One pan evaporator, end of season

[eastcoasttapper]

Our evaporator has one pan, divided into the three sections. We had our last boil two nights ago. Looks like that was it for the season. We have about 2-3" of syrup/sap left in all three sections of the pan. How do I get the remainder of the sap boiled into syrup without burning my pan?

[BryanEx]

Easiest way is to draw it all off into a big spaghetti pot or something similar and finish it as a batch on the stove or propane burner if you have one. Many people will do what's called chasing the sweet by adding water in the first section to push through the syrup/sap but from I've read they often end up with mixed results. I'm a batch producer myself so I don't have specific tips on chasing sweet if that's the route you want to go but it has been discussed very often in other threads.

[JuniperHillSugar]

EastCoastTapper:

I have a 2x4 with dividers, and when I finished my last run I boiled it down, slowly as far as I dared. Maybe 3/4" to 1" deep. I did this with very fine wood and a small fire. After the fire was out and cooled somewhat I had about 4 gallons of near syrup that I drew off and finished on my propane finisher.

I'm not sure if this is the best way, but with a 2x4 at 3" deep, thats about fifteen gallons, and a lot of boiling for the finisher.

Good Luck.

[eastcoasttapper]

JuniperHillSugar, that's what I'm thinking too. I'd like to boil it down a little more yet to make it a little less stove top time for me later on today.

All the other posts about flushing with water seem to refer to systems using the separate flu and syrup pans and I'm not sure how that works with the one pan set up. If I get the syrup too low today and end up quickly flushing with water, I may end up finding out how it works!

[BarrelBoiler]

hi ECS with 2-3 inches in a 2x3 (having done syrup on a barrel stove evaporator wit a 2'x33inch divided pan) i would start up your fire as usual and get a good boil going and get down toward an inch left over the high spots in your pan, then let the fire get less and less and kind of simmer it down toward 3/4 to a 1/2 an inch over just the dying coals- at this point your not any bubbles just whisps of steam with a helper pick the pan off and set it down on some sawhorses so you can draw it off
my old set of pans didn't have any lip on the top so i could pour out of it into my finishing pot
just keep a close watch with the low fire the pan won't be very hot and sloshing the near syrup around a little will keep the surface wet enough and let things cool quickly enough not to scorch

good luck