Jumpered Sap ladders

[Maplewalnut]

Is there any benefit to installing a small 'dry line' from just downstream of the top of a sap ladder to upstream of the sap ladder on the lower main? Would you get better vacuum transfer or would it mess up your vacuum through the ladder itself? Using stars if that matters

Mike

[Haynes Forest Products]

I think you would redirect the vacuum away from the sap ladder and vacuum is what makes them work. I think the sap would start climbing the vac line and become part of the ladder.

[Maplewalnut]

Haynes- that was my intial thought first but lets say you tee off your mainline 10 ft below your top sap ladder and extend it up a couple feet up higher and then slope back down at an angle to tie into your main 10 or 15 feet above your bottom of the ladder.

[twofer]

Seems like you would kill off the siphon of the sap ladder by creating an equilibrium of pressure.

[Brian Ryther]

Mike,
I tried this approach before. You will see examples of this in my photobucket album. I have found that the line sized pipe ends up acting as the major sap conduit and the spiders sit 1/2 full of sap. I have concluded that, as other reasurch has shown, the line sized ladder is the most efficent way to move sap vertically. I do however use spiders when lifting small #'s of taps, 15 - 50.

[Maplewalnut]

Brian- that is exactly what I was thinking. Not sure why I didn't see it in your pics before. So you saw no increase in vacuum upstream of the sap ladder when you insalled the pipe along with the spider?

This maybe a good spot for me to try the two pipe method. I know Russ and others have had pretty good luck with them. As I said I have only used spiders before but much like you only lift 50-60 taps max. This line will have upwards of 100 taps on it.

[maple flats]

I'm totally new to vacuum but I had a good visit with a producer recently who says he puts a tiny leak (tiny is the key) at the most distant end of each line that has a sap ladder. He claims it makes the ladder work better AND that it doen not lower the vacuum level like a small air inlet (leak) just past the lower point where a sap ladder is going to be used. With the leak near the ladder the vac level suffers beyond that point. As far as a vac line near the lower end of a sap ladder it sounds like trouble. But a vac line at the top of the ladder should be a winner as long as it is connected through a big enough chamber to seperate the air and the sap. IMHO, based on lots of experience in fluid movement in heating systems but non in vacuum.

[Brian Ryther]

I used to put a small leak in my ladders also. It gives you instant gratification because you can see the sap jumping up the ladder. Last year I stopped adding leaks and I saw no decrease in ladder performance or yield (sap /tap). I feel that the bottom line is that a leak is a leak. The entire system will now suffer from the leak. The trees are giving off gas along with the sap. That is all the leak you need to lift the sap up the ladder.

[Thompson's Tree Farm]

I agree with Brian 100%. No need for any "extra" leak anywhere. You will want a valve at the bottom of ladders so the last sap can be drained out at the end of the season.

[Wanabe1972]

I am also going to vacuum this year and was going to try a main line size lift to raise 150 tapes about 10 feet. after the lift I want to run my wet line 300 feet back to the barn right down a wooden cow fence. The question I have is I need to go over a farm gate and need to raise the wet line about 10 feet for a 10 foot span over the gate. Can I run a gradual slope on the wet line to get over the gate or do I need to run another lift?

[mapleack]

If you can still have fall the whole way, do the slope. If not, do another lift.

[220 maple]

I added a ball valve on the end of the inch line that feeds my sap ladder, I never used it. The system had enough small leaks at saddles, or spiles. As the guys at Indiana Vacuum told me when I asked why they had there pumps set wide open, "no one has built a perfect leak free tubing system" 30 Hg dreaming, I had 22 Hg at times during the season but probably avg. 18 Hg

Mark 220 Maple