Originally Posted by
DrTimPerkins
No, that approach is called "chasing the sweet", and as you experienced, it is not extremely effective (I can explain why, but it is a bit long and complicated....the short version is that you're simply changing the "steepness" of the gradient, so forcing a little more sugar from the pan, but not a lot). The time between draws gets longer and longer, and the draws get smaller and smaller, and you're still left with a lot of syrup in the pan.
I don't know....I chase with permeate after every boil and can usually get the contents in the flue pan down to 6% sugar, (don't want all that concentrate sitting in the flue pan to darken) versus when I boiled raw sap only and shut down, the content in the flue pan would be 12-14% after it cooled down. I only boil 30 to 40 minutes of permeate max to achieve this. At the end, as others have said, I empty the flue pan into pails and milkcans, refill with permeate and cook the contents in the front pan treating it as one big flat pan.
Mark
Where we made syrup long before the trendies made it popular, now its just another commodity.
John Deere 4000, 830, and 420 crawler
1400 taps, 600 gph CDL RO, 4x12 wood-fired Leader, forced air and preheater. 400 gallon Sap-O-Matic vacuum gathering tank, PTO powered. 2500 gallon X truck tank, 17 bulk tanks.
No cage tanks allowed on this farm!