Moving sap from the woods: Getting ideas for the future

[mudr]

Hi guys. In anticipation of expanding my operation, I am looking into moving sap easier. I've got a good sized field between the hard-packed laneway and woods. That field tends to be a bit soft, the four wheeler is somewhat limited in tow capacity, and I do not have a 4wd tractor (I do have a one old JD, but a 2wd model B without locking differential may not do well in these conditions). My next thought would be to collect in the woods into a central location (55 gallon barrel setup) and pump out from the woods through a mainline/transfer line along a hedgerow. I could keep the tractor on the hard packed lane-way and not dig ruts to china in the field. I'm looking at collecting 100 taps in that section of woods for now.

Distances and such: Would need to go a hair over 1,000 ft. It is one long but not steep hill (drumlin), no valleys, with the collection location and tractors being at the lowest locations. The peak of the hill is at the mid point, with 20 ft change in elevation from the collection location. I'm assuming a 1 inch line is what I'd go with.

Would a WX10 or similar 1 inch gas powered pump have enough power to pump that distance with that hill in the middle? Would a 1/2 or 3/4 HP shallow well pump hooked up to a small generator work better? Are there any online calculators that will help determine the gpm at the output based on this situation?

[lpakiz]

I am pumping out 285 feet from the bulk tank to the township road. Pretty much level as far as elevation. I have 1 inch, but wish I had larger. It takes 18-20 minutes to pump 250 gallons. I do go straight up to the line, suspended on a HT wire. So most sap will gravity flow out of the line to keep the line empty. My point is, go with larger line.
I suspect that once your liquid reaches the top of the hill, the downhill section will help pull sap.

[maple flats]

If the fall after the hill is greater than the rise from the source, once the line is full, it will siphon.

[Super Sapper]

The larger the line the more sap it will take to fill it. 1000 feet of 1 inch line will hold about 9 gallons of sap. Now some will drain out to your tank but what is left in the line will have to drain back to the pump to avoid freezing and will still need to be hauled out. A larger line will hold more and with only 100 taps I would think 3/4 or 1 inch would be plenty.

[mudr]

The larger the line the more sap it will take to fill it. 1000 feet of 1 inch line will hold about 9 gallons of sap. Now some will drain out to your tank but what is left in the line will have to drain back to the pump to avoid freezing and will still need to be hauled out. A larger line will hold more and with only 100 taps I would think 3/4 or 1 inch would be plenty.
I did some math, for 1,000 ft of 1 inch I get about 40 gallons. Did I do something wrong?

[RC Maple]

You are right mudr. I did the math too and a 1 inch line that is 1000 ft long will hold 40.77 gal of juice.

[mudr]

Oye. That's a lot of juice. If I have 100 taps, lets say I have 100 gallons. 40% of it will still be in the line when I am done pumping, though I will probably get some draining once I get past the top of the hill. I see three options.

-Let the 40 gallons (likely less) drain back into my collection/dump station barrel setup and leave it there for the next pumping.
-Put a shutoff in the line just above my pump hookup. I would close the shutoff once I am done pumping and leave the sap in it. I can detach and/or drain my pump this way.
-Have a second barrel of 40.77 gallons of water. Close a valve in the line once I get done pumping sap, then attach the pump to the barrel of water, pump the water up to "chase the sap", and then let the water drain back into the barrel.

Am I over thinking this, is this getting too convoluted? I was looking for a way to move the sap that was "easier" (as in not cutting huge ruts and getting stuck), quicker (not having to do 3 trips across the muddy field with the four wheeler), and cheaper (not going out and buying a small 4wd tractor or side-by-side UTV).

[BreezyHill]

After fighting with these same problems for a season my dad, having been a Surge Milk Equip Dealer built his first sap ladder. We ran electric wire to power a pump 300 feet from the sugar house and the taps all went to a tank 1000+' down grade on a road side.

I recall trying to thaw the 3/4" mainline from the pump, helping carry the pump to and from the tank, washing the roadside tank and vandalism of the road side tank before it was finally stolen and Dad didn't tap the lower bush any more.

Now we my sons and I tap the entire bush. All the sap comes directly to the sugar through several ladders on a mainline that travels 1200' with around 80' of elevation change.

