Natural gas evaporator

[liljohn]

I have access to free natural gas and am looking to set up a small evaporator for natural gas. I have a few ideas but was wondering if anyone else has a natural gas setup and if so would you share your experiences and maybe some pictures?

Thanks,
~lj

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[upsmapleman]

CDL'S PA. superstore is having a open house this Fri. and Sat. and to go along with it, Tim Eldridge will also have open house at his new sugar house and he put in a 5x16 natural gas evaporator. Says he will have it running from 12 to 1:30 both days. Not sure how close to Westfield PA you are but may be worth a drive.

[unc23win]

There are a few natural gas evaporators in the the Westfield area. Brookfield Maple (Lapierre Dealer) and Asaph Maple (Leader Dealer) and a couple of others also have them. I just talked to Bud @ Brookfield last night he made Syrup way cheaper per gallon than oil. You can either use a gun or burners. If the gas is free all you need to know is whether or not they can supply you with enough and if you can get the pressure right.

[KevinS]

I converted our oil arch to natural gas this year. It worked out very well in the end.
The flame pattern was substantially narrower than the oil gun. so I did have to bounce the flame around to get an even boil.
I also removed the regulator and used throttling valves. loved it by the end of the season

[brookfieldmaple]

9658
I converted this season. I love it.

[liljohn]

9658
I converted this season. I love it.


There are a few natural gas evaporators in the the Westfield area. Brookfield Maple (Lapierre Dealer) and Asaph Maple (Leader Dealer) and a couple of others also have them. I just talked to Bud @ Brookfield last night he made Syrup way cheaper per gallon than oil. You can either use a gun or burners. If the gas is free all you need to know is whether or not they can supply you with enough and if you can get the pressure right.

I am guessing this is a gun setup! Any examples of a burner setup? I think I am going burner as it is a small setup, 20-50 taps, small single pan 2x2 or 2x3.

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[maple flats]

Such a burner might use a burner for a larger canner. I have a 16 x 24 canner and the burner is like a H shape of a gas grill. See if you can find one that is larger and then just have the natural gas orifice in it.

[Jim_9999]

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[maple flats]

You got that right, they seem to have a license to steal.
An example of the utility company's "theft",
Today I set up with my local grid supplier to send my excess power generation from my sugarhouse solar system to my residential meter. Right now I have just over 2100 KWH credit on my sugarhouse net meter (I generated 2100+ KWH more than I used). They told me that I will lose that credit and restart a zero when the transfer becomes effective, as of my next meter reading. Based on our last residential bill,pro rating it to 2100 KWH, that means they get over $500 worth of free energy. Then from my next meter reading on, any excess will be applied to my residential electric bill. That is a license to steal. I told the guy I was dealing with that it was a license to steal, he said it wasn't because he was telling my what he was going to do. With that reasoning if someone robs a bank, by entering it and telling the teller what he is going to do, is it not sealing?
Sorry, I didn't mean to hijack your thread, I just had to vent.
As for propane, I don't evaporate with it, but I have a bulk tank at the sugarhouse (I think it's called a 50 gal tank). On it I have a 3/4" mainline that goes into the sugarhouse and then several take offs, where I run my 16 x 24 canner, my 2' x 6' finisher, my 500,000 btu torch to light the evaporator and a hot water tankless heater. With all of that it usually costs me under $100 a year for propane.

[JBUTCH2450]

We too are looking to change to natural gas. They are in the process of drilling an oil well on our property so we will have some free gas. The gas line also runs in front of our sugar house so we can buy it also. Can someone let me know where we can get more info on this? Any photos or information would be greatly appreciated.

[brookfieldmaple]

I have a few pictures of my gas set up on my facebook page, and would explain the entire process I went through if you like to email or call me.

[ryebrye]

I have access to free natural gas and am looking to set up a small evaporator for natural gas. I have a few ideas but was wondering if anyone else has a natural gas setup and if so would you share your experiences and maybe some pictures?

Thanks,
~lj

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I can try to get pics, but the guy up the road from me who I haul all my sap to has a natural gas fired rig. It is not really that complicated - take an oil arch and throw a natural gas burner on it.

His burner does 900k BTU per hour and he boils around 125 gph on his rig. He had a burner specialist help with the setup. He never fired it with oil or wood - always just natural gas. He had the first one in VT when he set it up.

[Jim_9999]

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[KevinS]

I used a burner from a commercial radiant heating unit, one with the long tubes that glow.
There used to be a grain drier on this farm so gas line and meter size were not an issue
I just mounted the gas gun in place of the oil gun.. okay the gas one is not really a gun but it is very similar One of them I tried had an air blower. I got better heat distribution with out the blower

[liljohn]

I'm not sure how it would work if you have a gas lease but I don't think they will give you unlimited gas for free, there's probably a consumption cap on gas usage.

From what I found out after trying to convert to natural gas is that having a line running to or near your building doesn't guarantee that you can tap into it. The gas company owns the line up to the outlet side of your meter. You can do whatever you want to do after the meter. The problem is the natural gas regulator & meter. There are various size meters, each size meter is caped at a certain btu flow rate. You can have a 900k btu (or whatever size you have) device connected to your side of the gas line but if you only have a 22k btu meter that's all your device will get, the device will work but at a diminished btu rate. The only place you can get a natural gas regulator and meter is from the gas company and they are the only ones that can install it. They will not give you a higher output meter just because you want one. You have to justify your need to them. In my case they wanted to physically see my burners. When they saw the burners they said they wouyld only install a larger meter if I agreed to being a commercial account.

As it was explained to me from a gas company marketing rep that I was working with, the gas company isn't just interested in selling you gas, they want to get the most money they can from your gas hookup. Different flow rate meters have different monthly fees. In my case my current residential meter costs me $13 a month, a Sonic natural gas meter will cost me $32 a month. If the gas company decides that you are going to be making syrup and selling it (whether you are or not) then they consider you a commercial account and the meter monthly fee goes up to $75 a month with a premium charge for the natural gas you use. If you don't meet the monthly commercial gas quota then a low usage surcharge is added to the bill. Another item is the gas line itself, if the gas company decides that you are a commercial customer then the meter will be a second meter along with your residential meter. A separate gas line will have to be run from the main line.....take a guess who is responsible for covering the cost of the second line installation.....

I'm speaking from experience, been dealing with this headache since around last November. I finally threw in the towel and decided it isn't worth it to go natural gas.

The easy part in the whole process is getting a gas burner and making or buying the arch. The hard part is dealing with the natural gas company. If somehow you can convince the gas company to install a high output meter you're golden, if you can't........

My family has 5 wells on our property, all with a very high yearly allowance. Our meters are on the well, the line then runs from there to the houses. We trench a pipe to the well they have always hooked it up not a problem. I am not really worried about getting the gas to my cook location. I guess I do need to look into what the btu rating on the meters, I'll research that thanks. Of course I am not looking to burn at 900k btu probably more like 150k.

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