CDL Intens-o-Fire oil evaporators?

[Lazarus]

Hi everyone! After this season I am selling my simple GBM 2x6 wood fired evaporator and moving up to a larger and more feature-rich platform. I'm at 300 taps on bags (scattered across eight farms), but they are really huge producers. I'm averaging around 200 gallons per day with spikes on warm days near 300 gallons. My GBM only averages 20 GPH at its fastest, and with a busy day job, that means it's not actually possible to boil off what I collect in any reasonable fashion or even close to it. The amount of wood I'm having to collect and cut is killing me, and I can never keep it dry enough to have consistent boiling in the damp and rainy southern Ohio "winter", even if it is under cover.

So I've made the decision to switch to oil, and move up to a 2x8 or 30"x8. I'm going to be travelling this spring to the northeast to check out some of the manufacturers, but I also have friend who is a CDL dealer. Does anyone have any experience with the CDL Intens-o-fire oil platform on that size arch? I've seen comments on the wood fired version, but not much on the oil. Anyone using these?

Thanks!
Lazarus

300 Taps on bags and growing fast
GBM 2x6 drop flue with preheater

[jmayerl]

Intensofire is a wood arch. I believe they make an oil called a tornado. Oil and wood arches operate totally different. In my humble opinion that size arch would be WAY to big for you unless you expect a lot of expantion.

[Sunday Rock Maple]

How about keeping the arch and investing in a hobby size RO?

[Lazarus]

I am positively not keeping this unit. I hate both the arch and the pans. Top to bottom it is a piece of junk and not worth investing a dime in. Plus I am totally done with wood. It's just not manageable in our incredibly wet and humid climate here, takes more time to work with than i have, and it's destroying my back.

I need to be able to boil off 200 gallons in under 5 hrs every day. From the specs I have seen, a 2x8 gets on average 40 gals per hour without forced air -seems about perfect.

RO is possible in the future, but not in the same year as putting in a new evaporator. Too much cash!

[nymapleguy607]

You could just sell the pans and buy a flue and syrup pan. My 2x6 had a 4ft flue pan standard size flues with a hood and preheater would boil pretty steady at 43 GPH. The arch was a traditional arch with forced air. If you only have 200 gals to do in a day I wouldn't go any bigger than a 2x6. If you went with leader or Sunrise metal shop you could get a max flue pan from leader thats rated at 50 gph or one from Sunrise with 16" flues I think they said it will do around 60gph. Just remember the pans with larger flues will take a lot more heat to get the high evaporation rates so you will definitly want a blower if you burn wood or a larger oil burner nozzle.

[Lazarus]

OK, I think I must have given too much information in my question and everyone is now trying to fix a problem with my current rig, but that's not quite what I was asking for.
:)

Just simply, does anyone have any experience with CDL's oil fired line, regardless of size? I may have gotten the name wrong, so whether it's vortex or whatnot?

[sam1234]

Hi Lazarus :

CDL builds oil units in many configuration.
The ''tornade'' from CDL is most likely a high production rig available in large configuration only.

For you, you would have to go with a deluxe oil evaporator.
smallest size is 2x8 on these.
Also possible to go natural gas or propane on these.
The boiling rate on deluxe oil evaporator from any manufacturer in the market is around 3-4 gallons of evaporation per sq.ft. per hour, so +/- 50 gallons per hour.
The tornado from CDL will reach over 5 gallons per sq.ft. per hour.
A conventional wood evaporator is usually 2.5 gal. per sq.ft.

Another option, if you do not want to go wood at all, would be the pellet evaporator called the Sirocco.
CDL presented this unit in Ohio at the open house and it was sold on site.
I am sure you could see it live if interested by calling Jim Cermak (CDL rep) located in Middlefield Ohio.
All the benefits of oil at a fraction of the operating cost.
On the other hand, since you are a small producer, the payback is probably not worth it, unless you are thinking GREEN.

I hope it helps!


OK, I think I must have given too much information in my question and everyone is now trying to fix a problem with my current rig, but that's not quite what I was asking for.
:)

Just simply, does anyone have any experience with CDL's oil fired line, regardless of size? I may have gotten the name wrong, so whether it's vortex or whatnot?

