We got some snow today. And cold New England weather is coming back. That means tapping trees is getting farther away. Oh well I need the time anyhow. I need one more thaw for a few days so I can build a block arch for preheating sap. Farmboy
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We got some snow today. And cold New England weather is coming back. That means tapping trees is getting farther away. Oh well I need the time anyhow. I need one more thaw for a few days so I can build a block arch for preheating sap. Farmboy
Well, between yesterday and today, me and the ol man went to the woods for a little wile, and got some mainline up and ran some latertals, and cut in drops, have to install around 20-30 more saddles, then moving to the next mainline, hopfully 100-200 more taps, there, Should be at or around 2000 taps on vac, and running 500 CV adaptors, hopefuly we have a good season, Key thing for me this year is keeping the Vac pump on and not having gas engines blow up like last season and had to scarmble for a gas engine, This year i plan to hav a back up pump and a back up motor, probably have 2 back up pumps if all goes, well, you never know whats going ot happen, been wicked windy here today, calling for -35 with the wind chill here tomororw wont be doing much if its that cold
hope everone is doing good and are planning on BIG SAP this season
Helped a buddy today set up his new piggyback on his 6x14 evap. 4 degrees above 0, alot of work with air bubbler tubes and hose clamps that you couldn't use gloves to work with the stuff. warming hoses up with hot water to slip them on the pipes and then our fingers would stick to the cold metal. and had a good time doing it. we are a strange bunch of people. but as the saying goes.....if i have to explain......you wouldnt understand.
Well, I've been working in the bush the last two days replacing leaky Ring style clamps on my main line with SS clamps. Running a few new lateral lines and setting up for a few more taps this year. Yesterday was nice and this morning was OK other than it snowed pretty hard. Well I dont mind working in the snow but 50 mph winds while it is snowing is another story. Finished my day pretty quick. We should have another couple weeks or so here so there's not a hurry. I will fire up the heat in the shop and maybe clean some tanks tommarrow supposed to only get to 14 degrees.:mad:
COLD, hunkered down by the wood stove!
I would think that if anybody had any buckets out in this wind they are long gone. Drove home in a snowstorm down 81 at 10 miles an hour with a line of traffic in front and a line in the back. This dang tractor trailer driver decided to bully his way by all of us and a few hundred yards I passed him in the ditch. I was going to stop if he had a trailer full of maple equipment in the back spilled all over but he didn't so I kept on going. I think I might have a problem I see maple equipment everywhere. This weather sure takes a smile of your face.
Got the 2010 construction on the sugar house finished last night. Finished siding the last wall and got the bay window in. Looks awesome, I planned to post pics but left the cell phone in the truck, which my wife took to work.
Drove 4 hours down to Mass in a snowstorm to pick up a storage tank for WCProctor last night. Nothing like unloading a tank at 8 degrees in a 40 mph wind at midnight by yourself.
Good news is my sugar house roof stayed in place during last night's wind. Good to go for the next 50 years now.
:cool: It's colder then a witches t....t... ...hart here! Things are coming together though. The arch is bricked, the stack is up and the blower is bolted on and wired in. I was going to set the pans on the arch today but the buddy that was going to give me a hand with them whimped out from the cold. So I brought the 3x3 finish pan in and set it on the warm wood stove added boiling water from the tea kettle and gave it a good scrubbing with green scrubby pads. Mostly just sugar sand but it had a few black scorched spots from the last user. It cleaned up pretty good though with a lot of elbo grease. I'll work on it a little more when I test boil the pans and scrub down the flues in the flue pan. Now I need some better weather so I can string mains and laterals plus set up tanks and barrels.
man you said it., winter returned with avengence. like I always say I can take the cold but man the wind it just rips right through you!!!!
I can't stay away from the trader I see noone else can either!!!! the fever is just too much. 219F I got it man!!!:lol:
Here's a couple of pans for you guys looking for something small. Bet this copper one would kick butt!
http://cgi.ebay.com/COPPER-Maple-Syr...item2c52c9eac6
http://cgi.ebay.com/Maple-syrup-pan-...item45f0ae7bbc
http://cgi.ebay.com/Maple-Syrup-Pan-...item2a04542ce6
http://cgi.ebay.com/Maple-Syrup-Pan-...item1c0fc074ff
i was out in the woods the other day when my dad came home and told me i was nuts it was 10 ou with a wind chil of like 0 i told him you have got to want it
I never left the house today. I have a throat problem and decided being cold wasn't worth while. I hopefully feel better tomorrow and get out if for nothing else haul in fire wood.
I have yet to see a syrup pan for sale on ebay from Canada. There was one in the local paper yesterday but you would thing more would show up around here.
jrthe3,
I stopped at your sugar house yesterday. No tracks around. You'd better get to work:) I left a present at the door step;)
Is that one of those presents (dog shi#)you would put in a brown paper bag as a teenager at someones house you didn't like. Set fire to it, ring door bell and run. jrthe3 watch out for that present. Keith
Hopefully its a cord of wood or a RO.
Got some pics of the first boil with the new 2x6 last weekend and some visitors I had.http://s255.photobucket.com/albums/h...nd%20visitors/
How many of you guys carry pictures of your evaporators in your wallets or close by. I can see this now. You guys in gathered around drooling over these pictures.
