Final Setup of new tubing I have a few unanswered questions. NEED HELP

[Clamer33]

I Just had all the tubing installed in the bush this fall. And we decided to build the sugar house this year also. After collecting from buckets for the past few years this is a big step up. I would like to know if all of what I am being told should work and if anyone has any suggestions as how to make this run smooth. Here is the everything that I know about our setup. Everything we have is CDL supplied products. Currently we are sitting at 650 taps. With 1" mainline used through out the bush. There are 4 mainlines spread through the bush with 3 of them under 500' and one long run that run around the back of the bush to the east side of the property line to pickup an low area. in that area the line has a y installed branching into two 300' lines. The total length is around the 1500'. Anyways all of this runs down hill to our remote pump house. This pump house is where two 250 gal totes are installed with the top cut off of them to be storage tanks. There will be a mechanical releaser installed which will be a Bernard Vertical double releaser 12x12x18x6. The sugar house is 600' away from the pump house. The first 400' is uphill with around a 30-40' lift, then the balance of the line slopes downhill right into the sugar house. About a 15-20' fall on on the line. We will have a Airablo 5.5hp honda pump good for 1500 taps running in the sugar house. Do to the length of the pump line we have also decided to install a 1" dry line from the pump to the pump house at the bottom of the hill. (there is a future area for expansion below the pump house) We have no hydro at any of the buildings except for the two generators we will be running. One large on at the sugar house and perhaps a small one at the pump house unless I can avoid it. I have been told that I will need a gould NPE 1hp 1st 230v pump to push the sap up to the sugar house where I have two SS 500 and 600 milk tanks. My first questions is can I use the Lapierre PISTON PUMP ACTIVATED VACUUM, assuming that it doesn't need hydro to work? Second question is that around the sugar house I have the ability to tap into an additional 150+ trees, but they are about 15-20 lower the the mainlines. With my releaser so far away from the area. Would a sap ladder work to join into the closest mainline. Or should I just gravity feed the sugar house? Though I think this option may not fully work, as it may be to low to the ground to drain into the milk tanks? One of the mainlines is about 150' away from the sugar house ending at the top of the hill. I could tie into this if needed. WE are just finishing the building and the pumps and releaser will be coming in the next few weeks, so I am trying to make sure that I make most of the right decisions before I have this system fully finished and ready for the season in the coming months. Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks
Chris

[GeneralStark]

I Just had all the tubing installed in the bush this fall. And we decided to build the sugar house this year also. After collecting from buckets for the past few years this is a big step up. I would like to know if all of what I am being told should work and if anyone has any suggestions as how to make this run smooth. Here is the everything that I know about our setup. Everything we have is CDL supplied products. Currently we are sitting at 650 taps. With 1" mainline used through out the bush. There are 4 mainlines spread through the bush with 3 of them under 500' and one long run that run around the back of the bush to the east side of the property line to pickup an low area. in that area the line has a y installed branching into two 300' lines. The total length is around the 1500'. Anyways all of this runs down hill to our remote pump house. This pump house is where two 250 gal totes are installed with the top cut off of them to be storage tanks. There will be a mechanical releaser installed which will be a Bernard Vertical double releaser 12x12x18x6. The sugar house is 600' away from the pump house. The first 400' is uphill with around a 30-40' lift, then the balance of the line slopes downhill right into the sugar house. About a 15-20' fall on on the line. We will have a Airablo 5.5hp honda pump good for 1500 taps running in the sugar house. Do to the length of the pump line we have also decided to install a 1" dry line from the pump to the pump house at the bottom of the hill. (there is a future area for expansion below the pump house) We have no hydro at any of the buildings except for the two generators we will be running. One large on at the sugar house and perhaps a small one at the pump house unless I can avoid it. I have been told that I will need a gould NPE 1hp 1st 230v pump to push the sap up to the sugar house where I have two SS 500 and 600 milk tanks. My first questions is can I use the Lapierre PISTON PUMP ACTIVATED VACUUM, assuming that it doesn't need hydro to work? Second question is that around the sugar house I have the ability to tap into an additional 150+ trees, but they are about 15-20 lower the the mainlines. With my releaser so far away from the area. Would a sap ladder work to join into the closest mainline. Or should I just gravity feed the sugar house? Though I think this option may not fully work, as it may be to low to the ground to drain into the milk tanks? One of the mainlines is about 150' away from the sugar house ending at the top of the hill. I could tie into this if needed. WE are just finishing the building and the pumps and releaser will be coming in the next few weeks, so I am trying to make sure that I make most of the right decisions before I have this system fully finished and ready for the season in the coming months. Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks
Chris

Without a good sense of the lay of the land it is tough to say for sure what your best option is for the taps around the sugarhouse. Can you just run them to the pump house releaser? Or run an additional line off the pump to a releaser at the sugarhouse and use a couple sap ladders or sap lift?

I would suggest using larger than 1" line for your air line between pump and releaser at pump house. You will lose CFMs through that small a diameter. 1.25" or better yet 1.5". Also, a 1.25" pump line would be wise as well.

[Sugarmaker]

Chris,
Congratulations on the new sugarhouse and going from buckets you folks have invested a lot!
Have fun tap them if you can.
Regards,
Chris

[Clamer33]

The line from the pump house the sugar shack was installed this fall by a company I hired who came recommended by Serge and the guys from CDL. The original layout, and setup had me maxed out using a twin diaphragm pump, and no releaser. I choose to ask some additional questions and decided that if I added additional taps to the system in the future that I would be wise to increase some of the items now at the start up phase. Hence the increased pump and releaser. WE just had our Maple syrup producers meeting and the Lapierre rep asked me about making sure my releaser was a Constant vacuum releaser. So I am going to ask some additional questions. I guess this will also decrease the amount of cfm lost in the system.

As for the increased line size, I guess I don't have a choose on the one line, though I picked up the 1" line today at the meeting for the dry line. Should I change it to 1.25" and perhaps run it under the currently installed line and install the 1.25 line for the pump line? Keeping in the mind that I don't own the pump or re leaser yet I have spoken for it, and will finalize the delivery early next week. We are just installing the walls on the building this week before moving the stuff in and setting up both the pump house and sugar shack....

I will try to upload a topo of the site

[Clamer33]

Here is some layout of the sugar bush