K. Talbot Brick Arch

[Sugarmaker]

These are some pictures of my neighbors arch and sugar house.
His name is Keith Talbot and he is pretty serious about making some syrup in 2010.
I was helping him get the pans set tonight.
The arch was designed and bricked by Keith.
He just got the pans back from the fab shop today. The rear pan is 30 inches wide x 4 feet long the front pan is 30 inches wide by 3 feet long. Rear pan is flat bottom at the present time.
He still has some work to do but it is coming along nicely.
I helped him build the stack one day last winter. The stack is complete through the roof with triple wall.
Some fittings, hoods, preheater, float box, plumbing, and other odds and ends and he will be ready.
By the way, Keith is pushing 80 and plans to tap maybe 150-200 taps this season. I think he has about 8 cord of wood cut and ready.
Next post will have remaining pictures.
Yea and he mixed all the cement for the floor around the arch, by hand too.

Regards,
Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Several other shots of this nice set up,
The pans are heavy wall stainless. One was given to him and he had the other made by local shop. I think they are about 1/8 wall thickness. Not sure how they will boil but time will tell. Pans do have dividers so he should be able to get a continuous flow of syrup. I estimate he should be able to do 30 GPH??

I liked the fire brick work that he did inside the arch!

Jim Botrles (Father and son) supplied the arch door and that got Keith going.

He is going to put pan gasket (rope) under the pans to get a good seal.

Oh yea he has a small blower at the back of the fire box too. I helped him fab blower the grates with the use of local fab shop 'iron worker' punch press machine.

Now if I could get him on the trader? Naaa! that might ruin him!

Keith built a loft behind the arch and has a very nice 100 gallon bulk tank elevated for a feed tank. I think this came from Scott Durfee another trader.

Regards,
Chris

[3rdgen.maple]

Wow that is one great looking arch. rings back alot of memories aout my grandfathers old arch. Looks very similar. Tell him great job and gets some pics of that rig boiling.

[red maples]

WOW again impressive looks very very good!! I hope I have that much energy when I am 80!!!!

[valleyman]

Wow is right! It's a work of art. Very impressive. Please pass along my compliments.

Sure hope we have a lot kids of today grow up like him. That's are only hope.
Good hard work.

[Daryl]

GREAT looking arch. Next time I come your way, I'd like to see it.

[Pete S]

A NEW dream! Beautiful! Green w/ envy. Saved the photos for "future use".

Has he "test fired" it yet?

Thank you so much for sharing!

Pete

[Sugarmaker]

Thanks folks I will pass along the positive comments when I see Keith. :)

I was a little worried that I was being a enabler on this project. I tried to give some advice and moral support but Keith got it this far by his own efforts.

Pete,
Keith has not test fired it yet. He loosened some bricks yesterday doing some sawzall work on the smoke stack base and he has to repair that first. My guess he will try it before Christmas.

Valleyman,
Yes we could all take a lesson fromm Keith. He is a good guy, hard worker and role model. Plus he loves to visit. Anyone in the area would be welcome at his sugarhouse I am sure.

Regards,
Chris

[marc]

Wonderful job! A real nice piece of work, something to be proud of. He did it all by hand and that must make it even more rewarding for him when it comes out that good. I'm a bit jealous, makes my oil tank arch seem tinney:)

[Gary R]

Chris,

That looks very nice! Tell Keith I said hello. You brought him over to my cousins last year to watch a boil. I didn't think he was that old. That is an inspiration. I'll be up sometime. Hope to check it out.

[Sugarmaker]

Gary,
Does your cousin want a welding project!:)
Chris

[Gary R]

If you asked him, I know he would say sure. He would probably want no money. That's a pretty big TIG project. See if you can pay him or barter something. He may like to hear some of your wisdom on syrup making.

[Sugarmaker]

Gary,
Thanks, I may stop and talk to him to get some ideas about joining options for the WRU.

Regards,
Chris

[killingworthmaple]

Can anyone tell me the why more people don't make brick arches. I have been toying with the idea of making one and don't know if there are any disadvanages to one. Thanks for any info you could share.

Nathan

[3rdgen.maple]

The big disadvantage is the time it takes to make one. Factory made arches really are not that expensive in comparison. I would think the brick arch requires a bit more maintenance to keep her in tip top shape. Shutdown time is longer as well since it takes longer for the arch to cool down. But those brick arches are a work of art and serve the purpose well.

[Sugarmaker]

Update:
Keith has the fittings to get his pans joined together. Firebrick is re-set. Gasket material under the pans and ready. Fire proof insulation between the pans.

I am helping Keith build hoods for his pans. The rear is 30 x 48 and will be 15 inches tall at the side walls, to hold a preheater eventually. He will run 8 inch steam pipe out the roof from the rear hood. We will have to cut in at least two doors for access.