An trying to work out side a bit but its just a tad cold. Have to warm my fingers up once in a while. I am amazed how little snow we have left compared to last year.
depends which sugar bush your talking about:lol: hopefully i will be tapping both;)Quote:
Originally Posted by farmall h
got my order at the farm show on weds. started puting up the main line, strung up about 200 feet today until my hands started to freeze (its -5 with out the windchill) cleaned my releaser today to in for the night, and now i get to work on collage scholarship essays!!! OH YAY!:mad: :cry: but needs to be done so i can make all those day dreamed plans turn into something if dairy farming doesnt work out after collage then im going big into the maple buissness and make some serious MONEY!!!:evil:
Dano,
You're right it does need to be done. Look at it this way, putting in say 5 hours of time and effort into writing, editing, and rewriting can make you thousands in Scholarships. When will you ever again get the chance to make $1000/hr?:D
Those days of nasty presents are way behind me. It was a SIHI liquid ring vacuum pump. I couldn't fit the wood in my van;)
in a pinch here sugar house still not done and still need to get evap
Mighty cold this am. -15 on the thermometer plus the wind chill. Got to the barn this morning around 10am and dragged out the Universal pump and took it home to the garage. I need to check the vac tank for leaks, fact is I don't know if the motor even runs. It might be 220v. I believe the pump draws vacuum 'cause I cranked it over by turning the pulley and pretty near sucked my hand up the 1 1/2 pipe! I am new to vacuum. A pump this large must need a regulator? I remember the old Universal pump at the farm had weights in the oiler...this was the way to regulate vacuum? Maybe too big? Is that possible? We'll see. I must add... it was colder in the sugarhouse than it was outside!
Okay this cold is rediculous. I did run into a bit of luck friday. I'll tell you the delima I have first. I have been considering alot of running vac across the road where most of my trees are. I will have something like 400 buckets on that side this year and there are way more trees to get. So the problem is no elecricity on that side and I do not want to run gas driven pumps because of the cost of running gas and how often I will have to feed it. I have the pumps already with 220 motors on them. Well friday a customer who has felt the pinches of the economy needs about 2000 bucks of labor and will struggle between paying his employees this week or paying to fix his press. He has a brand new deisel generator that is like 4 months old he bought for a backup and not used even once. Brand new this thing is 6500 bucks. He said if I fix the press it is mine. Hmmm what is a man to do. This thing is pretty sweet. dual 120,s and 230 a dc converter, onboard battery charger 9500 watts electric start with remote controls completly weather tight and on wheels 413cc motor with silent muffler system and runs 20 hours on a 5 gallon tank. Problem solved I will have a bush on vac next year now. Almost forgot yes Haynes it is a food grade generator now I have to find some food grade diesel to run in it....
I'd chain and padlock that to a good big NON-maple tree so it don't come up MIA.:)Quote:
Originally Posted by 3rdgen.maple
heading out to the woods to set my mainlines... Last year I used the wire tighteners.. this year I bought load straps that are about 2 inches wide and 20 ft long... I will tighten my mainlines up with those and the grippers... that way no damage to the tree when the strap goes around and they hold like a thousand pounds. I'm looking for quick install and quick de-install when I'm done since I have to take ALL my tubing down each year. imagine I'm starting today and will have everything back down by April 30.. sucks but what are ya going to do.
I'm looking at 2 sets of woods on nice slopes that if I can get in there no more putting up and taking down tubing and much closer as they are in my town!! we shall see this spring / summer when the leaves are out.
Warming right up. Only -10 this morning. We set the pans on the arch yesterday afternoon. The only trouble I'm having is the ceramic gasket between the pans is so thick that the nipples on the flue pan aren't long enough to get through the float boxs on the finish pan to the point that I can get the steel washer and rubber gasket on them. Perhaps when I test fire/cure refractory cement/wash fluepan today the heat will work the kinks out and I can snug them up compressing the blanket and get them on. If not I'll have to take the finish pan back off and split that gasket in half or leave it out. There wasn't one between them when it was setup before. Took a hike up through the north slope I'm going to tap. plenty of 24"plus maples that havent been tapped in twenty five years and some have never been tapped.I don't have anywhere near enough pipeline and tubbing as yet. Just to big an area with steep slopes and random gaps between bunches of tapable trees.
Heading to the sugar house to try to do something constructive!
Chris
plumbing up the releaser and bringing it over to the woods delivering some syrup collage scholarship essays boring day
Hey Gator are you gonna stay up till 12:01 and get the Febuary journel started or do I have to do it again:D No sleeping at the computor this time....
Big work weekend finished, all the wood is cut and split, enough pallets or close to it for the season. And 1000 bags are now on the holders. Started 7 a.m every morning. -15 degrees both mornings but what can you do about that. Brother Russ has pictures to post so hopefully he can get those on asap. Knuckleboom loader worked good off of my 1-ton truck. even at an idle it had plenty of speed. For some reason though i couldn't get the grapple to rotate. We had a freak rainstorm in Jan. then got cold so i hope rain didn't get in there and freeze somehow. Installed the 5 horse motor on the new induction fan. Didn't wire it yet though. Things are starting to get done up in the Wis. northwoods. Hope everyone else had a good weekend. Rhino
Got the mains up today, about 1600 feet. it should be easier this season that everything is already made, just have to put it all back up.. Oh and in the right spots would help too.... I think my mainline might go on the wrong side of a tree here or there but they are up... will side tie and tighten up sometime this week.