4x12 evaporator tap count

[tcross]

How many taps on vacuum would it take to make a 4x12 evaporator worth it? I may have a chance to get a 4x12 for an incredible price... like a gallon or two of syrup a year! an older gentleman is tired of making syrup and wants to get rid of it so he can convert his shack into something else! When i max out my woods i'll be able to get between 375-425 taps on vacuum leaving roughly 75 to be tapped with buckets! i won't be able to boil every single night but perhaps a night during the week and fri-sun. The evaporator would be basically free, and yes i could always sell it or trade it for a smaller one... however, the guy wants to give it to someone who will use it, so i am not going to let him give it to me and turn around and sell it for good #. it's only 5-6 years old! Would it be worth using for that amount of taps? or should i start looking for some new woods to lease?

[morningstarfarm]

That rig should boil 180-200 gph..would make a good day with 400 taps ...roughly 2 hour boil?...I say go for it...expansion is always a goal...

[spud]

I would jump on that right away. Have a little 250 RO to go along with it and you would be boiling less then an hour on good runs. What a deal.

Spud

[chrismxz583]

There are a few pros and a few cons to your predicament. I know because I had a similar situation. Sounds like the rig is in good shape and the right price. Does anyone sell sap in your area? One problem with a rig that size is that it takes a lot of sap just to flood the pans. Then if you have smaller runs it will also take a little time to sweeten the pans. If you keep your other smaller evaporator that could help with the smaller runs. You could always sell bulk if you have the sap to boil. Just dont forget that a rig that size likes to eat a lot of wood as well

[adk1]

a 5-6 year old 4x12 you say? that is worth some major coin..a feel bad for the guy that only had it for 5-6 years and was sick of boiling already

[Scribner's Mountain Maple]

That is real nice deal. I ran a 4*12 for a number of years. I say go for it. You can place ad today on craigslist saying you are BUYING SAP... I didn't have blowers and burned 1 cord of wood per 8-10 hours of boiling.

Think about producing 3 or 4 gal of syrup per hour. And then if you add RO like Spud suggested, that jumps to 12-15 gal per hour easy. oh and good luck moving it.:)

Ben

[adk1]

a cord of wood in 8-10 hours???? seriously?

[tcross]

yeah, I feel bad for the guy too! The **** thing is in impeccable shape! I don't want to think about how much he paid for it! he just got overwhelmed with it all and didn't have anyone to help him out! he'd been doing it for many years and I think he took too large of a leap/upgrade! he's a good friend of my old man and just wants the thing used... and I want to honor his generosity... but I just want to make sure it is worth it and not just rotting away in my shack!
that's a good idea about saving my current evap for small runs! that may work out really well!
I do have another bush at my hunting camp that my family owns that is about 30 minutes away from my house. I could get plenty more taps out of that... the only problem would be hauling it and plowing the private road that's 1 mile long and about 2200' in elevation and seems to be a snow trap! but I guess no one ever said sugaring is easy!

[tcross]

wholly crap! a chord of wood in 8-10 hours! that right there scares me! the local stihl rep. will love me this summer!

[Scribner's Mountain Maple]

I think wood consumption would go up if it has blowers. My 8-10 is an estimate. It may be more like 12 hours. All I know is during a 20+ hour boil I nearly burned half of a 5 cord stack. Also made 50 gal of syrup. Again mine had no blowers, RO or anything fancy. Efficiency increases if it has a hood/preheat, steam away, blowers/airtight design, etc. What Manufacturer/ model is it?

[adk1]

might be right. they say on average it is a cord of wood for every 25 gallons of syrup

[PARKER MAPLE]

If you get it and its to big for your needs I have a nice 3x8 I would trade with you lol.. But seriously, my grand father has a 4x12 and its boiling around 150ish an hes older and dosnt mind sitting around watching it go so his wood consumption is about 1/2 of mentioned rate. Idea for tap count hes running 1800 on his with nothing bare bones rig. No preheater,No RO,NO blower... Just good dry wood....

MR

[tcross]

I'm not sure of the model! i'll have to ask him! I never thought to look for that when I saw it in November! I can't get to it easily! his shack is way up in the woods (like 3-4 miles of steep mountain slope) and only accessible by snowmobile this time of year, until about the beginning/middle of April! I think that has a lot to do with why he is sick of it! I do not know if it has any amenities to it or not. but I suppose if a chord makes 25ish gallons of syrup, then putting 1 chord every 8-10 hours through it, really is not all that bad!

[morningstarfarm]

I have two words of you...ro and oil...I run a 5x12 and it costs me roughly 1 gal of oil per gal of syrup...I wouldn't even want to consider burning this thing in wood...would be a full time job for one guy just feeding it...

