Vacuum Emotional Rollercoaster

[rhwells2003]

Well title bout says it all.

For the past two years I've been setting my woods up around the house for high vac. I set my woods up last year (350+/- taps) but with a young family didn't have the money to spend on a pump & releaser, so went with gravity. Well I take that back I bought a shurflow which equated to basically gravity. ANYWAYS

This year I decided to make the leap to vac. My beautiful generous wife, let me borrow some money from our savings, and I bought a used double barrel lapierre releaser, and a used gast 1550 run of a predator pump. Thought nothing crazy but should get my feet wet in the world of high vac. I also added about 60+/- more taps.

So for the past couple weeks I've been adding taps, and building a new sap shed. I know I missed the first good run a week or so ago, but when I saw this warm up today I thought I was going to try and get up and running for that one. Started tapping sunday night, had stomach bug Monday so nothing, finished tapping by headlamp Tuesday, and yesterday I quickly built a temp roof for my pump motor, and hooked my dry line up, and fired up the pump for the first time hooked to my woods. Started right up and could hear it start to suck (roller coaster going up). Headed to my releaser, 2" of vac (roller coaster coming down). Realized I didn't tighen the fernco fitting connecting my releaser, so tightened that up, and no audible leaks at the releaser and vac started to climb (roller coaster heading up again). Vac stabilized out at only 9" (roller coaster back down). isolated one of my mains coming in, and acted like a leak. Went for a walk and found a spout had poped out, and a pretty significant deer chew. Fixed those up and back to the releaser. Vac was now at 18"! (roller coaster going higher) Sap wasn't running to good yet and wasn't close to a dump so I went inside for a while. Came out a while later to see the first dump. After a bit the float triggered, piston engaged, started to open one barrel and stopped. Wouldn't fully release, almost like it got hung up. So I loosened up the fernco just a little bit so it could operate better (acted like when the piston operated and tried to operate the arm to switch barrels it wants to spin in that fernco). Anyways after doing this I started taking 5gal buckets of water from the house and dunking a low drop into them to suck water to make the releaser operate. I did this for an hour or so and watched the releaser cycle through probably a dozen times. Everything seemed to be working fine, and by now my vac was up to 21.5"! (rollercoaster going higher and higher) Thought everything was good so at 1am I went to bed. . . . . . Woke up this morning 5 hours later with a 1/4 full tank full releaser, mains backed up with sap, vacuum running, and 0" vac . . . . (the big roller coaster drop!) It looked like it got hung up again on a dump and broke vacuum to both barrels, and the vac in the lines locked up the releaser flaps entering the barrels so they wouldn't drain. I cleared all of that, reworked the fernco again, and now my vac wont go higher then 10". (roller coaster is kinda at the bottom now) Couldn't mess with it long b/c I had to go to work. I'll be heading home at lunch to check it but I'm sure I'm going to find the samething again.

Has anyone had this issue with this style releaser and the fernco connection on top? Right now I have a 1" black pipe coming from my pump down through the woods to my releaser. 2' from my releaser I transition to 1.5" pvc, pvc to my releaser, 90 degree bend down with a small piece of pvc and fernco the two pieces together. Do people do something different? Almost seems like I need more flexibility for the action of the piston releasing and switching barrels. Maybe between my pvc 90 to my black vac pipe a 2' flexible pipe to allow more movement? I don't know I'm at a loss. Even that doesn't answer why I was getting 21" last night but now I'm only getting 10" I even shut off all my mains entering the releaser to try and just get my releaser up to vacuum and it wouldn't. I don't know. I'm sure newbie vac people go through a lot of these things.

[rhwells2003]

I'll try to post a pic of my releaser connection. Tell me what you guys think.

13320

[unc23win]

Is your fernco hooked to the releaser on the bottom? On mine I ran 1 1/2" in top of releaser then 1 1/2" fernco to another small piece of 1 1/2" then from there back to pump. The pivot has to be able to pivot that is a Bernard I have one. If it runs low on vac or doesn't move from side to side it can hang up in between and all vac will be lost. Also worth checking the linkage on the piston and make sure it is lining up when it switches side not much room for air if it doesn't line up it will leak.

[Tweegs]

My releaser won’t toggle between tanks with less than 15 inches of vacuum.

Every year is the same for us. I run around and tap the trees, when it’s time to fire up the pump I call the wife down to babysit the releaser.

You won’t really know how much vacuum you have until all of the mains are thawed and clear. A plug of ice or dam of sap will not allow vacuum past. Once cleared, a major leak can present beyond that point.