The main ladder line is also feed by other lines one has three of its own ladders to get sap out of a bowl area in the center of the bush.

This does mean that you will need to run vacuum pump rather than pressure pump and a releaser. I use recycled dairy equipment and pull 28+" of vac and 11897
a releaser.

For me there is no turning back. When the temp hits 29 the vac pump turns on and all sap is pulled to the releaser in the pic. The pump below the glass jar is setup to pump sap to one of several tanks.

Last season we ran around 650 taps on the system and plan to be over 1200 this season as we finish retubing the main bush. Last season a Delaval 73 was the main pump and this season it will be a Surge 75+ with a M3 or D 75 as standby.

I don't have time to truck sap even though we have a 2000 gallon tanker truck that can fill itself thru a 2" line in 16 minutes. Nor do I have time to screw around with pumps and draining lines.

A 20' rise would be 2 ladders and with the results of last seasons experiments I would use 1/2" riser lines. They thawed as fast as the 5/16 and ran 15-20 minutes longer at night before they would freeze.

My tallest ladder is 18' and shortest is 6'. In 2017 we will be doing a ladder series to get sap up a rock ridge in our front bush. 3 15' ladders with a total of 30' of line between the 3 ladders.

Let me know if you would like to see ladder pics.

Ben

[PATheron]

Id like to see the ladder pictures. How do you cool the vein type vacuum pumps so they don't burn up with the high vac?
I have a five horse masspump major with a cooling tower for the oil that my buddy made. On top of the pump he made a nice little tank that holds oil to drip down into the pump then the exhaust goes through this cooler that looks kind of like the cdl cooling towers. Ive thought of using it but he said over 15 inches of vac it mists too much or something so I never used it. Theron

[Super Sapper]

You're right it is 40 gallons, too early for math I guess.

[Moser's Maple]

why couldn't he just carry a generator, and submersible pump, and a pail with him. have the transfer line carry 22-24' up a tree for elevation drop. put camlocks on the submersible, and when tank is empty unhook the pump and let the remainder 5-6 gallons or so dump into the pail that he would take out with him. just a thought

[mudr]

I have read about this, elevating the pump end of the transfer line, with a 90 dropping a line to the pump. Stupid question: How difficult would it be to get a line up that high? I assume it would have smaller pumping requirements, right?

[Moser's Maple]

i've done this in the past with either a larger extension ladder up a tree with a partner holding the ladder and using a strap to secure ladder on top so it don't fall over, or i have used a portable climbing tree stand and climbed up the tree to the desired location and did my work that way. if it were me I would use a 90 elbow on top, but would just let the main line make the bend on top since fittings restrict the flow so much. just my thought, could be better ideas out there

[unc23win]

I use 90' elbow on mine I find that it makes the pipe easier to control and I am not too worried about restriction mine drain back when the pump shuts off not a big deal. I like to use pipe clamps you can put one every couple feet or so up the tree so on ht epipe for support and then you only have to climb once. BTW www.proflowdynamics.com has excellent prices on stainless cam locks.

[mudr]

i've done this in the past with either a larger extension ladder up a tree with a partner holding the ladder and using a strap to secure ladder on top so it don't fall over, or i have used a portable climbing tree stand and climbed up the tree to the desired location and did my work that way. if it were me I would use a 90 elbow on top, but would just let the main line make the bend on top since fittings restrict the flow so much. just my thought, could be better ideas out there

Hmmm. I like the idea, and I've got a 15 ft ladder stand right there. I can reach up to a total of about 18 ft with that, pretty close to the 20 ft elevation rise at the middle of the hill. Now I just need to figure out how to secure it in a couple locations to get the droops out.

[BreezyHill]

Id like to see the ladder pictures. How do you cool the vein type vacuum pumps so they don't burn up with the high vac?
I have a five horse masspump major with a cooling tower for the oil that my buddy made. On top of the pump he made a nice little tank that holds oil to drip down into the pump then the exhaust goes through this cooler that looks kind of like the cdl cooling towers. Ive thought of using it but he said over 15 inches of vac it mists too much or something so I never used it. Theron

Not all cooling towers are the same. It is what is inside that makes the difference.
11898
This is the inside of an Alamo reclaimer. Very simple and effective in reducing vapor for the most part. The other more standard option on larger reclaimers is to use steel wool to cool the vapor and to condense the oil to the bottom. As the wool condenses vapor it will have oil on the strands and this will force the exhaust to travel to another area. This causes the pull area of the unit to heat and transfer the heat to the walls of the unit.