The front hood will be 11 inches off the front pan and suspended by a channel on the front of the the rear hood and a front chain from the rafters.
Front hood is 30 x 36. It will have 8 inch steam pipe that will tee in above the damper in the rear steam pipe.

Keith bought 20 gauge stainless material from Gene Davis Co. in Erie for $30 per sheet 36 x 48. Very nice material!

Sides of the hoods are bent and the front and rear are cut out, ready for de-burring and bending.

Keith bought 1000 sst 1/8 dia. pop rivets to do some serious fastening.

These hoods should be a nice addition and keep his building from becoming a sauna.

Regards,
Chris C.

[Sugarmaker]

Pete S.
Keith has not boiled any water yet but had a paper fire just to see how it would draw.

Worked on Keith's hoods a little yesterday and a few hours this afternoon.
The small one was much easier to handle and came out OK. Only about 3/8 out of square, for a suspend hood this will not be a problem.
I started on the larger hood today and was going along good until I started checking for square. NOT good! I had to drill out a bunch of rivets and let it assume a natural state while jiging the corners to assure that it will set on the pan OK. Some how the guy doing the lay out work must have got one of the bends off a little:) and I had to do a little trimming to get everything to come together. Hope Keith doesn't notice:) Still have doors and stacks to cut in the rear hood and stack in the front hood. Plus the corner will need tuned up for welding. He will be using 8 inch steam stack.

Good day to work inside with the massive amounts of rain today.

Regards,
Chris

Yea, I know, I need to get some pictures too.

[Sugarmaker]

Still playing with Stainless:
Made the second eight inch thimble for on top of the front steam hood tonight. Takes me a lot of time mashing stuff into shape with minimal tools and tooling. :) Sugarhouse looks like a bomb went off in it.

Visited with the next door neighbor, he got a new skid steer for Christmas!

Chris C.

[Sugarmaker]

Inching along on the hood project. Got the 8 inch thimble extension located and installed in the rear hood. It turned out OK but could have been a little better. May need to apply some solder to tighten the joint a little. (Keith thats what you get for letting me work on these!) About 4 more hours and we should be about finished. And he can get them welded in the corners to hold condensate.

Yes the pictures! I know!

By the way don't put cheap duct tape on stainless it doesn't come off easy!

Chris C.

[Gary R]

Yes, post pictures. We guys get visually excited. How did you make the thimble? Do you have one of those three roller things that turn flat into round? Also, is there a test boil in the near future? If Keith doesn't mind I'd like to check it out.

[Sugarmaker]

Dang!
Now Gary tells me about the three roller thing! Man that would be way to easy!:)
No I just bent it every 1 inch or so into a crude round shape.

Tonight I did get the front hood supports installed to set the front hood inline with the rear and 11 inches off the front pan.

I would hope he would test fire around the first of the year. I am sure you would be welcome.

The pictures are coming soon! Been very busy!

Regards,
Chris
See you Sat. at the Force 5 boil demo!

[Sugarmaker]

Folks,
Pictures of Keith Talbot's hoods in progress. Use you imagination a little! These are setting on the floor next to my evaporator in the sugar house. Still some work to do like cut the hole and install the front hood thimble. Damper needs fabed for the rear hood. Front hood is suspended and will be 11 inches off the front pan. 8 inch dia. stack, has a tee in the rear pipe for the front stack to enter above the damper.
Sorry it took so long to get to these pictures.

Regards,
Chris

[KenWP]

Believe or not to make something look nice that I am makeing round I cut a circle the right size to use to round off any square bends. Makes it look pretty good. Hood looks okay to me. Nice and shiney.

[3rdgen.maple]

Darn Sugarmaker that friend of yours is gonna have one nice setup when you guys are done. Where do I sign up to get on your friends list?

[Gary R]

That looks very nice! Can't wait to see the whole thing together. Great job.

[sap runner]

That thing is nice enough to be in my living room,great job and good luck cooking!!!!!!!!!!

[Sugarmaker]

Folks,
Punched the hole in the top of the front hood for the 8 inch thimble and drove some pop rivets home to secure it. I used some grinding techniques rather than sawing and it was much easier to control the finished shape as I snuck up on the size of the opening. Did a mock trial of the steam stack tee system and things seem to align as we had planned.
Keith is going to do a trial fit of the hoods on the evaporator some night this week. Then the door/s can be cut in and fabricated for the rear hood to allow service of the future preheater. I hope to get some pictures while we fit the hoods to the pans.
Some brackets to be made on his rear pan to secure the hood in position. May need some angles along the pan edge to get a good seal and have a flat for the hoods to rest on.
Also need drains (half couplings) added to the drip channels on the exterior and a damper built and installed too. So maybe a little more work, but we are in the home strecth and they should be ready for him to use in 2010 season. Lots of details in something that looks relatively simple.