[sjdoyon]

We run our 3x10 with wood and yes, we have one guy feeding the evaporator every 8-10 minutes. We boiled around 6-8 hours each run last spring with 5,900 taps. We are over 10,000 this spring. We did add two new posts to our RO so we have four posts. We might have some long boiling days. Looking at a steam away if we add another 2-4 thousand taps.


I have two words of you...ro and oil...I run a 5x12 and it costs me roughly 1 gal of oil per gal of syrup...I wouldn't even want to consider burning this thing in wood...would be a full time job for one guy just feeding it...

[morningstarfarm]

Just went back and retread your initial post...you are boiling on a 4x6 now...the 4x12 will burn on roughly the same amount of wood...but...you will process several times as much sap in the same length of boil...thus shortening your boil from say 4 hours to 1 hour for the same sap...so you will burn 1/4 the wood...unless I am way off somewhere here in my calculations...

[farmall h]

Tcross...calm down man! Does the old guy have some trees left that need tapping? I have run a 4 x 12 since 1988 and have found that 1000+ taps on vacuum is ideal for this size. We do NOT have an RO...too much $. We generally go through 12 cords hardwood and at least 3 cords of softwood (dry hemlock). Granted if all your burning is softwood slabs (cedar)...you will be humping the fire every 10 minutes! If I were in your shoes I would accept his offer and maybe trade it towards a smaller unit or pick up 500 more taps. Generally we crank out 500 gallons a season on ours. Oil would be nice and a RO would be nice...but ya gotta start somewhere!

[farmall h]

Morningstar..you need to float Tcross a loan! Oh, by the way..my 73 years young father boils all by himself! :)

[tcross]

not sure why I would need to calm down... but sure, why not! fire wood is no issue and I have plenty room for expansion if I find I need to or want to! well, I ended up taking his offer! I can't get the arch out of there till the spring, so i'll still be on my current home made rig! I've been taking things from his sugar house that he doesn't need... The arch needs to pretty much be totally re tined, but that's minor! it needs to be bricked but all the insulation is in perfect condition! I was looking at his pans which are in pretty good shape... just need to be shined up a little! I have a question about the front pan! it is a Waterloo Lightning 4x4 soldered pan! I don't have a lead test kit, but will probably have to buy one! I'm thinking there is a good chance the solder is lead, but I don't know! did they make these pans lead free at any time? the back pan is a raised flu D&G, and that pan does not look to have any lead... again, i'll test it! I'm curious, because if it is lead, i'll probably start looking for used 4x4 syrup pan. no funds to buy a new one right now or any time soon!

[Scribner's Mountain Maple]

That sounds just like my old arch. Are there any manufacturer plates on the pans. They usually have a date of when they were built. For Lead, they stopped allowing Lead solder in 1989 I think. So anything made before that is likely lead, and everything after that is not. My pans were made in 83, hence why I sold it. If yours are lead and you want to replace them, keep your eyes open for Syrup and flue pans on craigslist. I have seen them some for a 4*12.

Ben

[tcross]

8440
there isn't a date or serial # on the pan. there is a tag for it, but it is not on there and does not look like it has been rubbed off or anything? if there isn't a serial # on there, then I'm assuming it's probably pretty old! ??

[Bruce L]

The 4 x 12 should be good for you, what you need to think about is sap storage, do you have lots of tanks to hold the sap for your weekly boils or whatever? Yes it will seem like it is taking more wood, but you should use less wood overall from shorter boils. Our new rig I fire softwood into every 3-4 minutes, seems like a lot, but boiling time is very short, longest boil last year I believe was about 4 hours and made 37 gallons of syrup from raw sap

[Paul VT]

8440
there isn't a date or serial # on the pan. there is a tag for it, but it is not on there and does not look like it has been rubbed off or anything? if there isn't a serial # on there, then I'm assuming it's probably pretty old! ??
I have yet to see one of there tags that do have any numbers. I have seen many but never any numbers in the spaces. Including 5 different pans I have owned.

[shane hickey]

Most of them have the year they were made but never are a serial number

[tcross]

there's a good possibility there was another tag on it and it got taken off... or something like that! i'll get a lead testing kit and make sure! I have two just like that and another that I got last summer all the same size. hope at least one of em are lead free! if not, that's a lot of valuable scrap in a few years!

[PARKER MAPLE]

I have the exact pans on my 3x8. The tag also appears not to have any numbers on it. I bought it second hand from Bascoms where they tested it. He said they were lead free. I think my tag is a different color though.

[500592]

My small brothers pans say that they are lead free I think most small brothers stuff has lead in it.