Getting back into sugaring after an 8 year break...

[mwarren]

From 2002 through 2008 I had a small sugarhouse with a 30x8 leader King drop flue arch. I had approximately 315 buckets that I hung on mostly red maples. The most I made was 84 gallons. In 2008 we moved to a new house and didn't have many maples so I sold my equipment and haven't boiled since...Although I don't boil myself, I usually make my rounds to various operations to get my "fix".

A few years after moving to the new property, we bought the adjacent property (27 acres) so we now have approximately 33 acres. There are some maples but they are so spread apart that I'm not sure it's worth it to try to tap too many. There is one section near the house that has about 110 taps that I could put on a nice pipeline and run them right to the sugarhouse. I have been wanting to go "BIG" with a sugarbush but I'm not sure that will ever materialize.

I've decided that rather than miss out any longer, I'm gonna tap the 110 and put them on high vacuum hoping to make 50 gallons of syrup. I'm sure that over time I can add more taps here and there and probably double the tap count. Thinking that this time I'll go with a 2x6 with a steam hood and pre-heater. I'll burn wood. should give us enough syrup for ourselves, and to give away each year without being too much work. I can probably sell a few gallons too.

I'm looking to hear from folks that have less than 200 taps on vacuum (or a good 3/16 setup). If you could do it again, would you change anything or what would you suggest to keep? Last time I bought a new evaporator. This time I think I'm going to find a used arch that needs work and build a AOF/AUF arch. I'll hopefully find used pans and try to keep the overall cost down so I can spend some money on a nice vacuum pump and a stainless tank. Any thoughts?
Mike

[ryebrye]

I'm looking to hear from folks that have less than 200 taps on vacuum (or a good 3/16 setup). If you could do it again, would you change anything or what would you suggest to keep? Last time I bought a new evaporator. This time I think I'm going to find a used arch that needs work and build a AOF/AUF arch. I'll hopefully find used pans and try to keep the overall cost down so I can spend some money on a nice vacuum pump and a stainless tank. Any thoughts?
Mike

How much slope do you have? If you have a decent amount of slope - 3/16 is _definitely_ what you want to do. I built my own releaser and bought a gast 1023 vane pump... but also have a gast 72r piston pump - the piston pump is actually a better pump for under 200 taps - (higher vacuum and enough CFMs, with lower power consumption)

I have 107 taps and I've gathered over 3400 gallons of sap this season - with at least a couple more days to go this season I might get up to 33 or 34 gallons of sap per tap. Last season was a shorter season and I had over 22 gallons per tap. Talking about the power of vacuum... you mention that the most you made with buckets before was 84 gallons. This season if all the sap I collected got turned into syrup (I sell / trade the sap so I track sugar content and volume) - it'd be 82 gallons of syrup. A lot of this has to do with the treezillas I am tapping - my season average sugar content this year is still above 2.1% and that helps a lot. For vacuum, I have a steep drop so with my mainline under anywhere above 23" of vacuum combined with 3/16, I've got over 28-29" of vacuum at the tap.

I don't boil myself. I haul my sap to a local producer and trade for syrup there - and if he is shut down before me I will I bring it to Peter Purinton in Huntington. If you didn't want to jump in to boiling right away you could just sell sap your first year and use that to help fund evaporator stuff for the next season. (Peter Purinton will definitely buy your sap, and if you are in huntington I imagine he's pretty close to you)

I would definitely recommend a stainless tank. I bought one off craigslist that stores 250 gallons - the way I have my releaser set up in it I can store about 185 gallons in it but if it is going to get close to that I'll usually drain out 50-60 gallons into a food grade barrel I have set up next to it. Start watching craigslist for stainless tanks and be ready to jump on one. Fortunately for you, a 200-300 gallon tank is too small for most people so they don't get snatched up as quickly as the 450-500 gallon tanks. A 200 gallon tank and a food grade barrel or two from the "Bobs Barrels" guy down in Bristol would be a good storage plan.

If you want to see my tubing setup let me know and I can walk you through how I did it. It's pretty straightforward - 3/4" mainline and laterals with 5-12 trees on 3/16 feeding down into it. Even though I only have 107 taps and that's supposed to be good for 200+ taps, I actually wish I went with a 1" mainline because on days with a big run my mainline will almost be entirely full at the bottom. (It's not _that big_ of a deal though because even if I don't have my pump on at all I still get 27"-28" of vacuum at the top of my lines) I might put another 3/4" line above my existing one in a sort of wet/dry-line setup but obviously a wet/dry-line setup is ridiculously overkill for 100 taps.

If you don't have the slope for it you can still get 27-28" of vacuum on your mainline with a Gast 72R piston pump, and then even a couple of feet of drop on 3/16 and you'd be at maximum vacuum level. They are great little pumps - I have learned a few things about them too so if you wanted tips on how to rebuild one if it accidently sucks in sap I could walk you through it. I'd recommend watching ebay for them - they are used in dentists offices and other settings so every one in a while a few of them go up for sale. I paid less than $300 for the one I have (It's not currently operating - I've got to replace some parts on it... remember when I mentioned that I learned a few things about them? one thing I learned is that the torque specs in the manuals are inch lbs not ft lbs... and I stripped a few of the screws when I rebuilt it once... don't make that mistake and they are pretty foolproof little pumps)

[mwarren]

I don't have too much drop in the area where the 100 taps will be. There are some areas around me that have decent trees and some really nice drop (but it's not my land...) Hopefully I can get some permission to tap some of those and add another 100 or so.

Like I said before, since this won't make me huge money, I'm not sure I want to get in too deep. More sap means RO which means filter press which means more sap needed which means better vacuum pump which means bigger arch which means more space in the sugarhouse.....And so on....

I'd like to come and see what you have. I'll IM you to see where you're at.

Mike