Printable View
Here are some pics of the air injection system that I built for my evaporator. The Bubblemaster 1.0! Before the Bubblemaster 1.0 all I was making was grade B and darker syrup. On March 19 I boiled for the first time with the Bubblemaster and since then right up to the very end I continued to make grade A syrup. That was close to half of my crop this season.
Attachment 7716Attachment 7715Attachment 7717Attachment 7718Attachment 7719
Wow that's impressive! What type of blower did you use and where did you locate it at?
I used a new shop vac and put it outside on the platform next to my feed tank. I used 1 1/2" PVC pipe to connect it to the Bubblemaster.
I never would have thought of that. Nicely done!
Attachment 7720Attachment 7721Attachment 7722 2 Air Injector Filter Pumps on the outside of sap house.Air Injector pipes in sap evaporator and air injector pipes in finish evaporator.
What do you think would be the optimum CFM required? I wanna see if I can get a little squirrel cage blower and make a manifold for it. so is that 1 inch pipe that the 3/8 pipe is conected to? if that is 3/8 tubing?
and its hard to see how did you connect the smaller tubbing onto the larger pipe? I am really gonna do this for next year as well. See how it goes!!!
I think you will need a radial blower (like a shop vac) I do not believe a squirrel cage would have enough pressure.Quote:
Originally Posted by red maples
You are blowing air into the hot liquid evaporating? Never herd of this before what is the purpose of this you allude to the fact that it produces a lighter grade of syrup why would that be this is very interesting post.
Yes, there have been some testing and pictures posted on using this method. There was a huge improvement in syrup grade using the air injection.Quote:
Originally Posted by b116757
Brad the manifolds are 1" pipe and the tubes are soft copper. I soldered compression fittings into the manifolds to attach the tubes with. The volume of air with a squirrel cage will probably be enough but it may not make enough pressure to push the bubbles up through the sap in the flue pan.
b116757 the air bubbles are pointed to the bottom of the pans to stir / force the nitre up so that it doesn't sit there and burn. This is a big problem for producers that concentrate their sap to higher percentages with their RO's. The sap in my flue pan was the color of syrup or darker before it even come into the front pan. I concentrate up to 18% before I boil.
Russ do you think a air pump for a large fish tank would be enough air and filter through the charcoal and water same as fish tank? I know you said that you had it cut way back.Also 1/2 inch tubing instead of the 1 inch copper and 1/4 inch air tubes instead of the 3/8. Your thoughts would help with many that are going to go this route for next year. Thanks Keith
Very neat setup up there Russ.
Need more pics. How did the pan bottoms look after boiling for awhile? Were they cleaner than with out the bubblemaster 1.0?
How far off the pan bottom did you place the bubble tubes?
The biggest benefit of the air bubblers for me was that I no longer use any defoamer.
yes I did read that you barely need defoamer and it knocks the amount of niter way down because you are really boiling at a stightly lower temperature and the agitation causes less niter. and cleaner pans as well. the article I read said its good for ROed concentrate as well as raw sap too. because with the raw sap it will spend ALOT more time in the pans developing color sugar flavor more niter and more chance to get carmelized sugars to form. creating darker syrup.
I don't know if 1/2" pipe and 1/4" tubes would be too restrictive to get air all of the way to the end. I'm also not sure if the aquarium pump will move a large enough volume of air for it to work. The only way to know would be to try it.Quote:
Originally Posted by SSFLLC
The bottom of the front pan looks like I just cleaned it with the exception of the area that didn't have holes in the tubes. On the draw off channels the holes start 12" away from the thermometer stem. I haven't removed the steam hood to clean the flue pan yet so I can't see the bottom of that. The sight tube is a lot cleaner than it used to be. The tubes are 1/2" off of the botom of the pan.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dennis H.
I still use some defoamer especially with the late season sap. The amount that I use is drastically reduced though.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark
I must not have read that paper. I haven't read anything yet that mentions raw sap but I can see that it could help there too.Quote:
Originally Posted by red maples
Brad, please post a link to the paper.
Why the reduced defoamer use?
I understand that liquids will evaporate at lower temperartures if agitated, but if the air's cooling the sap down enough to boil at a lower temperature, your thermometer in the syrup pan wouldn't work properly.
Here's some reading for you guys.
http://www.uvm.edu/~pmrc/air_injection.pdf
Seems like some copyright infringements of a Lincoln, VT. R and D guy and patent infringement on a Buxton, Me. manufacturer. LOL
I notice lighter syrup at the beginning of the season. Last year most of the syrup I made was grade B even with the bubblers, probably caused by the warm weather we had and they did not save me on that. I don't see a decrease in niter and have to change the syrup pan every 4 hours. One thing that is different is absolutely no defoamer is needed.
