oil useage

[twobears1224]

we have alway burned wood to boil.i,am wondering how much fuel oil you guys burn per season?? could you guys with oil fired archs list what size arch you have,how much oil you use,how much syrup you make and weather you have ro or not?? thanks.

delbert

[maplecrest]

my leader 6x14 at the start had a small bros. preheater and was 3 gals oil to one syrup. then i bought a steamaway and it stayed about the same.[raw sap] when the r/o came into the game i avg. .4 gal oil to gal syrup.

[brookledge]

The best way to estimate oil is about 3 gallons of oil to make 1 gallon of syrup. Then as you increase your efficiency by using steam aways or ROs the amount of oil drops.
Obviously the larger the evaporator the more oil per hour. The ratio stays pretty much the same no matter what size evaporator you have.
keith

[syrupkid]

this is just my opinion but why would anyone cook with oil wood is cheaper and if you own a sugar bush you are constantly managing your bush so you will have wood just my 2 cents worth

Joel:confused:

[briduhunt]

I am considering switching to oil, as oil is a lot easier and takes less time. I have a limited amount of time to cut, split and stack wood and the price of wood is going higher each year. Even if I owned a sugar bush there is a lot of time involved in getting wood. I have three kids, one starting college and the other 2 in high school and I attend all of their events both sports and others. I consider my time as a cost equal to money. If I were doing my other jobs and making money instead of working on getting my wood for the evaporator I could be making more money for the family. Although my maple business is just small right now I still want to produce more with less time comittment involved. So oil might just be my best option.

[maplecrest]

joel, you are young and get more energy to burn than the wood you cut now. in 20 years you will look at it with a different body and thought process on how you will make syrup.i was 35 when i switched to oil. i could not cut enough wood too keep up with the tap increase. but now at 51, with force 5 evaps, and new r/o,s i have a different view on wood but i bought a new oil fired evaporator. the truck pulls up and fills a 1000 gallon tank. job for fuel done.the wood i cut in the bush is left to rot for the good of the trees.

[maplwrks]

During the season, I want to be in the woods, checking for leaks. Burning oil enables me to do that. When I'm done in the woods, I walk into the sugarhouse, turn a couple valves and start boiling. I make syrup 20 minutes after the rig starts. With the RO, I got my oil consumtion down to 1/3rd gallon oil to 1 gallon syrup.

[Haynes Forest Products]

Besides when you wake up from that nap and find the pans on fire its quicker to hit the switch shutting down the rig than to put out a wood fire with buckets of sap.:mad:

[syrupkid]

i still cant be convinced oil is the way to go i dont want to give any more money to the arabs than i have to and with the price of oil being bound to rise with our modern technology some wood evaps(force 5) are more efficient than oil fired ones

Joel

[sapman]

I switched to oil after I had a Steamaway, and my usage was 2.2 oil/syrup. With the RO, I'm now at about .7 or less oil/syrup. As far as efficiency goes, I was just reading Tim Wilmot's article yesterday, and oil is about 70%, and basic wood-firing about 30%. When I started burning wood in the house, I knew it was time to switch to oil in the evaporator.

Tim

[Homestead Maple]

I started out with a 3x8 King evaporator and firing the evaporator at 5.5 gals. of oil an hour the evaporator would put 85-88 of sap through it an hour.( I use a water meter in the sap intake line to measure flow.) I added a Steamaway and I could put 143-145 gals.of sap through the evaporator an hour. I was making between 3-3.5 gals of syrup an hour at this stage. I added an RO into the operation and still firing the evaporator at 5.5 gals. an hour, still using the Steamaway, I make between 12-15 gals. an hour concentrating the sap to 8%, and depending on other conditions. So that would roughly figure to .45 - .36 gals of oil to a gallon of syrup. At $1.98 for oil right now, that would be .89 - .71 cents to make a gallon of syrup, for the oil. I always try to buy my oil in July or August because that is usually when oil is at it's lowest cost. Usually, I say. Remember last year. But even last year when oil was at $4.40 roughly. that would mean that I could have had $1.98 - $1.58 in oil cost into a gallon of syrup. Not to bad either I figure. But I didn't pay that much for last seasons oil. Once everything is up to temp and you start drawing syrup, it is a constant stream of syrup coming off the evaporator. Some people so I understand, that can fire with wood well, can accomplish a constant flow of syrup off their evaporator too. I would only go to wood if it was costing me $5.00 for the oil to make a gallon of syrup. I think that would be a long way away from what I can do now.