problem with test boil

[JSEDLAK]

Ok, so last night I decided to finally do a test boil...it was more like a test steam. Got a used 5 x 6 flat pan, poured a concrete square and built a block arch, put a 6" stack roughly 10 feet tall. Filled the pan with about 2" of water, started the fire and 3 hours later had nothing but steam... not boiling. Could it be simply that I need to build a bigger fire with thinner cut wood? And with this size pan is it best to build the fire centered on the front on the front or closer to the draw off valve? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[talahi maple products]

Maybe needs fire closer to pan,or fire more contained(tighter seals) or forced air to increase fire temp,
If you can post a picture of it burning it might help.

[bowtie]

that is a big pan for a block arch, and i'm thinking that you have to build a wide fire in the front of the block arch. also not trying to be smart-a$# but how much air is getting to the fire, on my block arches i had an opening on the front that i "opened" or closed depending on the fire, you can use a piece of sheet metal. i also built up the area behind the fire with blocks to "force" the fire up to the bottom of the pan, if you do not the heat passes by into your "stack" and will not heat up the pan as quickly. if you can send pic's of arch it would help. also there are a lot of pics of block arches in the past threads you can search them.

[JSEDLAK]

I did hill up the back 1/2 of the arch with dirt to push the fire up, and also used some sheet metal to control the air flow, I know it isn't air tight. But thought I should be able to get a boil. I will try building a bigger fire across the front of the pan.

[motowbrowne]

5x6 does seem pretty wide for the length. Seems like a bigger fire (more wood, more air, or both) would get it hotter, but seems like you might be sending a lot of heat out the stack. We had a 3x10 block arch with flat pans and a 12' stack. We'd build a big fire up front and when it burned down, 45minutes later, we'd rake the coals back and do it again. Burned a lot of wood that way, but it'd boil real hard. Seems like with only six feet you're gonna have a lot of waste heat. Oh, one more thing we did have a damper in the stack with the flat pans. When it started burning clean, we'd damp it down a little to try to save some heat from going into the sky. Good luck.

[ericjeeper]

Need bigger fire, more air.. more wood.. Takes a lot of BTUs to get that much surface area to boiling.
,

[325abn]

I think 5 X 6 is the problem here, it basicly a super sized steam table pan. Yes? You would be better off cutting it down to 2 X 6 I think.

[West Mountain Maple]

Do you have the fire up on a grate so air can move through it? or just a fire on the floor?

[bnbmaplesyrup]

We had the same problem with our block arch on a 2 x 6 pan. We filled the block with sand - went to a 8" pipe and put a grate in bottom. Problem solved

Let us know what your soluton is to fix this!!!

[JSEDLAK]

Wow thanks for the help, the pan is a leader pan, it has the channels that the sap basically zigzags through from one end to the other....I thought they were called flat pans. The fire is sitting on the ground, I will have to build a grate for it to sit on and make it bigger. Funny someone mentiond filling the blocks with sand, did that help keep the blocks from breaking too? Thanks again, anyother pointers more then welcome

[JSEDLAK]

Ok, built a grate today, got a piece of sheet metal that fits the opening better and made the opening bigger to allow for more air flow, easier loading and to be able to build the fire closer to the draw off. Will be doing another test boil on Wednesday.