Vacuum pump at the top of the hill?

[tuolumne]

Is this possible? I would have easy access to electrical power at the top of the sugarbush, and a paved road at the bottom allowing sap pickup. Could this work with a wet/dry setup? It seems that vacuum transfer does not care about gravity. How would the flow interaction work at manifolds, and what style of manifold/booster could make this work?

[mapleack]

For this to work correctly you must have a dry vacuum supply line the whole way to the bottom to your releaser. To do it the way you describe is counter productive, with air flow traveling the opposite direction of sap flow. You're not technically moving "vacuum", you're moving air.

[Thad Blaisdell]

mapleack is right, you will need to run a pipe all the way to the bottom to the releaser, then wet and dry all the way back up. What happens if you don't is that the vacuum will pull sap up the pipe and you will get a whooosshhhh whooooosshhh sound as the sap collects and tries to go up the pipe. And when this happens you will have no vacuum at the bottom.

Now comes the fun part..... if your sugarhouse is at the top, run another pipe all the way up and pump it up using a generator, no hauling necessary. If this is something you can do I can explain it more. I do it for 1900 taps and pump over a mile.....

[schellmaple]

Thad,
Do you drain the line from the sugarhouse to the releaser or do you have it baried underground?
Schellmaple

[Thad Blaisdell]

Thad,
Do you drain the line from the sugarhouse to the releaser or do you have it baried underground?
Schellmaple

Do you mean from the sugarhouse to the pump? No. I use a deep well pump in the bottom of a round bottom tank and I remove the check valve. The sap in the line flows back into the tank. If I thought it was going to freeze up especially hard I can pull the pump out of the tank, but for the most part it stays right there. As far as sap in the line, I have never been that nervous about it freezing. I pump it out at the end of the day, so the sap in the line (if any) is all thawed out. I use a float hitched to a generator to shut the generator off, thereby shutting the pump off, go and start it and walk away.

[doocat]

Don't mean to hi-jack the thread but.....Thad, what kind of deep well pump and how high are you pumping? I have seen pumps from hundreds to thousands and am interested in doing this. We have a significant lift to go over.

Craig

[unc23win]

I wouldn't mind hearing more about it either Thad you gave me an idea I already have a deep well pump and probably electric could have electric. I was going to do it all on vacuum but it might be easier to run dry line then pump once a day or at least later in the day.

[Thad Blaisdell]

My lift is 130-140 feet. Total length of pipe 1 mile. From Tank to top of hill is 1500 (ish). Then down the hill almost the same drop. My understanding of siphoning only works on 30 feet or so..... not sure on the truth of that.

What I do at the tank is put a 1.5 hp deep well pump right in the bottom. I have an 8000kw generator. I wire the kill switch to a float. So when float is goes down it makes the connection to the kill switch. Thus shutting off the generator, and stopping the pump. I also have the one inch pipe connected to my releaser at the sugarhouse, I thought it was easier for line to drain. My tanks at SH are upstairs, thus I would have to lift the line up 15 feet leaving a lot of pipe with fluid. So the line to the tank is always under vacuum, but does not need to be.

This has worked flawlessly for 2 years now. I do recommend a moisture trap at the releaser though..... if you have a problem it is a bitch to get the sap out of the line feeding vacuum to the releaser.....

More than happy to explain more if necessary.

[tuolumne]

No need for generator to pump - paved road access is good to the bottom of the hill and it seems cheaper to haul by road than to dedicate a generator to that location. I suspected that a third pipeline would be needful. Still, 2000' of plastic would be cheaper (and quieter) than establishing power at the collection point.

Back the original question. If the dry line is truly dry, air transfer and sap transfer would not be interfering. It is in the boosters/manifolds that the interaction takes place. I can see a lot of loss in a standard size manifold. How much "gurgling" would take place if the manifold was tallish and made out of something like 4" pvc?

[unc23win]

If you are putting the releaser at the bottom of the hill you just need a vacuum supply line to the releaser then your wet and dry line out of the releaser to your tap system. Depending on how much line you have you might want boosters in the wet dry system. My neighbors have one big pump and they ran 2 inch vacuum lines to 6 maybe more releasers mounted on tanks all of which are right by the road for easy pick up.

I think Thad was trying to save you hauling. I guess my take on that is it depends on how much hauling.

