Looking for advice on which way to go with expansion

[BlueberryHill]

Hoping I can use some of your experiences/mistakes to help me decide what to do.

I have maple fever. My 2x3 is probably not gonna cut it this year. I had 55 taps last year and at times it was hard to keep up with the 2x3 since I can only boil on weekends. Had to take a couple of Wednesdays off of work which is OK. But I want to speed things up. It would be nice to have shorter boils instead of 14 hour boils.

I am tapping my brothers hill with 3/16 gravity lines. Should get 30 taps over there and I expect a lot of sap. But what the hell am I going to do with it! I can't take a month off of work. I think I want to get 100 taps in just cause it sounds cool (to a small timer like me anyway) and I just feel compelled to ramp this up every year.

I have been thinking about cutting the back off if this thing and adding another pan. I have some stainless sheets and I could have a friend weld it up into a crude flat pan, maybe 2x3 or 2x4 in size. That's the cheapest route.

What I really had hoped to do was to cut the back off and get a flue pan in there but it seems a little late to get that done this year. Plus I have concerns about it possibly freezing seeing that my rig is basically outdoors. I am under a lean-to tacked onto the side of my shed. A good roof, but no walls on 3 sides. (sugar shack will be built this summer)

But then I read about guys with home made RO systems and I think maybe that would be a good way to go and I could just leave the 2x3 as it is for now. But I have a lot to learn about RO. And I really don't have a safe place to put an RO. I don't have a garage. I can't drag a big RO into my house every night.

Trying to keep from spending a ton of money at this point if I can help it. So I don't know. Just thinking out loud here to see if anyone might want to kick my butt in a certain direction before I start racing in the wrong direction.

[Sugarmaker]

Ok some last minute suggestions:
1. You have a brother. Let him boil some portion of the time during the week.
2. Freeze as much sap as possible getting the ice out and saving the sweet sap.
3. Take a few more days off work you will never regret it. Never seen a headstone saying "should have spent more time at work".
4. Quick get that stainless to the fab shop and have them start on the pan, even if you have to set up a make shift arch this year for it. Increasing your surface area will reduce your boiling time.
5. Find another neighbor that will boil your over abundance of sap. Will still feel good to produce more sap and you can get some tips from them too.
Hope this helps.
Regards,
Chris

[Big_Eddy]

Here's what I wrote to another user a week or so back


My few cents worth

To double your production (but not your wood consumption) add a second 2x3 pan at the back of your arch. Plumb the 2 pans together, or build a siphon bridge, adding sap to the back pan only. You'll evaporate almost twice the sap with the same wood consumption. You concentrate into the front pan and add raw sap in the back pan. $100-$500 investment depending on what you buy or can make yourself

Next step up is to buy / build or have built a flue pan for the back half of your arch. Huge increase in evaporation over the flat pan, again without increasing wood consumption. Now you're evaporating ~4x the sap for the same time and same wood. $500-$1500 investment

Once you're at a 3:1 or 4:1 arch (length:width) with flues in the back half or 2/3rds - the next big jump is to RO. $2500-$xx,000 investment. Now you're still evaporating the same amount each hour, but you've already removed 1/2-3/4 of the water so the syrup comes off that much faster.

I'm of the opinion that too much sap is better than too little. You can't boil what you don't have, but you can dump what you can't boil.

[BlueberryHill]

Thanks Chris!
1. I wish my brother was into this, but he does not want to do the work. He just likes to eat the syrup, not make it! That goes for my whole family. I think I might be adopted. My kids are just getting to the age where they will soon be able to gather sap. That's gonna make this a lot more fun.
2. Been using natures RO!
3. True.
4. Yeah, I suppose that I should do this. My biggest concern is modifying the arch and then having to modify it again next year to fit a flue pan. Not even knowing what kind of pan or what size pan I will be getting I don't know what I should do.
5. My neighbors are all from Mass. I am the crazy guy up on the hill with the guns and chainsaws. We don't mix well. They prefer to stay in their McMansions. Sometimes they come out real quick to BBQ or polish their cars, but for the most part they can be found in front of their flat screens.

[BlueberryHill]

Thanks Eddy. How does a siphon bridge work? I put it into the search field but nothing came up.

[Big_Eddy]

http://mapletrader.com/community/showthread.php?18050-Siphoning-between-pans&highlight=siphon (http://mapletrader.com/community/showthread.php?18050-Siphoning-between-pans&highlight=siphon )

[BlueberryHill]

Awesome, thanks for the link. Looks like a great solution in a pinch. I am running out of excuses to not extend this thing, haha.

[The dairy farmer]

That's the fun part when you are small u can modify things till I get to wear it works well or u get a big evaporator

[morningstarfarm]

If you get in a bind give me a call...I'm about 40 mins south of you and will gladly help you out...actually my brother lives right up there by you...he will bring his sap down too when he gets overloaded...

[maplerookie]

here is a cheap way to help enclose your lean to..i used 2x3x 8's build with studs on 24 centers or so doesn't take much and you cover a lot of distance that way. buy some tarps{ I used 6 x 8 $1.99 each ) cheap ones at value or home depot or harbor freight.i found they work real well if you keep them tight Starting at a top corner hang from side to side first putting in screws or nails at an angle (the angle keeps the wind from pulling it off the screw or nail) to correspond with the grommet holes It helps a lot if you set your studs to correspond with the width of the tarp. then tighten up top to bottom. I put in screws to grommets at the top then laid scrap wood on the extra tarp at the bottom to keep the wind from getting at it.. if you only enclose 2 of the sides at least you will have 3 walls to help you stay out of the wind. good luck let us know how you make out.

[BlueberryHill]

I found a guy with a 2x3 tin drop flue pan for sale and I am thinking about going for it. He said is has a small leak that should be soldered. Is that something that is fairly easy to do or should I try to find an expert to repair it?

Got 32 taps on 3/16 gravity set up at my brothers this weekend. 1 line has 14 taps and it is pulling 17 pounds at the top right now. And all the taps are not even running today. WHen a good run gets going it should really crank. The 2nd line has 18 taps and a couple near the top loked like leakers and we tried to hammer the taps in more but I don't think it did the trick. Only 8lbs of vac at the top of that line. Should we just drill new holes in the 2 leakers and leave those leaky holes open? Don't know what is normally done in those circumstances.