UV lights

[nymapleguy607]

Just wondering if there was anyone out there that has used a house UV light for sap. I see that e-bay has alot of these and the price isn't too outrageous, so I thought I might pick one up but I figured that I would ask before I spent some money Thanks Jeff

[Haynes Forest Products]

What is a house UV light? I got a pond UV light that has nice fittings for 40.00 on ebay. There is a thread for that topic that has alot on it

[sapman]

The UV light units sold in most maple catalogs are really just the same as used in household systems. Wedeco, for example. I've installed some in homes. Decent units, I think. I believe there's only one UV meant for sap, the Sap Steady or something like that. I've heard the cost is $2000~! In theory it should do a much better job.

I used to use a UV, but it really wasn't in the right point in the plumbing. It didn't do any good for me. I think your best bet is to just boil quickly after collecting, and keep things as simple as possible.

Tim

[DS Maple]

As far as I can tell there really isn't any reason you couldn't use a standard household UV reactor for maple sap. I did a bunch of research last year regarding the process and my pilot setup included a Trojan UV 40 gpm household reactor designed for drinking water. One thing to consider though is that drinking water transmits around 90% of the UV light (254nm) passed through it while sap transmits a range from 10% to around 50% depending on the quality. In my UV system I pumped through the reactor when offloading the truck tank, then set up a cycle between two tanks. The sump pump in one tank pumped through the reactor then into a tank above it, which would then spill back down into the lower tank. In all I was able to store and continuously treat about 1100 gallons inside the sugarhouse. We also held sap for up to a week and made the same grade syrup as others in the area who boiled daily. Going back to the reactor though, if you wanted to treat in one pass with a machine rated to 40 gpm, I wouldn't pump any faster than 10gpm. The UV dose required for sap is quite large, and you won't do much pumping at the rate given for water.
As far as the Sap Steady system is concernced, yes you can pump at the given rate because it is designed for sap. If I am correct there are 6 lamps in that unit, thus giving a larger dose in a shorter amount of time due to a larger exposure to the rays. More lamps=more money though, so maybe pumping a little slower is worth it.
Hope this helps.

[Dennis H.]

Going along with what DS Maple is saying, For what I been told is that most household UV's have 3/4" pipe thru it and with sap the UV can't penetrate all the way thru to the center of the pipe full of sap.

Where I heard this they said if you could find a household with a 1/2" pipe then it should do the job just fine.

Its been I while since I was told this and something tells me that they told me that with Sap the UV will only penetrate about 5/16" into the sap.

I think I heard this all last year up at the NY Maple Conf.

[DS Maple]

There isn't a set depth that the light will penetrate. It depends on the intensity of the lamp along with exposure time.

[nymapleguy607]

If the light where to have 3/4 fitting why not neck it down to say 1/2" that would be simple enough or am I of base on this?

[sapman]

The inlet/outlet size is of no consequence, in my opinion. What matters is the distance between the stainless vessel and the quartz sleeve down the center. We currently install Sterilight UVs, with a chamber approximately (guessing here) 2" and the sleeve maybe 3/4". Most brands I've installed lately seem about like this, but some older ones had much larger chambers with relatively small sleeves. I would agree to definitely run the sap through as slowly as is reasonable to achieve maximum kill rates. I used to run at only about 1gpm, and with water this was rated to kill almost 100% of bacteria.

Tim

[Dennis H.]

Thats was my thinking DS Maple before I was told that. I still am not sold on what the guy told us.

I mean I can see how water or Sap, with all the minerals and stuff in it can act as a filter and depending on the depth would filter out the UV after a certain depth.

Now if you are talking pur H2O then I would say that there shouldn't be much to hinder the UVs from going all the way thru.

I am now starting to remember that the whole discusion started on the subject of using UV lamps to help keep sap last longer on open top tanks, which then led into using inline UVs to kill bacteria.

My mind is always working and I thought that someday that I might use an inline UV plumbed into a tank with a circulator pump so I could turn the pump on and let the sap circulate thru the inline UV. Help keep the sap last longer before Boiling is the thought.

[DS Maple]

The circulator pump setup is exactly what I have as I said before. As far as I can tell it works pretty good. I also have a UV lamp hanging in one of the storage tanks and while it is not much good at treating the sap in the tank (because it's like four feet deep and the light isn't very powerful) it does a great job keeping the scum from building up on the insides. At the end of the season, that tank is always cleaner. This not only means less work at the end of the season, but there are less microorganisms to eat the sugar from the sap when it is pumped into storage.

[colt454]

I have a little different setup, sap pumped in goes through the light to a
2000gal tank till full then out to the light again into the RO out to another light and into a 600gal tank then to the pans

[maple flats]

I use a household unit labeled for water at 8 gpm. The ss vessel is about 3" and the quartz sleve inside is about 1"od, giving about a 1" penetration needed. I think the SS is reflective enough on the inside so the UV is reflected back and forth. I run my sap thru at 5 gpm and have it plumbed so I can run continuous recirculation. I do that if I have to hold sap for more than 24-48 hrs depending on sap temperature. Since I set this up I have made a higher persentage of lighter grades of syrup, and I schedule my boiling more rather than doing real late sessions trying to finish each day's sap before quiting for the day.

[sapman]

Sounds like you guys are using the UV lights to the best advantage with good setups. I had mine set up wrong, but then I always tried to boil everything right away anyway.

Dave, my wife would sure appreciate it if I had a UV setup like you, and just quit boiling at a set time, instead of going til done!!

Tim

[Dennis H.]

I don't need a UV setup yet but that is no reason not to have a plan when the time comes.

I heard somewhere that to get the best quality syrup "Boil today what ran today" or something tlike that.

So if was up to me I would do everything possible to boil everything the day I collected and only then would I look at using a UV to help keep te sap hold over to the next time I could boil.