Draw Off Temp?

[Dan W]

The last few years I have been boiling outside next to the garage and had easy access to the kitchen stove to boil water and get a base line for temps. This year I have a new evaporator in a new shack several hundred feet from the house. I am going to be building an automatic draw-off and wondered how you guys get a temperature base line. Short of using a coleman stove and my 0-50 thermometer, how can I accomplish this? I will still verify it with a hydrometer. Dave Y showed me a converting barometer he has but I haven't seen one in any catalogs. I suppose condensate water from the steam hood preheater would work with the thermometer just fine. Just have to commandeer a pot from the warden or get my own at Wally World. Just looking for a way to simplify things to the max. How do you guys do it? Dan.

[dschultz]

I never boil water.I just use my syrup hydrometer to set my automatic draw of temp

[3rdgen.maple]

I would be guessing that the thermometer you use to check the temp of boiling water compared to the thermometer on the auto drawoff would have some degree of difference. What I do is drawoff the first batch using the hydrometer then calibrate the thermometer on the syrup pan to that. Works good for me but I also wonder if you could not just take a reading on the sap intake side of your flue pan and use that for your boiling temp.

[Thompson's Tree Farm]

3rdgen,
That is the way we did it for years. Put the stem in the intake side at a rolling boil and adjusted the thermometer to "0". If there was an error, we were boiling it slightly heavy because our "0" point would have been ever so slightly higher than water boiling point.

[DanE.]

Here is the boiling point calculator that I used lasted year. 2 miles from me is a weather reporting station that updates the pressure (read at sea level) every hour.

http://www.csgnetwork.com/h2oboilcalc.html

Here is a chart you can print out and use if you know the pressure.

http://www.hi-tm.com/Documents/Calib-boil.html

Dane.

[Jeff E]

I to simply set my temp at 219. Once the first draw starts, I check with the hydrometer, and adjust. I check it usually at least once an hour during the boil, and keep it fine tuned that way.

[Dan W]

Thanks for all the info. My Amish built shed is supposed to be here in September. I will have a lot of time to get the evaporator set and do a test boil in the fall. I think I will have to do a combination of temp and hydrometer till I get a feel for this thing. I know it's not rocket science but I would like to get syrup or heavier to start off with. Seems like the evaporator will do a lot more work a lot easier than a turkey fryer and I can always dilute aas needed. Sure is going to be a transition from basically batching with the Half Pint. CAN'T WAIT!!!

[brookledge]

If you go onto Marclands auto draw off web site there used to be a chart that had the boiling points based on the barometer. In general I will look at my barometer in the sugarhouse and set the draw off from the chart. I still use the hydrometer to verify it though.
Keith