Air Tight Sugar House

[ibby458]

I read a thread the other day that got me thinking. (I can't find that thread now to post to, so I'll start a new one)

We all know sap boils better at low barometric pressure. I wonder if it would be worthwhile to build a sugarhouse as tight as possible, and use big fans to exhaust the steam, and lower the pressure in the building. You would have to have forced draft, with an seperate air intake, and a good gasket around your doors and under your pans, but I think it might work.

Obviously, it's unlikely you could seal up well enough to keep the pressure very low, but even if you could do it enough to keep the pressure inside the sugarhouse consistent from day to day, it might be worthwhile.

Has this been tried before?

[lew]

Instead of sealing up the entire sugarhouse, why don't you just make a tigh fitting steamhood for your flue pan and put a tube axle fan in your steam stack. I think that might be more likely to work than buttoning up your sugarhouse that tight, and that's the only place you really need to have the lower pressure any ways. Just a thought.

[brookledge]

It might be a good concept but there would be alot of hurdles to over come. If you put some type of exaust fan to remove air from the building how are you going to open your door to put wood in or if you are useing oil you need a barometric damper in the stack to keep the right amount of draft. Seems like it would try to suck the oil gases back into the building. As far as pan gaskets you wouldn't be able to use the ceramic fiber because it would suck the smoke right through it.
I think you have a better chance to try and control the enviroment inside your pans only. If you could make a vacuum chamber type pan but then the metal would have to be so thick to withstand the vacuum that you wouldn't get good heat transfer.
Another thought is to look at pressure boiling. Like a pressure cooker that you would use on your stove for cooking vegtables. When you increase the pressure, the boiling point increases so instead of your sap boiling at 212 you could boil it at say 215 and it might evaporate faster I don't know any of the answers but I would think that over the last 100 years someone has thought of raising or lowering the barometric pressure to gain evaporation rates
Maybe Kevin knows alittle more or you could contact Proctor Maple Research.
Keith

[saphead]

Vacuum boiling has been tried in the past but is not really practical.In my opinion boiling with steam is the most efficient,if you can make high pressure steam cheaply.In Mass. you'd have to get a speciality license to operate just that boiler,then the fuel cost etc. etc. So I guess it's tighten up your rig, steam side and fire side and put the wood to it!

[Maple Hill Sugarhouse]

I was trying to think of words to let you think about what your trying to brainstorm/but to make it short=It's just a dream.

Here is a link to the posting on high and low pressure boiling point http://www.mapletrader.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2307