[325abn]

I have nothing to add about the pan &n arch you ask about but I will say. With a full time job and limited time, oil is great. Flip a switch and have a rolling boil in 3 minutes when done for the night flip the switch and go to bed. There is a $4/Gal price to pay for the convience though! :)

[gmcooper]

Lazarus,

I hear you on wanting to switch to oil. I do not have a CDL oil fired evaporator but know a couple producers that do. They like them and I do not think they have any regrets other than when oil prices go up. They got them for the same reason you mentioned, not enough time to mess around with wood. I would look at maybe even a 3x8 evaporator. There is nothing wrong with boiling an entire days production in 2-3 hours. Sure makes life easier when you can. Also unless you already tap every maple in 10 miles of you, you will like the rest of us add more taps once you have more time and are not boiling till 5 am everyday. Good luck with your shopping!
Mark

[sam1234]

Hi Lazarus,

see this link, may be interesting for you!
Chinook - High efficiency wood evaporator.
Sirocco - Pellet Evaporator.
Both rigs shown are 2-1/2x10 and will proceed 100 gallons per hour.

Smallest size available is 2.5' x 8' that would proceed +/- 80 gallons per hour.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yX3CW0bzw10&list=UUI4eKW_cyhS0PE0c0uU4v5g&index=2

[PARKER MAPLE]

Anybody have an idea of cost of these rigs. Im wondering how many bags/ tons of pellets it takes to make a gallon of syrup. I like the idea on an biofuel like pellets,, and the efficeinticey of it as well.

[sam1234]

Hi Maple Rookie,

For example :

for sap at 10 brix :
17 lbs of pellet will maple one gallon of syrup. (+/- 1.39$ of pellet in canada)
.85 gal of oil will be required to make one gallon of syrup. (+/- 3.67$ of oil in Canada)

Whatever the brix, the production cost is almost 1/3 of the cost (in canada).
In USA, I would guess 1/2 the cost, since oil is cheaper (if I can use the word ''cheaper'').

Also, what is interesting is that many states are giving grant when removing an oil arch and going with biofuel.


Anybody have an idea of cost of these rigs. Im wondering how many bags/ tons of pellets it takes to make a gallon of syrup. I like the idea on an biofuel like pellets,, and the efficeinticey of it as well.

[sam1234]

Oh, and a 2-1/2x8 pellet evaporator will burn 107 lbs of pellet (2.7 standard bags of 40 lbs) per hour which is equivalent to 6.5 gallons of oil per hour (910 000 BTU). so savings are easy to calculate.

[Greg Durdik]

Lazarus,
I was looking at ordering a 2x6 GBM with a welded CF pan and a pre-heater pan based on the dealers recomendation for a economical unit. I saw some bad reviews back in 2009 but yours is a first recently. My goal was to be able to evaporate 15 + gph. What in particular don't you like about yours ? What is your opinion of the companies support of their product? Thanks for your time.
Greg

[PerryFamily]

I called CDL because I am very interested in the Sirocco Pellet evaporator.
I was told they make syrup for $.80/gallon. He did not mention what concentration that was based on.
I was also told that a complete 2.5 x 8 was $23k. He said complete was everything including hoods stacks roof jacks.....
Was also told comperable oil setup was $20k.
I am looking for the consistancy oil, with out supporting an arab country by buying oil.
I like that they are domestically produced at 2 locations within an hour of myself, and that you should be able to buy in the summer in bulk at a good price.
Gonna be a few years before it is within reach but I am going to look at them at the open houses this month.

[TheMapleMoose]

I got kind of lost on the few different discussions happening here but we have a 2x6 oil fired leader evaporator with a max flue pan and homemade parallel flow preheated. Before the preheated we were at about 40-43 gph, and with the preheated were up to 50-55 gph. We usually boil 8-10% concentrate and end up about 1 gal of oil to 1 gal of syrup. We're using about 4 gph of oil, and have found this to be the most efficient on our rig....hope that garble of info helps.

As far as pellet fired evaporators are concerned, I'm sure not alone in the oil fired community in hoping this becomes viable. I'm sure the price of pellets is going to be on the rise but its got a long way to go if the cost numbers we've run are close. I think both CDL and Lapierre have one out. I like the Lapierre concept a bit better due to their use of a pellet gun instead of firebox like CDL, but that is only based on what we saw open house 2013.

[Mark]

D&G has one that can burn pellets or firewood. Pellets are fed from the back and the firewood doors are still on the front. Run out of pellets just switch over to firewood.