How to drawoff on flat pan?

[HOSER]

Hey, quick question.

How do you drawoff on a 2x3 with out scorching the pan?

Is it just as simple as cracking the valve all the way open and letting it run out, then shut the valve and add water?

Thanks,

HOSER

[smitty76]

my 2x3 pan had had handles on either side and we removed it fro the fire to drain it. seems to me you can't drain it all out when it is on the fire because it will scorch. Just my experience.

[PerryW]

It will definitely scorch if you get much less than 1/2" of liquid in the pan.


With a 2x3 flat pan, you will most likely have to finish on the kitchen stove. When you run out of sap, you can slow down firing and try to end up with around 1/2-3/4" of partially-boiled sap in the pan (when the wood is burned up).


Then yank the pan, or let things cool down and come back and drain the pan after the coals from cooled down.

[Haynes Forest Products]

You need to remove from fire or let the fire die down. It will only take seconds to burn/scorch warp the pan if it doesnt have enough liquid to keep it cool. Syrup is a poor coolant plus TRYING to chase it with water will only end up diluting the finished product. When I flat pan single batched I had the garden hose at the ready so when we liked what we had we put the fire out and drew off and filled the pan and hit the road till next time.

[lpakiz]

You can also stand by with a steel shovel and remove the embers to stop the boil. For me, works best to remove the pan. I have a couple horizontal pipes that I can slide the pan onto (like sawhorses). Then rotate pan 45 degrees and dump into catch-kettle sitting on ground. I wear long-cuffed welders gloves.

[peacemaker]

i did like ip i had a piece of thin steel i threw on the arch to stop the smoke from filling my temp shack dumped some raw sap or water and slde it back on

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Build yourself a little frame beside the firebox just to slide the pan over onto until it cools off some. A few cinderblocks, wood, metal, etc.

[RileySugarbush]

Another trick to keep from scorching your hands when you lift off the pan is to throw a piece of thin sheet metal (like HVAC ductwork) over the coals.

It is tough to shut off a fire quickly, but as you approach done, stop loading fuel a few minutes early, then just before removing the pan, cover the coals with that scrap sheet. The boil will stop immediately as you block the radiant heat. Then you are not trying to carry hot syrup over hot coals in a hurry and you are less likely to candy coat your hands.

[Big_Eddy]

I use a 2x3 pan. After 20 years, I have a pretty good idea when the syrup is ready. In my case - a days boil of roughly 60 gals sap ends up about 1cm deep in the pan. When I'm 30 mins before I want to quit for the night, and running at about an inch, I stop putting wood in, and start to allow the fire to die down. Then I "manage" the fire by using handfuls of twigs, bark, and small sticks to get the syrup foaming, then let it die down, foam, die down, until I'm down to 1cm. Each handful of twigs makes quite a difference at this stage. By the time the syrup is ready, the coals are mostly gone, and I have embers only.

I rotate the pan 45 degrees on the top of my blocks, then tilt it up and pour out the lower corner into a stock pot set on the ground. Once the pan is empty, I lift it off and set it aside until tomorrow.

If I'm out of sap and still hot - a handful or 2 of snow onto the coals takes the fire down quickly. Or when it gets warmer, a squirt bottle (mister) of water does the same thing.

Whether you tip out the corner or use a valve, you need to get your pan off the heat before you empty it.