First bottling for 2016

[highlandcattle]

Pretty painless operation after all these years. Ron set up the finisher alongside the filter press and ran it into a bucket to fill the coffee urn and all done. No hysterics from me anymore from the days of a canner filter. No more swearing from him as the syrup didn't go through. All cleaned up and mess put away until next time. I had an Amish metal worker build me all stainless countertops a couple of years ago. So neat and clean. Yeah! First boil down.

[poulin]

Wonderful !! Could you explain your process ? No stress anymore ??

[highlandcattle]

Yes. We indulged in a filter press years ago. It saved our marriage. Seriously, its made this so much eadier . over and done in a few minutes.

[maple flats]

Wow, nice work. I too love my filter press. It sure saves lots of time and does a super job. Since I have a draw off tank, a finisher and a canner, I also use the filter press pump to move product from one point to another. My FP, draw tank and a second draw tank I use as a mixing tank off the finisher are all plumbed together and each has it's own valve. Then on the FP, I have a long movable discharge hose on the bypass (to regulate the pressure as it climbs near 40 PSI) and on the discharge to that hose I have a 180 bend SS spout. When I want to move product, I just open the proper valve and hook that discharge hose on whatever I want to move the product too. I use this when I clean the front pan and when I send syrup to my finisher. Then when I have enough to bottle or pack a full barrel or 2, I draw it into my mixing tank, add filter aid (FA) and run it thru the FP. From there it either goes into the canner or a barrel or 2. Final density checking is at the output on the FP, before I start sending it to it's destination and grade checking is anywhere during the filtering process. Before I hooked it up like that, I initially had to carry SS draw off pots from the evaporator and dump them into the canner to filter using a flat rack, then I got the FP and I then held 2-3 SS pots (20 qts ea.), then re-heated them, mixed the FA and sent them to the FP, ending in the canner. Once I had a small finisher I added the plumbing to use the FP pump to move product and it became lots easier and safer than carrying a nearly full pot of hot syrup.
Now I've just got to catch up on getting ready. I finished tapping one woods yesterday as I got 3 helpers for 3 hrs. We also strung 2 more 3/16 lines, tied all the 3/16 lines into the mains (I now have almost 175 taps on 3/16 with good drop). Then I hooked up the power cord to my vacuum pump at the sugarhouse and tested it, plugging into the RO recep. It still worked. Now I have a little more to connect the mains into the releaser and tie the releaser dump tank into my sap tanks. I will likely miss the current run entirely, but the next one should finally find me ready to collect and boil.
After this week, I have a week off from school bus driving and that will allow me to finish my must do list (for maple anyways), and even some of my want to do list.