Bulk Packing

[danno]

For the first time I have borrowed some of the 35 gallon barrels from my dealer. The idea being when I sell the syrup back to him I just leave him with the barrels.

The smell inside the can is similar to glue? Fermented syrup? I will probably just be using the cans for commercial grade. Do you guys wash them out before you repack them? If so, do you wash them with anything besides hot water?

Any fancy idea on how to get these full barrels in the bed of a pick up truck? I've seen some guys that have their sugarhouse floor about the same level as the bed of their truck - so they can roll them in. That won't work for me.

[Big maple]

I don't know about the smell, you might want to ask the guy about that, better safe than sorry. As for thirty five gallon barrels two guys can easily set them in the bed of a truck. I would take off the tailgate just as a precaution though.

[maple flats]

35x11=385+ bbl wt. I would rather use a barrel hand truck, less chance to pinch/crush fingers. However if you are on a level or near level playing field, tilt and roll on one edge, but do not drop, barrel could burst or badley dent.

[Whitfield]

I use 34 Imp Gallon SS drums - think that works out to 40.8 US gallons. I find the easiest way to load them into a pick-up is to just use the wooden ramps I use for loading the four wheeler. The planks have a metal (aluminum)clip on the end so they fit up pretty well flush on the tailgate. I then just dump the drum on it's side and roll it up. Don't try it with metal ramps they are two slippery and the drum slides back on you. Easier with two people. If the drum starts to slip make sure you get out of the way and let'er go. Also if you stand the drums up again in the back of a pick-up throw a piece of cardboard down first. Drums sitting on cardboard are much less prone to slide around.

[sapman]

Danno, I got some of those barrels also. I actually am probably the last to grab any, so they were well picked over. I'll be spraying them out with hot water prior to filling. Some have the epoxy lining coming off all over inside. I asked about putting med. amber syrup in some of them, and we decided that the buyer provided the barrels, so I guess it won't matter. And, they'll reprocess it all. But I still cringe at the thought. I don't want to send my barrels away and never see them again, though.

Tim

[danno]

Hi Tim -

I spoke to Sandy and she said hot water and lots of it is what they do. They use the hot condensate right off the evaporator. That being said, I only used the barrels for commercial. No way would I put good syrup in a barrel that smelled like that.

[sapman]

Hi Danno,
I always wash my barrels with condensate, too. I let them fill right up, then dump. But now of course there's no more of that, so I just hosed them with hot water, also. Got most all the crap epoxy out. Guess maybe I got lucky, the barrels look awful, but smelled OK.

Tim

[tiggy-at-mac.com]

We planted a big steel girder in the ground this spring with a gantry (big old arm on a hinge) on top. I just put a chain falls up there, like you see in your local garage - the thing they use to hoist motors up in the air. That way I can roll a barrel out (I'm using 55 gals, which requires both hands) and then hoist it up, and use the gantry to swing it up into a pickup bed.

I'm unreasonably proud of this arrangement. I'm almost tempted to move my syrup back across the street just because I can. -tig

[Haynes Forest Products]

I had old timers tell me to leave the drums with a little syrup in them so they would clean out easy. Bull after getting them back all stinky and with mold in them I find that if there rinsed out clean then they stay that way. I wash out with hot soapy water and there fine the stink goes away.

[OneLegJohn]

I put an addition on our sugarhouse this year. It has a second floor for sap tanks. It required an I-beam for the span. When I went to the salvage yard to buy a beam they had a crane beam. It had the trolley with it and didn't cost but a few bucks more. I didn't think about it at the time-but it is great for lifting 40 gal drums into bed of truck