Economy of boiling with propane

[Camofrog]

Propane is of course not the best fuel source for boiling, but I don't think it is as bad as everybody says.

I've gotten a gallon of finished syrup out of $26 of propane (two tankfuls), and that seems to be about half the average retail price. And I am evaporating out of a big aluminum stockpot, not a broad-surfaced pan.

The burner I am using stands up straight, so I could conceivably put one right up against another and evap out of a rectangular pan laid across both; that might halve my boil time.

[Cedar Eater]

Propane has a lot of advantages and there are things you can do to improve its performance and economics. You'll probably want to buy a stainless steel pot though. Sap will eventually eat through aluminum. Welcome to the forum.

[Run Forest Run!]

I agree Camofrog. For me, propane is convenient as I am working on my own to make the syrup. I need to be able to shut everything down to collect the sap from my second location and leaving a fire unattended wouldn't cut it.

Over the past four seasons of sugaring, I also average one gallon of syrup with 2 tanks of propane. (This year a propane refill is $9.99) That's when sugar content is around 2.5% in my sap. I had some super-concentrated sap that I boiled a few days ago and got the equivalent of 3 quarts of syrup from only one tank of propane. That was awesome!

[Camofrog]

Thank you for the welcome!

I'm definitely not boiling with the aluminum stockpot again, but I can totally use it to to brew beer! Where you don't want evaporation.

[MidMichMaple]

Propane is of course not the best fuel source for boiling, but I don't think it is as bad as everybody says.

I've gotten a gallon of finished syrup out of $26 of propane (two tankfuls), and that seems to be about half the average retail price. And I am evaporating out of a big aluminum stockpot, not a broad-surfaced pan.

The burner I am using stands up straight, so I could conceivably put one right up against another and evap out of a rectangular pan laid across both; that might halve my boil time.

I'm with you, I used propane last year (my first year) and I will probably always keep my operation small so that I can stick with propane. My results were similar to yours, and I really didn't have a good setup. I used the side burner on my grill with a stainless stock pot. I am not able to make syrup this year due to moving (bad timing!), but next year I might try to move up to a turkey fryer and a better setup. The nice thing about propane is that it keeps things easy and fun, which is what I want my hobbies to be. :) I don't really want to spend a bunch of time cutting wood or getting a fire going or babysitting a fire, because then it becomes more of a job and less of a hobby.

One other side benefit is that I could pretty much boil sap every day if I wanted to, because there wasn't a lot of prep involved. I could go collect sap and boil it the same day, then stick the almost syrup in the freezer. No worries about sap going bad, or getting behind and having to boil for an entire Saturday. I also ended up with beautiful light colored syrup in every batch that I did, I am assuming because the sap was never very old when I boiled it, and it didn't get boiled for very long.

[delstele]

Thank you for the welcome!

I'm definitely not boiling with the aluminum stockpot again, but I can totally use it to to brew beer! Where you don't want evaporation.


It's not recommended for brewing either some say it leaves a metallic after taste..

[Ravenseye]

I use a stainless steel turkey fryer to pre-boil while also using a stainless steel flat pan. The turkey fryer is propane and the flat pan sits on a three burner propane camp stove. Unless it's windy out, the setup works quite well. If it gets windy, all bets are off. I keep saying I'll build fold up wind breaks to help keep the flame on the steel but I always get too busy and forget. Last Sunday I boiled down 8 buckets of sap before finishing inside on the house stove. Got 6 pints of real nice syrup and I'm pretty happy for that.

[Jeff S]

I am fortunate to have a little wood stove in my garage to boil my sap ,but about 3 years ago I got to thinking what if I didn't have the little stove but still wanted to make some syrup for personal use what would I do. I decided to try a electric turkey roaster with a Kill-a-Watt connected to it so electric use could be monitored. At that time if you included all the taxes and charges that go with electricity I was paying 12 cents a kilowatt, the end result was that I made a gallon of syrup for just under $20 which as you know is well under retail even 3 years ago. I did all this in my garage so I would not steam up the house.

[saphound]

I'm starting to think the same thing too. I only need a couple gallons and the turkey fryer is doing it. Next batch will be in a steam table pan on the new burner and that should help gph a little. As long as propane stays 10 bucks a tank, I think I'll save myself a lot of work and stick with it. At least that's todays thinking, I could get ambitious and change my mind..there are a lot more trees I could tap, ha.