King with no sap tubes in rear pan?

[Sugarmaker]

Folks,
I have a old set of King pans. And when I got them there was no 'directing tube" system in the rear pan. These are the ones that bring the cold sap forward to the front of the pan. Anyway, I have been using it without these tubes and was wondering how much the efficiency would improve If I had these in place? Several sugar makers were surprised that I could make syrup at all! I have a external float box and only one entrance from the float box into the pan. (yea its that old). Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated. I may make it a point to get these in place for next year. At this point it hasn't seemed to bother me much? But maybe with the tubes I could see a improvement in boiling rate?

Chris

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Maybe, but you are getting around 90gph I think you said. Like they say, the proof is in the pudding and you sure made a lot of good pudding this year. A preheater would help more than anything if you don't have one. :D

[digman_41]

Cris I have a 3x5 king pan with only one inlet tube from the float box, the pan came with an arch I bought last summer. it has no tube either I would assume it would be easy to make one my stainless evaporator simply uses a piece of 2" of dvw copper pipe with holes in the bottom and a cap. It seems like your pan would flow a little better with the cold sap entering at the opposite corner and flowing completely around the sap pan.
Sounds like your evaporator is working fine, but it wouldn't take much to make the tube or get a used one.
Mark

[Russell Lampron]

Chris,

Does your flue pan have a divider in the middle so that cold sap would go in at one end near the front and have to loop around the divider to get to the outlet to the front pan on the other side? If no divider you would have to make one of those to make the 2 pipe setup work.

Russ

[Sugarmaker]

Digman_41,
I was thinking of copper running across the pan thru the center partition then two copper pipes (tees) coming off this one on each side of the partition running towards the front of the evaporator. Then a shut off of some type at the end of each one so that when I change sides I would close one and open the other so the sap had to travel back around the partition? If this doesn't make sense tell me before I go off and cobble something together that wont work. You mentioned holes? I seem to remember holes in the bottom of these pipes on my neighbors rig. Then there was also a plug in the end of the tube. It had a handle that stuck out of the sap. But he never changed sides so it was always in the same position.

Russ,
Yes there is a partition down the center of the pan. The opening in the partition is at the back of the pan. But my sap enters near the back of the pan also.

Bottom line is that as I think about how the sap is being added and boiling, these tubes directing cooler sap to the front of the rear pan on the side near the draw off side, would force the sap to have to travel farther and boil more as it travels to the back of the rear pan then to the front and into the front pan.

Chris

[sweetwoodmaple]

Chris,

The D&G reversible models have a 2" diameter tube (no holes) that runs the sap all the way up to the front of the pan from the float box connection. This tube sits directly on top of the drop flues so...if you run 1" deep or so...the top of the tube is exposed similar to a steamaway, so you get some side benefit of steam heating.

With my 2 x 6, as long as you didn't flood the pans with sap, you couldn't notice a difference between the side that cold sap was entering, and the side that the sap was crossing over into the front pan.

I only get 90 GPH with my 3 x 10, so you must be doing ok. Though, I'm probably losing 5 gph since I don't have the condensate from the steam hood directed outside (just falls back into the pan).

Good Luck with the modifications.

Brian

[digman_41]

Cris, I take it your sap simply comes in the hole in the side of your pan directly from the float box. You should look at your neighbors rig sounds like he has the tube system you need to make for your pan. If you don't change the direction of your sap flow I suppose it wouldn't make much differance. We have a huge amount of sugar sand in the sap from our trees around here. If I don't change the direction of sap flow in my pans every day I would have a mess with all the niter that would build up in my syrup pan. If I knew how to transfer pic's from my digital camera I would take a picture for you, it really is a fairly simple tubing system. I think the new Leader pans just let the sap run out of the tube..no holes in the bottom. It seems to me the old pan I got only had 1"and 5/8 tube not 2"
Sounds like you have enough information should have plenty of time to get it ready for next season. Mark

[Russell Lampron]

Chris,

With the partition already there it shouldn't be too hard to figure out a way to run 2 pipes in so that they exit near the front of the pan on each side. Blocking off the one on the side where you draw off would give you a higher sugar content entering the front pan. On my evaporator this is done with a rubber stopper on a metal handle that is real easy to switch when I change the side I draw off on.

Russ

[brookledge]

Chris
I don't think you will see an increase in GPH but might help in making lighter syrup. If your sap comes in the float box and is then able to take the shortest route to the syrup pan it basicly creates an area that still boils but the sap stays there longer.
You have the right idea to make your own tubing to bring the sap from the float box to the begining point of the flow.
The whole reason for all the dividers in both pans is to make the sap go in a continueous flow through out the pan with out mixing in with other sections. This is why its important to use defoamer
Keith

[sapman]

I think Keith is spot on. The defoamer is SO necessary in keeping the good, continuous flow going. It's easy to see when using an auto-drawoff. The time between drawoffs is very indicative.

