how much SAP do you need ?

[halladaymaple]

Hi all:

Traditionally I always boil everyday I have sap, to me, in my experience that makes the lightest grade possible. My "new to me" RO can process 200 Gallons of sap her hour so say 100 gallons of concentrate. I bought the RO to deal with the heavy days traditionally found mid to late in the season.

Question: what if I have light days of sap run and I don't get enough sap to concentrate.

Is it ok to boil the "light days of sap run" sap in an evaporator that had 5% sap coming in?
what will it do to the boiling process?
will it mess up the pans? or will it just take longer.

All would be good if I had 600 gallons of sap everyday, but that isn't going to happen.

Of course I could save these light days of SAP for 3 days, but that goes against my belief of boiling sap ASAP. My customer base is largely extra light or light (Golden) and I fear keeping the SAP that long will degrade the color class.

I'm sure there are RO guys and gals out there that ran into this. I would really like to hear your thoughts.

Thanks all

[maple flats]

We are about the same size , #taps, rig and RO size. I always use the RO if I have 300 gal or more of sap. If not 300, it depends on the temperature, if in mid 30's ( 37 or less) or colder I just hold it, if mid 40's or above I boil it. The grey area in between sometimes goes 1 way, sometimes the other.
I do not like boiling sap, using an RO for 5 seasons has gotten me accustomed to boiling concentrate. I have only boiled straight sap for my first boil of the season if I barely have enough to sweeten the pans, all other times I RO it, even if only 45 minutes run time, then clean-up.

[Sugarmaker]

I dont have a RO yet:)
My tap count is similar. We can boil about 120-130 GPH on the old King arch. So I have not gotten a RO, due to some of the same reasoning about small runs. I have at one time brought back less than 100 gallons of sap, and put it into the rig and boiled it in. With a RO I would need to keep it from freezing and wait for more sap.
Last night is was about 800 gallons of 2.5% sap in 7 hours. Made for a long day. RO would have cut this to a couple hour boil. The steam away probably helped some. Still lots of wood was consumed.
I like to get the sap that I gathered that day into the rig and heated up. Just seems like the right thing to do.
Regards,
Chris

[wiam]

Pretty much ro every run and boil. I do have extra permeate stored inside in case I don make enough to wash/rinse that day.

[VT_K9]

I am looking to add taps to get my count up near 500-700. I am at 330 taps now. I run vacuum and looking at your tags I don't see vacuum mentioned. This is to sap gathering what an RO is to sap processing. Even adding at sap puller will make a big difference.

If the temps are down I normally hold the sap one day. I can handle about 700 gallons of sap right now with out too much difficulty. But it is nice to boil the same day.

Mike

[Russell Lampron]

I don't boil anything without running it through the RO first. Once you boil concentrate you'll understand why. On small runs I leave it in the woods until there is enough to gather and boil. With 700 taps on high vacuum I usually have the opposite problem and can't get it through my small RO fast enough.

As for how much sap you would need, you want as much concentrate as you would use as a minimum to start your evaporator with raw sap. You also need twice as much permeate as what your RO is rated for to wash and rinse it when you're done. Taking 3/4 of the water out of your raw sap makes about 8% concentrate which is a good place to start for a new to RO user. If you want 100 gallons of concentrate to start your evaporator you would need 400 gallons of raw sap. That will put you close to what you need for permeate too.

[halladaymaple]

Thanks Russell, that was some of the missing info I needed.

And to mike... I do have a surge Alamo 80. Can suck a golf ball through a garden hose...😁 All vac all the time

[VT_K9]

Glad to hear that you are on vac. We have had several projects going on at once and it is my Father and I working the sugar bush. We are thinning the bush every year to enhance the sunlight and growth of Maples. We take the other wood for fire wood and I am using some hemlock for a garage build. We hare holding back on running new mainlines for additional taps until the trees are harvested se we don't have to avoid the lines. Hopefully, someday, we will have about the same number of taps you do and a similar sized evaporator. Our CDL Hobby 250 works great with our 2x6 and can run the second pass and stay just ahead of the evaporator. I don't believe it will keep up with a 3x8. I expect we will go to a larger feed tank (100 gallons now and works well for our current size) when we step up and then we will have to get a little more ahead on the RO process before firing up the evaporator.

On a side note how do you like the oil fired evaporator. Did you have wood before and do you miss anything about the wood. My Father is thinking oil may be the way to go. I am thinking the only advantage would be less wood handling. We have plenty of land to harvest wood if we had to, but we are getting slab wood at a good price (sometimes free after we have a load of hemlock sawn). We would have to extend our sugar house to handle anything longer than a 2x6 though. What are the dimensions where you run the evaporator and how do you deal with the cold temps and oil?

Mike

[heus]

Pretty much ro every run and boil. I do have extra permeate stored inside in case I don make enough to wash/rinse that day.That is the key right there. If you can store permeate without it freezing you can run your ro no matter how small of a run you get.

[halladaymaple]

Hi Mike

Never regretted changing to oil. Instant heat constant boil fast shutdown. I have an outdoor furnace so my supply of wood wasn't an issue. Changing to oil was more about having a consultant heat and regular draw offs. The dimention of my sugar house is 24x32 so space isn't an issue. I have about 3' all around the evaporator just for some safety. Oil isn't a problem with the cold temps.