Sap ladder or more slope?

[Clinkis]

I'm getting ready to run a bunch of mainline. I have one line in particular that I'm really struggling to get enough slope to the releaser. It's about 450' and has about 28 taps on it. At best it will have a little over 1% slope. Would I be better off to increase slope and install a sap ladder to get it up to the releaser? How much vacuum loss is there through a sap ladder?

[halladaymaple]

I'm getting ready to run a bunch of mainline. I have one line in particular that I'm really struggling to get enough slope to the releaser. It's about 450' and has about 28 taps on it. At best it will have a little over 1% slope. Would I be better off to increase slope and install a sap ladder to get it up to the releaser? How much vacuum loss is there through a sap ladder?

Sap ladders work great if properly installed. I have 3 and 1 of them is a double 6 start and 130 taps beyond them. My run is ahout 600'. They are a great solution to limited slope. For 28 taps a single 6 star is plenty. Vacuum loss is minimal if any at all. Check out my face book page I have a small video on it. ( halladaymaple). Good luck.

[JoeJ]

In my new woods, I had one sliver of land with 120 taps in it, (towards the end of the mainline) that started to slope away from my 1 1/2" mainline. So I carefully installed the 720' of 1" pipe with a laser at a 1% slope. The 720' of pipe is supported by a few trees and posts set 8' apart. This set up works fine and that line maintains 27.5" of vacuum like the rest. I don't like to use sap ladders if at all possible. The 1% carefully installed sloping pipe does not freeze up.

Joe

[maple flats]

While I have sap ladders and do well with them, I would not put one in if I could get a 1% slope. However consider using 3/16 on that line and tie it to the vacuum where you can. You may even do best if you then follow the mainline slope with the 3x16 until it has had near 30' drop from the last tap, then connect it to the vacuum mainline.

[BreezyHill]

I have numerous sap ladders. As others have said if installed correctly they work fantastic. Do it wrong and you will have a bitter producer. 1% slope on a tight main that is properly installed with no sap pools will work very well. One sap pool and you will have poor vac past that point.
for 28 taps I would do the sloped main line.
Good Luck and buy a laser level off ebay and mark the trees on a cloudy day or dusk. I did this and it worked great. Bot the Johnson level for $11.99.

[DrTimPerkins]

Good Luck and buy a laser level off ebay and mark the trees on a cloudy day or dusk. I did this and it worked great. Bot the Johnson level for $11.99.

As others have said, if you have 1%, go with that and do it right (use a level and install it perfectly). If you absolutely must, then use a ladder, but if you do....do it right. If you get a cheap level, or even if you get an expensive level, then double-check to be sure it is reading correctly. 1% is a very small error, but in your case, a 1% error would cause big headaches.

[Clinkis]

Thanks for all the advice. I have another run of 600' of 3/4 Maine I installed last year that had around 1.5% slope. It was a constant battle keeping pooling to a minimum as sags became an issue as the weather warmed as the season progressed.