And I know of times that if I'm doing everything right, and still have trouble drawing off consistently, one of the plugs has loosened, allowing sap to mix. This is true even in the float box. So getting the tubes in the flue pan should at least help in consistency.

Tim

[Sugarmaker]

Guys,
You are right on. Even with our manual draw off I can see a longer period of time between " batches " of syrup. Then some down time, waiting for the next batch, this must be when a slug of raw sap is mixing in.
We do change sides to scour the niter from the pans this works well.
I will look at the tubes in my neighbors 2.5 x 10. I may try copper tubing.
Would a ball valve on the end of each tube work? As long as I don't have them both closed!
Thanks for all the suggestions.

Brian I don't get much condensate off my rear hood, I Think the drip tray has a leak in several places. Always something to do!

Regards,
Chris

[sapman]

Chris,

Would there be any way to plug the lines from the float box, like normal? The standard plugs Leader sells should work with 1.5" copper.

Tim

[Sugarmaker]

Tim,
I may look at this too, but with the hood and preheater on, the amount of room to reach in is tight. I may have several options and can dream about this between now and next season. First thing is to go measure the outlet and see what I can get that fits over it real snug.
Chris

[maple flats]

Bear with me on this. Is it possible that it is already snaking back and forth? Sugar makes the sap heavier. Is the sap entering and the fresh sap being lower in sugar than that which has boiled down some it crosses to the far corner by the action of the more concentrated stasrting a flow. It descends in the channel between the flues and moves along just by the gravity of heavier descends and lighter remains on top. As this happens it flows back and forth between the raised flue channels until it is at the flue pan outlet and goes into the syrup pan. This action might be automatic because of the density difference of the boiling sap as it progresses thru. OK, shoot my hair brained idea apart. Kevin, anyone?

[Maple Hill Sugarhouse]

:lol: :lol: :lol: mapleflats-There is probably such great agitation within the Raised flue pans that sugar density is probably all mixed up and about the same within a sliver of a brix on the left side of the divider and the density would be different on the right side depending which side you were drawing off in the syrup pan?

Now on a Leader Special there are 5 dividers on the old 4X14 Drop Flue and i have tested the sugar% out of each partition before and got different sugar concentrations/so the dividers do to some degree help keep sap that has a higher sugar content from doing a lot of inter-mixing with the lower sugar content in the next divider. Certainly there is some intermixing but it wouldn't be as greater of a problem on that particular model as with say a 2 part pan raised flue pan.

[Russell Lampron]

The sap goes in to my flue pan at 8% on the draw off side and goes into the front pan as high as 20% on the other side of the evaporator. It usually runs around 17%. I have noticed that the evaporation of the evaporator has gone up using the concentrated sap too. Sometimes I am getting over 40gph.

Russ

[Sugarmaker]

Guys,
Started on the fab work for the sap tubes. Using 1-1/4 copper, which is the size of the opening from the float box. I have the tubes cut and laid out in the pan. Looks pretty good. Just need to get a slick way to close off the flow to each side, then solder some of the joints together, other joints may be a slip fit to allow dis-assembly. Best idea I found so far to connect the copper to the fitting inside the pan at the float box is a stainless band clamp, looks like this might work. Need some other features and this should be done.
Cut pallets tonight and sold some syrup to a customer from Virginia.

Chris

[small_operator]

Chris,
I use copper pipe(I think it's 1-1/4")the crosspiece that fits into the sap box has a sweat x mpt fitting soldered on that end, then a tee in the middle at the closer side, then an ell at the far end. I have a long piece of the copper pipe which I put into the side(tee or ell) I want to feed to, then I just slide a cap with a stub sweated into it into the other side. When I want to switch sides, I just swap the pipe and the cap. The fittings aren't real tight, but I think they prevent mixing.
Gary
Monroe, NH

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Chris,

Mine have a little stainless thumb screw in box fitting on the end of the pipe and where they connect to the pipe coming out of the box and this helps a lot to help clean them. :)

[Sugarmaker]

SO and Brandon,
Thanks for the ideas,
I would like to open and close the 'valves to direct the flow' with my steam hood in place so I may have to "rig" something up to allow me to do this around the preheater and the drip tray. I think I will check McMaster Carr for cheap valve ideas.

Regards,
Chris

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Chris,

Couldn't you make plugs to plug off the pipes from inside the float box?? That is the way a normal one is designed?? It takes me about 60 seconds to reverse the flow in mine and that includes moving about a gallon of syrup to the new drawoff side in the syrup pan.

[Sugarmaker]

Brandon,
This is a evaporator from the stone age. It only has one opening from the float box to the pan. So I am going to rig some valves along the tubes.
Chris