Regards,
Chris C.

[Dave Y]

Chris,
Nice jop on the hoods! I had the opportunaty to meet and talk with Keith on Saturday. Very nice gentleman. He will be please with the final product.

[Sugarmaker]

Dave,
Thanks on the hoods.
Keith was very impressed with your Force 5. We are getting him up to full maple speed as fast as possible! He enjoyed the boiling demo.

Regards,
Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Tinkered with the hoods a little between other things going on, like getting ready for the family to come for the holidays. :)
( I did can some nice honey this morning too. Some will be going to the PA state farm show for display only.)
On the hoods I built the damper assembly for the rear steam stack consisting of a bent stainless rod 3/8 dia. and a scrap piece of 20 guage stainless cut to fit fairly close. Then zip tied the two together. ( I need to get a picture) Keith will need to add a compression spring to hold it in position.

Also built the two drip trays that will be under the 8 inch stacks, inside each hood. These were made from some triangular scrap from the hoods. I have to get them fastened in place and add a vee from the drip pan to the inside of the hood channel to remove condensate.
My hoods don't even have these features!

After to the trip to Yeany's Keith is also thinking of putting a light in the front hood too! It did help to see what was going on while boiling!

Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Folks,
Some shots of the hoods on the evaporator for the first fitting. Several areas of details to get the hoods final fit to the rear pan.
Front hood will be suspended from the rafters at the front.
Access doors in rear hood will probably be in the vertical sides due to the height of the rear hood.
Also notice that Keith has some of the fittings in place for joining the pans. 1.5 inch stainless street "L's and union, plus brass ball valve.

Merry Christmas,
Chris

[Pete S]

That is a "work of art"! Thanks for sharing!

[twobears1224]

thats arch is going to end up way to pretty to even use!.. :D

delbert

[jrthe3]

chris how close is this to your place going to have to make it out to see this in person it is so awsome looking

[Sugarmaker]

Yes,
Keith is very proud of this rig and he should be! I believe it will be a nice set up fo him and should boil 25-30GPH?

Boyd,
Keith is about two miles form me so If you come by we can stop over there.
Anyword on the TIG for sale?

Regards,
Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Visited Kieth today.
He has installed the handles on the sides of the rear pan and they will align his rear hood also.
He has a jig made for the stainless preheater he is building and has it ready for the weld shop.
I took his float box home and cut it down to 9 inches high. It needs to have a half coupling welded on and then he can thread it on to his rear pan.

I believe he said he was getting his steam stack and roof jack this week too.

He is getting closer!

Regards,
Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Update:
Had a chance to get to Keith's tonight.
He has added bricks and sand to his rear portion of the arch to give about 4-5 inches of clearance.
Keith just brought home the hoods from the weld shop all the corners were tigged so that the hood channel should allow condensate collect and be move outside.
I saw his all stainless preheater and it is VERY nice! It has 11, 1 inch tubes 40 inches long and square tubing for the end manifolds. We have to design and build brackets to suspend the preheater and then make the drip channels which will run into the hood channel at the back of the evaporator.
Doors for the rear hood, some plumbing and he should be ready to go!.

Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Preheater update:
Keith and I worked on his preheater set up. We built a series of stainless vees (bent on the hand brake) one for under each of the 11 stainless tubes. Then welded a stainless angle across the bottom to keep them at the right 2 inch spacing. Added vericat hangers to the cross bar ends four places and bent them over to hang the vee drain system from the outside tubes. The vees will be about 3 inches below the tubes and have good area for the steam to come up through between each vee. It is a very elegant simple system and will drain direct into his end chanel of the hood on the down side of the preheater. This system was Keith's idea and sure beats the complexity of my system. I will try to get some pictures.
I now need to design four brackets to hold his preheater in position. These will be permanently attached to the inside of the pan (screws). I think 4 inch rise in 40 inches should be about right for the slope.
We also got the door skins cut out. But need to cut the openings in the sides of the hood after we get the preheater set so that we can make sure we get the doors in the right location for access to the plumbing fittings.
We are going to be close to get him set up for this year.

Regards,
Chris

[NH Maplemaker]

Chris, that will work very well for Keith! Sound just like the way I built mine.With the stainless vee's and the steam directly hitting the 1" pipes. I get 205 degrees except when drawing off! 3% has seen it running at 205 degrees maney times when he has come over to give me a hand boiling. Keith will really enjoy it. I also put a temp gauge on the exit pipe just befor it drops into the float box. The kind they use in the radient floor heating system. It has a well that the gauge snaps into.(gauge isn't directly in the hot sap ) Hope that makes sence! It's very entertaining to watch the gauge when boiling!
Keith is very lucky to have a good friend and neighbor like you to help him out! I'm sure he is a good friend and nieghbor also. Jim L.