I am burning woodchips and not oil so I have a little slower boiling rate and maybe the reason for not needing some defoamer. I added a third syrup pan to increase the flat pan area which probably increases the flavor and darkens it a bit.
At the end of the season when I have a problem getting the syrup through the press I will then use some defoamer but that syrup goes into the drum unfiltered and sold for whatever I get.
We keep tasting the syrup to see if we can detect a change but can't, if we did we would take them out and go the organic defoamer route. Just don't want to put chemicals in the syrup.
You just gotta make sure that the bubbles are 12" or more away from the thermometer stem and you won't have a problem. I've only got holes in the last 6" of the tubes in the draw off channels.Quote:
Originally Posted by Amber Gold
Would that R & D guy from Lincoln VT be you? I worked closely with the Buxton ME manufacturer when I built mine. My design is slightly different than his but the difference in mine was his suggestion. As far as copyright infringement goes does anybody else call theirs a Bubblemaster?Quote:
Originally Posted by 802maple
I guess you got me there. LOL
Do you guys have a rough formula to figure how many cfm you need in a blower for a bubbler?
I didn't use a formula. I just bought a small 6 gallon shop vac and it moves more than enough air for the bubbler that I built. A friend of mine used the same vacuum when he built one for his 3x8 evaporator.Quote:
Originally Posted by mapleack
This the blower that is used in the manufactured bubblers, Ametek 116472-13 Blower / Vacuum Motor 4M937
Thanks Jerry, I wanted to buy a spare blower but have not yet figured out what it is. I will order one online today.Quote:
Originally Posted by 802maple
Mark I would double check yours before ordering, because there has been some made with different blowers, The one I put up is the most used though.
Mine has a 3 stage and the one you listed was a 2 stage. I found the right one, I was comparing the pictures with mine and noticed a difference. Thanks again.
Russ, one interesting variable is hot-air versus cold-air injection. It seems to me that the air injection does two things; 1) agitate the syrup and 2) cool the bottom of the pan. I'm wondering which variable is the most critical. I'm just guessing, but to me it seems that injecting hot air, drawn from a plenum around the stack for example, would do the agitation just as well AND might increase the boil rate by increasing the temp significantly since the stack temp is probably at or over 400 degrees. Perhaps this would increase the evaporation rate enough to keep the syrup from carmelizing and darkening. My fear is that cold air injection might have the negative effect of lengthening the boil-time over that of hot air. I haven't read-up on it, I'm just speculating. (more things to try...more things to spend money on....it never ends.).
Doc
I am not going to say that warm air won't increase the boil because i don't know, but I do know that cold air doesn't decrease the boil. Because of the constant agitation actually it increases the boil. This technology is not new as the Steamaway, Piggy back and CDL steam pan do the same thing and they evaporate sap even though they never come to a true boil as they never get over 195 to 200 degrees. In a woodfired unit I have seen up to 15% increased boil due to the bubbler. Typically because of the constant heat a oil fired evaporator doesn't show as much of an increase, especially if it is a hard boiling unit.
Russ when you soldered the compression fittings to the 1" tube did you simply drill a hole first the size of the fitting? Also, how big are the actual air holes, and do they point straight down or at alternating angles?
I drilled holes in the 1" pipes to put the compression fittings into then I soldered them in place. The holes in the tubes are 1/16" and point straight down.Quote:
Originally Posted by heus
Doc, you pose an interesting variable and my thought is that I want the cold air to slow down the caramelization process. The cold air doesn't seem to have a negative effect on the evaporation rate of my evaporator. If anything it is the same or better. With the amounts of sap that I got in a run this season I rarely boiled for more than an hour and a half at a time which made it hard to put a number on the evap rate. It was close to 40gph before and after the Bubblemaster.Quote:
Originally Posted by Greyfox
Russ, i am trying to remember, are you wood or oil fired?
Jerry, my evaporator is wood fired.Quote:
Originally Posted by 802maple
this sounds like a great thing for the birch guys as well. I keep eyeballing my few birch trees as I drive by them....
thanks for sharing - another dang thing I've got to think about making.
Just curious as to whether you had to change the depth at which you run your pans to compensate for the extra bubbles? (so to not scorch pan) What sap depth do you run ?
I didn't change the sap depths in my pans. I run 1" in my front pan and just cover the feed pipes in the flue pan.
Has anyone tried this in just the front pan? This is the only pan I could put this in, and I like to make light syrup. Im wondering if it would be worth it.
I made bubblers for both of my pans. The guys that only put them in one pan put them in the flue pan. You may or may not notice any difference doing the front pan only. My thought is that it won't make much difference.Quote:
Originally Posted by Uncle Tucker