[mapleack]

Back the original question. If the dry line is truly dry, air transfer and sap transfer would not be interfering. It is in the boosters/manifolds that the interaction takes place. I can see a lot of loss in a standard size manifold. How much "gurgling" would take place if the manifold was tallish and made out of something like 4" pvc? It doesn't matter how big your manifolds are, if the wet line freezes you'll be pulling sap up hill the wrong way in the dry line. You need to spend the extra money to have a dedicated vacuum supply line from the pump to the releaser. Put a safety moisture trap at the releaser so this supply line can't fill with sap. I've got a central pump and three remote releasers, in one of the woods the vac supply line runs right along the wet / dry for 500 ft. This isn't the place to try to save money, trust me.

[BreezyHill]

I think you may have confused some folks.
The use of a tall manifold to attach the vacuum source line would be a very good idea. The tall line out of 4 or even 8" pvc would work well. It will give the releaser more room to get caught up to the sap flow should something go wrong. Since it will be a sloped run the sap will not likely get back to the pump but a moisture trap is still needed at the pump to condensate any vapor in the line.

It is very easy to tap pvc will standard taps and they can be picked up from ebay very reasonable. just use a 64 smaller bit than recommended to be certain that the threads are full size to get the best seal possible and use pipe dope to seal threads to maximize vacuum. Put the vacuum supply line in the top with a reducer if using 4" saves the threading and is the highest point so the cylinder is evacuated easier and harder for moisture to travel up.

Great question!

Ben

[tuolumne]

This isn't the place to try to save money, trust me.

Thank you all for the valuable feedback. This is not an attempt to save money as much as a contrary sort of fellow always wondering about different ways to do things. This is how inventions happen after all!

[mapleack]

tuolumne, if you haven't read the recent thread on whip style manifolds, here it is http://mapletrader.com/community/showthread.php?20932-The-Whip&highlight=whip It's a good read. If stainless fittings are too pricey I believe someone said CDL now has full bore inside diameter plastic fittings. Always pay attention to the fittings your are using, why pay for 3/4" mainline and then put a fitting in it that is only 5/8" inside diameter? You no longer have a 3/4 main. Good luck with whatever you set up, if it does or doesn't work, come post about it so others can learn either way.

[schellmaple]

Do you mean from the sugarhouse to the pump? No. I use a deep well pump in the bottom of a round bottom tank and I remove the check valve. The sap in the line flows back into the tank. If I thought it was going to freeze up especially hard I can pull the pump out of the tank, but for the most part it stays right there. As far as sap in the line, I have never been that nervous about it freezing. I pump it out at the end of the day, so the sap in the line (if any) is all thawed out. I use a float hitched to a generator to shut the generator off, thereby shutting the pump off, go and start it and walk away.

Thad,
Thanks, You answered my question. You have the setup that I would like to have. I have a tank at the bottom that I have to pump into another tank then haul back to the sugarhouse. I do have eletric at the tank at the bottom and if I had another pump that would lift 30-40 feet max in the tank and another line to run aprox 1500' back to the sugarhouse, I would be in buisness. The only problem is with the vacuum pump and the deep well releaser pump at the bottom, I'm maxed out on my eletric.I guess the only option I have is to move my vac pump to the sugarhouse were I have more current and run another line to the bottom with just vac and add a pump to the tank and a line back to the sugarhouse.

[Thad Blaisdell]

If you have a deep well releaser..... that will most likely lift it 30-40 feet. If not put in a slightly larger pump. You may be able to pump directly to the sh. Or just put in a generator to run the pump to sh. with only a 30-40 ft lift you wont need a very big pump. 1/2 hp with a 3/4 inch line would suffice.

[schellmaple]

I do have a deep well releaser and I would have to drain the line before a freeze up right?



If you have a deep well releaser..... that will most likely lift it 30-40 feet. If not put in a slightly larger pump. You may be able to pump directly to the sh. Or just put in a generator to run the pump to sh. with only a 30-40 ft lift you wont need a very big pump. 1/2 hp with a 3/4 inch line would suffice.

[Thad Blaisdell]

Put in a second line, switch every night. Have it so you can connect the other line to the vacuum to drain it. Or just drain it, or 100 other ways to do it.

[BreezyHill]

So how do you defrost these lines when sap pools in a low spot when it is under ground, in potentially frozen soil?

[GeneralStark]

I don't think they are talking about buried lines.

[wiam]

The line Thad is talking about is not buried. I do have buried line that is 3-6 feet down. Any low spots are in wet ground. I have not had a freeze problem with this. I have a vac line with it and had moisture get in it and that messes with vac transfer. I had to blow that line out with a 1.5 inch valve of my shop compressor to make it work