when running your wet/dry lines. Use stainless steel fitting vs plastic fittings. You will buy stainless once and reuse them indefinitely unless a tree falls directly on the fitting. Stainless fittings are thin an as a result prevent ice dams from forming and the flow of both vacuum and sap are maximized. Stainless fittings result in a negligible loss in diameter of your tubing. The general rule is 10 CFM for every 1000 taps. High vacuum above 20 in. will yield 5% more sap.
Always size you dry line 1 size larger then wet lines. Plan you layout so you can easily walk you bush to check for leaks.

Consider attending Maplerama in Rutland VT next week. http://www.uvm.edu/extension/maple/mainline/maple_mainline_june12.pdf
Carl Lapierre will be there to discuss Vacuum Pumps and tubing.

[Alberto8100]

You have two options in this regard:
1.Use stainless steel fitting vs plastic fittings &
2.Whole installation.
Second option the best choice designed on the whole set up.

[spud]

If all your sap run into your sugar house then you only need one vacuum pump not three. It sounds like the three pumps you have now are lower CFM pumps. What does the pumps run for vacuum? If all your getting is 15-18 inches of vacuum then I would get rid of those pumps and buy a new one. A nice 5 HP with 60 CFM will cost you $5000.00 but it will pay for itself the first year in all the extra sap you get. If you use the right vacuum pump you will get 20+ gallons of sap per tap hole on a average year. If you go with the old pumps you (might) only get 15 at best. Five extra gallons of sap per tap on a 3500 tap woods is 17,500 gallons = 406 more gallons of syrup. That in bulk price is $13,000 more dollars at the end of the year just by having the right pump. If I was you I would buy a brand new pump and buy 3500 CV2 spouts. In all this will cost you $5000.00 for the pump and $1365.00 for the spouts. If your looking to get the most for your money then these two items are must haves.

Spud

[philkasza]

Since we have been talking vac pumps I would just mention, from my experience pumps are over rated. With 3500 taps I would buy a pump that can pull 27" on 5000 taps or more. When you start talking these big pumps it does not cost that much more to get an oversized pump and not run it as hard. We recently purchased a 75cfm pump for our 1900 tap bush, that is quite oversize but if we get a couple leaks out there the extra sap we will get from that many cfm pump until we get the leak fixed will easily pay for the extra size of pump. That is my two cents! Also pumps are rated on a super, super tight system, most people without experience that set up woods do not get a tight system the first time they do that. If on a good day a squirrel chews a hole in your line and you drop 2 in. of vac that is a 10% loss with a big pump it may be 5% or less. Some pumps number of cfms are rated at 18 in. and some at high vac so watch out for that as well. I guess in short last season was a nightmare as far as the pump goes. Best of wishes maple season is only about 5-6 months away!
Sam

[spud]

I would agree with that 100%. Cornell's study say's that you should double the amount of CFM that the dealers tell you. The old rule of thumb was 10 CFMs per 1000 taps but the study say's 20 CFMs per 1000 taps. I have a 10 HP 125 CFM two stage pump that I used last year on 5000 taps. This coming season I will have 6500 taps on that pump. According to the research that is what I need to maintain high CFMs to the far sections of my woods. Yes a much smaller pump could do the same job if the system was really tight. For me I am a one man show and to think I can run a real tight system all the time is silly. As pipeline gets older and showing wear the big vacuum pump will help keep higher levels of vacuum even with some leaks here and there. The way I look at it is if a person is going to do all that work in the woods setting up then why not get the maximum amount of sap out of your trees?

spud

[maple36]

thanks for the input guys i have to figure out what im am going to do. if i go with on pump to the house i may not be able to since it is almost a mile from the sugar house to my furtherest taps any suggestions as for this. if i got to the shack i have power

[mapleack]

A mile away isn't far at all IF you use large enough pipe. My farthest are a half mile or more, no drop in vacuum level at the end. I've been to large Vermont sugarhouses that had taps several miles away. Do lots of research and do it right the first time!

[OGDENS SUGAR BUSH]

also remember with 3000/3500 taps you will have some leakers, its a lot of work finding them so you want to keep the vac as high as possible so go a little bigger

[Thompson's Tree Farm]

thanks for the input guys i have to figure out what im am going to do. if i go with on pump to the house i may not be able to since it is almost a mile from the sugar house to my furtherest taps any suggestions as for this. if i got to the shack i have power

Go with the power. A mile is not a problem, Just make sure the pipe is big enough and use a wet dry system. You will want at least a 75 cfm pump and if you will eventually have 5000 taps you should go to 100 or 125cfm.

[sjdoyon]

we had 3,600 taps on 208 acres with our 2" wet/dry lines running about two miles from the sugarhouse. We have two main wet/dry lines running in opposite direction to separate sugarbushes. We had 26" at the end of the line but walked the lines every other day to maintain pressure. We just added another 2,000+ taps this summer. Looking to add another few thousand next summer which will maximize our vacuum system. Sounds like you have a good set up to put your system on one vacuum pump.
FYI, our vacuum pump is oil cooled and puts out a lot of heat, we have to keep our door and window open to the vacuum/RO room when running vacuum.