[Sugarmaker]

NH Maple,
Yea Keith is a good friend and would do just about anything for his friends. And He makes new ones very easily. Although he hasn't even test boiled yet I think this will make a very nice rig. He was pretty bummed that he did not get it going last year. He had the arch but not the pans. He is also very interested in making as much of it himself as he can. Partially the cost, but also the satisfaction. I told him that it takes a long time to put a good system together.

I like the idea of a temp gauge on the sap outlet too and I have one on my rig. I may suggest that to him as he starts to plumb it soon.

Keith brought over some .050 thick stainless last night. We worked on the brackets to hold the preheater. We whittled out two tall front brackets and two that are 4 inches shorter for the back. These will be attached to the inside of the rear pan, near each corner. I need to try to get some pictures!

Regards,
Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Helped Keith tune his preheater assembly into the home position and get the measurements for the location of the entrance and exit holes for the sap flow.
Brought the rear hood back home and need to cut in the doors and punch the holes.
The pans are set! Fittings in place and could be water and boil tested soon!

Regards,
Chris

[Gary R]

Got to check out Kieth's rig the other night. Took my uncle and Sugarmaker over there. It's a nice looking rig. He's going to be able to boil alot on it. He went all out on the stainless. All stainless preheater. It is very nice! Hopefully he and Chris get it running soon. It's almost time to boil:)

[jrthe3]

come on gary your scaring me with that talk

[Sugarmaker]

Talbot update:
Keith had his 8 inch roof jack installed by his son-in-law, Ron, yesterday, and the steam stack is in place.
We worked on the rear hood and added the two doors and latches plus punched the sap inlet and outlet holes in the sides for the preheater.
Keith has to get the plumbing, 1 inch copper, from the feed tank to the preheater inlet, and then from the preheater outlet to the float box. Plus get the float set. I think he needs a float too??
Should be able to test boil end of this week? I think he is more ready than I am:)

Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Brief Update:
I have to get some pictures of the preheater before Keith gets the hoods on. He has the preheater plumbed and the float in place. I got the seals for the 1 inch pipe openings. Keith will do a test boil on water this week end. He is like a kid in a candy store!

Chris

[Sugarmaker]

No pictures of the preheater.:) Keith had the hood on when I got over there Sat night.
Got the seals in his rear hood for the preheater inlet and outlet.
He has the front hood suspended with a cable and quick disconect snap.
Steam stack is in place.
Keith did add another 3 feet of smoke stack to make sure he was above the peak to allow good draft.
He is waiting for warm weather and then will do a water test boil and clean up.
Not sure he realizes how fast this is going to boil compared to his little pan! I think is going to boil at about 25 GPH maybe better?

Keith finished all the plumbing from the feed tank to the preheater inlet. and from the preheater outlet to the float box. He had a 1/2 inch drain line to put in from the hood drain to a bucket under the arch. Should give him enough hot water to clean up equipment.

Currently I may have to take sap to him because he is more ready than I am:)

The neighbor that farms next to him had a old trailer (small) and added some sides and gave it to Keith to haul behind the four wheeler to haul sap.

Currently he is looking for a pump to get the sap to the feed tank.

Chris

[jrthe3]

chris i use a eletric 1 imch clear water pump from harbor frieght it like 20 or 30 dollars i have had the same one 8 years with out a prob

[Sugarmaker]

Boyd,
Thanks, I will mention it to Keith. He loves Harbor Freight!

Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Keith fired his rig up and had a good boil going on Sat. The preheater was working good and the pipe exiting the preheater was to hot to hold your hand on.
The thicker pans seemed to take longer the get hot.
He was getting a little more steam coming out from under the front hood then we expected. Maybe we undersized the steam stack at 8 inch dia?:(
Suggestions?

Chris

[jrthe3]

run a second stack outside for the steam hood that is what i had to do or go with a bigger stack two eight are cheapper then one 12

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

The longer he boils, the warmer the building(inside temps) should get which will help eliminate a lot of steam.

[Sugarmaker]

Boyd and Brandon,
Yes Keith may have to experiment with another stack on the front hood and out the roof. His building is a big pole barn so its not going to heat up well.:( I think its 32 x 48 at least. It wasn't filling the building but it did not have the draw that I expected.

Thanks,
Chris

[jrthe3]

i don't know what it is about steam but it is funny my first stack was 10 inch and it would not draw worth a cr@pe i called leader up and they told me to down size to 8 inch and it works great

[Sugarmaker]

Boyd,
Thats strange on the stack size reduction and better draw. Well what ever works!


Chris

[Sugarmaker]

Talked to Keith. He is going to tap about 100 taps in his nort bush and has all systems ready for big sap run!

I am sure that if any one wants to stop and see his operation he would be gald to have you.

Keith and Bonnie live about a half mile north of 6N, on the east side of West Road. His house sets way back in the field.

Regards,
Chris