With the pump on and my wife at the ready, I trot off to find the leaks.
I walk with one hand on the main, you’ll easily hear a leak if your hand passes over it. I stop and listen to every saddle, look at the lateral. If sap is zipping through the lateral, I’ve got a leak.
I’ve found that a wrap of electrical tape on the pin hole leaks (squirrel chews) will get me through the season. Anything larger requires an overhaul of that section.

Once I’ve got 20+ inches at the releaser, my wife can go on about her business. We communicate by radio.

I keep fixing leaks until we’re at our typical 25 to 27”.

Prior to the next season, everything with tape on it gets replaced.

From what you’ve described, it sounds very similar to what we face every year.

[rhwells2003]

Is your fernco hooked to the releaser on the bottom? On mine I ran 1 1/2" in top of releaser then 1 1/2" fernco to another small piece of 1 1/2" then from there back to pump. The pivot has to be able to pivot that is a Bernard I have one. If it runs low on vac or doesn't move from side to side it can hang up in between and all vac will be lost. Also worth checking the linkage on the piston and make sure it is lining up when it switches side not much room for air if it doesn't line up it will leak.

So the pvc I installed goes to the 90 bend, and then a small piece pointed down toward the inlet of the releaser. I then have the fernco attached to the pvc stub I left, and the pvc stub that comes up out of the releaser. So I loosened the fernco last night so it could slide inside it to dump, but there seems to be a very fine line between loose enough to slide, and leak loose. I guess I'm confused on what you mean the linkage on the piston, and it lining up during a dump

[unc23win]

Ok you don't want the fernco where you have it. Put a 1 1/2" piece of pvc 3"-6" long into top of pivot point with no glue then clamp the bottom of the fernco to the top of that piece then the other end of the fernco to your pipe to your pump. You have to have the fernco tight so it won't leak.

It's probably not the linkage but when the piston slides it pulls a tie rod over it only has about 1/8" to seal so if it pulls too far or not far enough it will leak.

As Tweegs said with low vac it won't work right but you said your loosening the fernco that's at least one leak right there. And if it's leaking at the releaser it's hard to maintain anything.

[rhwells2003]

My releaser won’t toggle between tanks with less than 15 inches of vacuum.

Every year is the same for us. I run around and tap the trees, when it’s time to fire up the pump I call the wife down to babysit the releaser.

You won’t really know how much vacuum you have until all of the mains are thawed and clear. A plug of ice or dam of sap will not allow vacuum past. Once cleared, a major leak can present beyond that point.

With the pump on and my wife at the ready, I trot off to find the leaks.
I walk with one hand on the main, you’ll easily hear a leak if your hand passes over it. I stop and listen to every saddle, look at the lateral. If sap is zipping through the lateral, I’ve got a leak.
I’ve found that a wrap of electrical tape on the pin hole leaks (squirrel chews) will get me through the season. Anything larger requires an overhaul of that section.

Once I’ve got 20+ inches at the releaser, my wife can go on about her business. We communicate by radio.

I keep fixing leaks until we’re at our typical 25 to 27”.

Prior to the next season, everything with tape on it gets replaced.

From what you’ve described, it sounds very similar to what we face every year.

This is all basically what I did last night at midnight haha. I found a few leaks and it jumped me from my initial 10" to 18" right off the bat, and slowly worked its way to 21.5". But even before I went and found leaks I shut my mains going to the woods so my pump was just putting vacuum on the releaser and my dry line and it would pretty much instantly jump up to 23". But now today for some reason when I do that it still doesn't go above 10" I don't know got a little fudging around I think. Just hoping I didn't burn my vanes up. I had the motor going on just idle, just like the guy I bought it from said he's done for the last two years. I don't know we'll see.

[unc23win]

13321 The fernco is just above the picture I have 1 1/2" pic in the top of pivot point you can see writing on it.

[rhwells2003]

Ok you don't want the fernco where you have it. Put a 1 1/2" piece of pvc 3"-6" long into top of pivot point with no glue then clamp the bottom of the fernco to the top of that piece then the other end of the fernco to your pipe to your pump. You have to have the fernco tight so it won't leak.

so when you put a stub onto the stub that comes up from the releaser it doesn't leak through that with no clue or a gasket or anything? Makes sense that it will rotate and operate a lot better that way.

[rhwells2003]

13321 The fernco is just above the picture I have 1 1/2" pic in the top of pivot point you can see writing on it.

ok yeah I see what your saying now, that makes sense. I'll give that a try when I get home tonight.

[mellondome]

You should have a pvc stub that is milled slightly smaller and has an oring . This will allow the fitting to swivel the small amount it needs without vac loss.
Donimion Grimm part # 403965

[JoeJ]

Rhwells,

Can you post a better picture of the top of the releaser? I have 5 Lapierre 8 year old mechanical releasers there work very well. They have the simple up and down float to trip the vacuum. I also have a small 2 year old Lapeirre releaser with the swivel top that I should have been smart enough not to buy. Does not work very well. I just looked in the Lapierre 2016 catalog, and it looks like Lapierre has gone away from the simple releaser mechanism to a lot of swivel tops.