11899

This is the 18' ladder when being built. I added a dry line that was 1" and that was to large of a diameter. To much slippage of sap back down around the air bubbles killing efficiency. So last season I built a pvc manifold and used 1/2" risers. Perfection!

I will get pics added here after I get a couple taken...cant find the owns from maple season.

Cooling the pump:
Cool the oil to ambient temp before it goes in the pump...use 12'-18" of copper line to connect to the dripper from the oil source or reclaimer filter. This makes a big difference from 80 oil to 40 is a lot of BTU transfer.

Box fan and a digital temp control to turn on the fan and off when not needed. Typically I don't need to run the fan til end of season when we get 55 plus days.

Good vac oil and change it every season. Cheap oil will lead to a hot pump. motor oil will plug the drippers and burn up a pump.

ATF is not designed to vaporize at the temp we need to cool the pump.

Delaval makes the best oil out there. The next best is the blue oil at tractor supply. Far cheaper and it is just like, if not the same oil.

Water trap on the reclaimer is a must also. Don't put water into the filter or it will plug. No filter and you can get shards of steel or debris into a dripper and you are done.

Temp control was off of ebay for $10,
box fan from walmart $10,
not having to haul sap and get all the trees to the sugar in tubing....PRICELESS!

If I had to haul sap with my current work load I would only do around 300 taps.

Pumping the sap up to an elevated line will work but you will need to drain the pump and the line still to prevent freezing. I would have to bring the pump back to the sugar house every use or run the chance that it grows legs and runs to the local scrape yard. They all demand a license and you are photographed on the scale and what is in the truck due to all the stuff growing legs around.

[BreezyHill]

Id like to see the ladder pictures. How do you cool the vein type vacuum pumps so they don't burn up with the high vac?
I have a five horse masspump major with a cooling tower for the oil that my buddy made. On top of the pump he made a nice little tank that holds oil to drip down into the pump then the exhaust goes through this cooler that looks kind of like the cdl cooling towers. Ive thought of using it but he said over 15 inches of vac it mists too much or something so I never used it. Theron

Not all cooling towers are the same. It is what is inside that makes the difference.
11898
This is the inside of an Alamo reclaimer. Very simple and effective in reducing vapor for the most part. The other more standard option on larger reclaimers is to use steel wool to cool the vapor and to condense the oil to the bottom. As the wool condenses vapor it will have oil on the strands and this will force the exhaust to travel to another area. This causes the full area of the unit to heat and transfer the heat to the walls of the unit.

11899

This is the 18' ladder when being built. I added a dry line that was 1" and that was to large of a diameter. To much slippage of sap back down around the air bubbles killing efficiency. So last season I built a pvc manifold and used 1/2" risers. Perfection!

This is the top manifold for the ladder with 1/2" risers. 11900
I tapped them in a different positions to try and get the sap to spiral in the manifold rather than to run the risk of blocking vac transfer if they came straight in thru the bottom. Each insert is screwed in as far as possible to eliminate blocking and they are in the bottom that is against standard design. going in to the top; standard design would cause slippage as the sap hit the first 90 elbow and in previous designs caused the ladder to jump up and down with each surge. Not good when trying to keep air tight seals in place. If you look closely you will see mistake #???. I added 5 risers when I should have had 4 for the volume of the 1" supply line. Worked ok but much better with 4.

11901 This was an odd day. 33 degrees said the temp gauge for the pump. The sap was flowing in the swamp or bowl area of the bush that is protected from the wind. In there a gauge said 37. The 1/2" risers were running but the 5/16 lines had frozen. I am thinking the larger surface area of the 1/2" was collecting more solar heat than the 5/16" risers. We ran like this all after noon. The bottom manifold is 1/2" hose barb with 90 angle into 1" x 1/2" x 1" Tees with the last one a 1" insert x 1/2" elbow. To balance the risers you loosen the pipe clamps and rotate the tees to equal the flow between all risers. This takes about 15 minutes during peak flow. Low flow works fine with this setup. The blue line that is on the top of the manifold is just a plug. I plan to rotate the manifold and attach a blue to the bottom and black on top to reduce my sap temp as much as possible for end of season high temps. This is a 14' ladder location. 2" Pvc to act as a balance tank and to allow better inlet positioning. 3" to hard to get the 1/2" holes just right.

