linearb
03-30-2023, 02:39 PM
My wife and I bought a house in 2017 that'd had a sugarhouse built in 2013. All I knew about real syrup was that it's delicious and the only real pancake/oatmeal topping for me, but I figured it out pretty quick the first year because I'm obsessive and I think that unused tools tend to fall into disrepair. I kept the DIY 3x4' arch that was down here, binned the leaded pan in favor of TIG-welded flat pans ($350/each, OKHardware) and rocked that setup 2018-2022, starting at 50 taps on gravity and slowly building towards 140. Mostly midsize trees, a few giant suckers, some that are barely tappable. I made varied amounts of syrup, I think 14.3 gal in the best year off around 650-700 gals of sap.
This was my setup last year
https://i.imgur.com/VJzTO2i.jpg
This year I put in all new mainline (had been using old, used ones), all new taplines, a sap guzzler diaphram pump and upgraded to this D&G Sportster that someone on here steered to to last summer
https://i.imgur.com/57OPGks.png
I got sick last week and could not boil every day and despite turning vacuum off as well, I still managed to overflow my 240gal stainless tank. Fortunately there's still stacks of snow on the ground, but I've already boiled 800gals, finished off 12-13gals of syrup with a bunch floating in the pans, and I think that I am unfortunately going to hit a combination of burnout and firewood shortage before I run out of sap; the end of next week we have a snap into the 60s for 4 days that may well end the season anyway, but I got my butt kicked by illnesses and got behind at work and just can't blast through 100gals a day for another week ;)
Also, while the stuff does tend to sell itself pretty easily, there's a limit to my interest because boxing and shipping stuff takes time (good luck moving this around here; I do my best biz south of the mason dixon and west of the mississippi, using myriad discord and other social media markets).
We use about 5gal a year as a family, so, we're more than set.
The new rig blasts through a lot more sap, is much more efficient on wood, and the resulting syrup is more clear.
Thanks for coming to my TED talk!!
This was my setup last year
https://i.imgur.com/VJzTO2i.jpg
This year I put in all new mainline (had been using old, used ones), all new taplines, a sap guzzler diaphram pump and upgraded to this D&G Sportster that someone on here steered to to last summer
https://i.imgur.com/57OPGks.png
I got sick last week and could not boil every day and despite turning vacuum off as well, I still managed to overflow my 240gal stainless tank. Fortunately there's still stacks of snow on the ground, but I've already boiled 800gals, finished off 12-13gals of syrup with a bunch floating in the pans, and I think that I am unfortunately going to hit a combination of burnout and firewood shortage before I run out of sap; the end of next week we have a snap into the 60s for 4 days that may well end the season anyway, but I got my butt kicked by illnesses and got behind at work and just can't blast through 100gals a day for another week ;)
Also, while the stuff does tend to sell itself pretty easily, there's a limit to my interest because boxing and shipping stuff takes time (good luck moving this around here; I do my best biz south of the mason dixon and west of the mississippi, using myriad discord and other social media markets).
We use about 5gal a year as a family, so, we're more than set.
The new rig blasts through a lot more sap, is much more efficient on wood, and the resulting syrup is more clear.
Thanks for coming to my TED talk!!