RO questions for small scale producer

[claystroup]

If I expand my "Hobby" to about 200 taps and was to purchase a smaller RO that could process 100gph, my questions are:

1) On a big run day of say 300 gallons of sap, the RO would probably run 4 hours (concentrate to 8%) or so. With that much usage, how long would it take approx. to do the normal cleanup (wash cycle, etc) that a RO requires?
2) For the season with say 2500 gallons total sap ran through the RO, what all cleanup would be required to properly shut it down and store until next season and how many hours is a safe estimate to do that type of final cleanup?

Just want to compare the hours saved boiling (with an evaporator that can boil 20gph) vs the extra hours needed to properly service the RO to see the true overall time savings.

Thanks,

Clay
Stroup' Sugar Bush

[maple flats]

Regardless of how long you run the RO, the cleanup is the same. You start by running permeate for 5-6 minutes and send what flushes out to your head tank (you simply flushed out sugar). Then you put hot water in a wash tank, about 5-7 gal at 115-120 degrees will be good for a 100 gph RO. Then run that thru the membrane and back into the wash tank, continuous circulation for 10-11 minutes. If the temp drops below 105, add more hot water to get back to 115. After that, you dump the hot rinse water and flush the membrane for 5-6 minutes, discharging the concentrate to drain and the permeate can go to your permeate tank. On each of these operations, you adjust so the flow for concentrate essentially matches the permeate flow. That is good for a daily cleaning.
At the end of the season (or sooner, if performance drops off and a quick permeate rinse doesn't fix it) you need to do a soap wash, acid wash and finally rinse well, add preservative if it's the end of the season and put it away, freeze protected until next year. If you are interested, send me in a PM your email and I'll send you a copy of the owners manual for a Deer Run (Ray Gingerich) RO. It is just a basic RO and should work for any basic RO.

[bowhunter]

You just factor in the end of the day flush as part of a day of boiling. I flush mine with about 50 gallons of permeate at a high flow rate. This can be done while you're in the house having dinner, etc. Warm permeate does speed up the rinsing process, but I don't have any way to heat the water and don't see the need to do so right now. The end of season clean up is as Dave Klish has described it. All in all pretty simple. I've reduced my wood consumption by 75% with the RO and that saves a lot of time and effort that you should include in the comparison.

[MISugarDaddy]

Also understand, using your example of 300 gallons, during the 4 hours you estimate the RO would be running, you can also be boiling on your evaporator, so that 4 hours is NOT time lost. You may have a short time period while you get enough sap in your feed tank from the RO so you can start your evaporator, but that would be no more than an hour, during which I am sure you have other work to do. Then as Dave said, during your daily cleaning which takes less than half an hour, you would be boiling also. An RO is a time saver from start to finish.
Gary