Cooling the pump:
Cool the oil to ambient temp before it goes in the pump...use 12"-18" of copper line to connect to the dripper from the oil source or reclaimer filter. This makes a big difference from 80 oil to 40 is a lot of BTU transfer.

Box fan and a digital temp control to turn on the fan and off when not needed. Typically I don't need to run the fan til end of season when we get 55 plus days.

Good vac oil and change it every season. Cheap oil will lead to a hot pump. motor oil will plug the drippers and burn up a pump.

ATF is not designed to vaporize at the temp we need to cool the pump.

Delaval makes the best oil out there. The next best is the blue oil at tractor supply. Far cheaper and it is just like, if not the same oil.

Water trap on the reclaimer is a must also. Don't put water into the filter or it will plug. No filter and you can get shards of steel or debris into a dripper and you are done.

Temp control was off of ebay for $10,
box fan from walmart $10,
not having to haul sap and get all the trees to the sugar in tubing....PRICELESS!

If I had to haul sap with my current work load I would only do around 300 taps.

Pumping the sap up to an elevated line will work but you will need to drain the pump and the line still to prevent freezing. I would have to bring the pump back to the sugar house every use or run the chance that it grows legs and runs to the local scrape yard. Guys have lost equipment out of garages around here so nothing is left out of sight anymore.

I have more pics of the manifold build if needed.

Ben

[unc23win]

Ben I have a question about your manifold you said the inserts are in all the way right? Just wondering so that means they are threaded in as far as possible? Which means that that protrude up from the bottom of the pvc pipe correct? So the sap then flows up out of them and and back down the inner wall of the pvc?

Have you tried 1/2 risers with no manifold?

[BreezyHill]

Yes, one ladder was built using just 1 x 1/2 x 1 tees and it failed to keep up with the line. The issue was when the sap hit the elbow sap would flow back down the pipe since the bubble of gas/air would stay to the top of the transition. The other attempt was straight up into the same tee. Riser closest to the releaser did well but the flow was blocking off the flow of vac to the other three.
11902
In the pic the tap is in to the point of where the insert will stop. The large hole is the wet line and you can see the dry line opening thru it.
The wet line elbow had a small v slot cut to allow the manifold to fully drain.

Watching sap flow thru tees and Y points of two 1" mains helped me to realize that the flowing sap was blocking the line. On the old 5/16 ladders I use a peace of blue line to be able to see air flow. My son wants to put a mini pc camera into the manifold that he can move in a grommet to see the flow of the lines. I am think that will be cool for the third ladder that has a lateral that comes into the top of the ladder. That line was backing up during peak flow.

My thought process was that the risers needed to have no resistance from sap in the manifold and sap shooting across the side and to the top would lose its speed due to gravity and be less of a blockage. I would like t get a section of clear 2" to really see what is happening but that was to costly to do experiments on.

[unc23win]

Ok so are you threading the 1/2 inserts all the way in or are you stopping them so they are flush with the inner wall of pvc?

[BreezyHill]

11903

In as far as they can but with the angle of the hole some are not in very far; but are located further up the side.

So yes but the amount in varies with progression.

[VT_K9]

Last year we moved our sap house further and lower from the sugar house, to the lowest point on the property for that area. We had a rise of 65-70' and a run of about 780'. Honda has a pump select feature on their website (we found it to be accurate for our use). We settled on the WH15 pump (1.5"). We ran 780 feet of 1.5 black poly. It turns out there is about 70-75 gallons of sap in the lines (we drain them back into two 55 gallon drums on the tractor). We have a CDL 588 gallon tank in the woods. We fire up the pump, get it to a good run, and then pump for 10 minutes. I am within about 1" of the top of the 260 gallon tank in the sugar house.

Good luck,

Mike