[rhwells2003]

You should have a pvc stub that is milled slightly smaller and has an oring . This will allow the fitting to swivel the small amount it needs without vac loss.

Well after looking things over a bit last night I think your absolutely right. the male pvc stub does have a spot for an oring gasket, but just no gasket. So I'll go to CDL today and pick up a couple of those. I think I'll also attach a piece of 1 1/2" flex pipe in the vertical before going back to pvc or converting to my 1" black pipe. Just for some more flexibility. I have no idea how the last guy did all this with just a fernco, who knows.

I also looked at my motor and pump last night too before I shut it down, and it still was only creating about 10" of vacuum. It looked like the pump pulley wasn't spinning very fast, so I put a tach on it and it was only spinning 200rpm. The motor that runs it I believe is suppose to turn 1800rpm or so on an idle, and the guy I bought that from said he just always kept it at an idle. I thought the belt looked pretty loose on it so I think the belt was slipping. So I'll tighten that up and see if that does the trick. Kinda makes sense why it worked the first couple hours that night and then wasn't after that. I would imagine after running for a while and things getting good and heated up, that that's when it'd start to slip.

JoeJ - No I don't have another picture. Wish I thought of that last night b/c I pulled my dry line all off of it last night, could have gotten a good pic of it.

[unc23win]

You should have a pvc stub that is milled slightly smaller and has an oring . This will allow the fitting to swivel the small amount it needs without vac loss.
Donimion Grimm part # 403965

On mine I eliminated that insert piece with O rings last season and it worked the best of any season of 4. I agree with JoeJ swivel mechanisms are not as user friendly on double mechanicals.

[Tweegs]

I bought my releaser refurbished.
It didn’t come with a swivel.
Not knowing any better at the time, I glued in an adapter, adapted again to hose barb and ran a softer hose to the moisture trap.

4th season with it this way and haven’t had any trouble. The hose is supple enough to move even when cold, yet rigid enough not to collapse under vacuum. Just that clear vinyl stuff from home depot.

If you can’t get it fixed the right way, what I did may serve as a plan B.

[rhwells2003]

Well I went to CDL Friday afternoon and asked for an O Ring to fit a 1.5" swivel releaser. Was given one and on my way. I didn't go to put it on till Saturday afternoon, and guess what wrong size haha. I measured it at 2.25"ID, guess everyone makes mistakes, they're pretty busy right now. So sunday morning I went to Ace and grabbed 8 O Rings in 1/8" increments to make sure I get one right. Went home and one seemed to work. Lubed it up good, then put a 1.5" coupling over it, and the other side of the coupling reduced to 1", put a 12" section of 1" flex pipe, and then connected to my dry line.

I then went to my pump and I was pretty sure my belt was loose, and slipping. The motor and pump are both bolted to a wood platform. So I unbolted the pump and slid it forward to get it as tight as possible. I turned it on this morning when I woke up and instantly had 20" at the releaser. Within a couple minutes my releaser was ready for its first dump and it cycled flawlessly. When I headed back for the house I was up to 22.5". When I got back up to the house the belt was squeaking a little bit but I left it and headed to work. We'll see what happens. . . . .

[mellondome]

Just make sure there is no pressure on the fitting.. ( not supporting any weight)

[rhwells2003]

Just make sure there is no pressure on the fitting.. ( not supporting any weight)

Yeah I have a pipe support attached to a truss where it comes into the room of my sap shed, and right at the elbow down I have it attached to a piece of wire suspended from the roof, just for support, and to keep some of the weight of it.

So I went back at lunch yesterday to check it, and the belt was still slipping a little and I only had 15" of vac, but I didn't really have time to mess with it, so I left it. When I got home last night I had 0 vacuum but the motor was still running and slowly turning the pump, so the pump continued to just slip. So figuring the belt was good and warm, I quickly shut the motor off, detached the pump and pushed it as tight as I possibly could and bolted it back down. Seemed good and tight this time. I then sprayed some belt conditioner on it, and started it back up. Instantly 20". I then walked my woods, made it back to the releaser 30min later, and I had 24.5". That held till I shut vac off at 11pm last night. So I think I have everything figured out. I might try and make up some sort of idler pully to keep good constant pressure on the belt to reduce and slippage. But I think I'm heading in the right direction, even with a bit of an up and down vac day yesterday, I think I still managed to get 500gallons of sap off 400 taps.