Container with pop syrup ok?

[heus]

There is a guy on ebay that has 275 gallon water containers that originally contained some kind of syrup to make soft drinks. These are the square containers surrouned in steel wires with drain at the bottom. Would these be ok for a sap collection or storage tank?

[Bucket Head]

Yes, and no. Seeing that the tank had a food product in it, nothing toxic, it would be good for sap. However, I'm sure there is a strong odor of whatever soda was in it. That odor is hard to get rid of, and it might "flavor" the sap too.

Years ago I got some fifteen gal. plastic containers that had soda syrup in them. Just to see, I filled one up with water and let it sit for a while. When I smelled and tasted the water, you could definately taste the soda. I did not use a one of them.

I know a lot of guys on here use old soda containers of various sizes and materials and claim no problems. You'll just have to rely on your gut, and your nose, to determine if you should use the tank.

Steve

[Maple Restoration]

Heus we pick up two of them this year for sap and we gave them a good wash first with hot water and the power washer then filled them up with the same cleaning solution they clean beer and wine bottles with you can get the cleaner at any home brew center it get rid of just about any smell and kills bacteria we let them sit foe a day drained them and gave them a final rince and good to go. we have had sap sit in the tanks for up to 3 day's no smell or taste. so i guess you could say we had good luck thus far!

[PerryW]

I can tell you from experience that cherry syrup is hard to clean from plastic drums.

[mapleman3]

I had barrels that held apple juice concentrate, they smelled like it for a while but did not effect the sap....

[Clan Delaney]

I've used the home brew bottle cleaner, and it's great. I use a product called Super-chlor (calcium hypochlorite I think). It's a ****ed powerful oxidizer and will clean even dried on gunk from beer bottles. I would trust it to get most of any residual food flavorings out of a storage container.

[sticky mess]

i have used plastic juice drums, I cleaned them with allot of water and a hint of bleach. No problems yet.

[MaplePancakeMan]

Your talking about the cage tanks? i have 4 they are awesome for sap storage, just get em clean and clean em often and you'll be fine