Deja vu

[dsaw]

It flowed this week. I had about 130 gal in the 4 of my 9 barrels I checked. They’re down a steep slope, so I gathered about 90 of that in the dark tonight before the rain sets in tomorrow. Fairly confident I’ll be over 200 gal of sap, my largest run ever.

[Andrew Franklin]

Thanks Russell and Mitchell, I'm not going to eat it as is, so it's currently boiling to 263 and we'll see...not holding out hope Good news is I went down to my property yesterday at 2:00 and thanks to a homemade ro and really good dry wood I processed about 150 gallons to just over 2 gallons of 65%. Since I only slept 3 hours I'm going to reheat and bottle tomorrow, but this batch tastes great and is worth the effort.

[dsaw]

I had a good weekend. Ended with 4.5 gal of syrup; by far the most I've ever made. My yield was low since I started with 400 gal of sap at ~1.3%. I think I need to run permate through my RO when done and collect it until it turns clear. I also think I need to do the same with my filter press, then save the filter wash in the freezer for the next weekend. My equipment is oversized so I can run fast (I took the 400 gal down to 13.5% in 3 hrs); but I need to work on minimizing loses. I'm still learning and working to optimize. I have the WesFab short stack with the hand pump. I didn't understand why you needed an electric pump; until today. That hand pump got old fast. Something else to research.

[Russell Lampron]

I have the WesFab short stack with the hand pump. I didn't understand why you needed an electric pump; until today. That hand pump got old fast.

I have one of those too. I put an air operated double diaphragm pump on mine. I have to use double papers on the end plates and tighten the nuts with a pipe wrench to keep it from blowing syrup all over the place but it works great.

[TonyL]

What a weekend. Finished off the sweet from four boils, ended up with 7 gallons of syrup, coming from 370 gallons of sap. Boiled another 80 gallons down to sweet today, and my wife has another 55 gallons to boil tomorrow. I spent 26 hours chucking wood into the evaporator this weekend, and another 15 hours boiling on Wednesday (took off work to boil!). We've never had sap come this hard and heavy.

[dsaw]

I have one of those too. I put an air operated double diaphragm pump on mine. I have to use double papers on the end plates and tighten the nuts with a pipe wrench to keep it from blowing syrup all over the place but it works great.

Russell, funny you responded, when I did a search for "wesfab short stack pump" your's was the only post that came back. From that, and other posts, it seems like an air pump is a good option; and I have installed an air compressor at my remote sugar farm; so as long as the cfm's align, I should be ok. A few questions: What exact model do you have? What output liquid pressure does it have? (when I ebay searched a few models, then tried to look up the specs, Yamanda talks all about the air specs; but doesn't mention the liquid psi specs, only output gpm). What PSI/cfm do you operate at?

[Andrew Franklin]

And the maple sugar tastes like crap. Oh well...

Good news is I got 2 gallons of syrup from what I ran through the ro and evaporator starting Friday at 3:00 pm through about 4:00 am Saturday, and it is very good. I always seem to get darker syrup, but great flavor. The next week or so looks tricky, since I am usually free to only boil on weekends. I'm sure it ran yesterday and today, so I'm hoping the cold temps forecasted hold it until I get down there next.

[Russell Lampron]

Russell, funny you responded, when I did a search for "wesfab short stack pump" your's was the only post that came back. From that, and other posts, it seems like an air pump is a good option; and I have installed an air compressor at my remote sugar farm; so as long as the cfm's align, I should be ok. A few questions: What exact model do you have? What output liquid pressure does it have? (when I ebay searched a few models, then tried to look up the specs, Yamanda talks all about the air specs; but doesn't mention the liquid psi specs, only output gpm). What PSI/cfm do you operate at?

My pump is a Yamada but I don't remember the model number. It is a 1/2" pump with Teflon diaphragms. I know other producers are using 3/8" pumps on bigger presses with no problems. I'm running mine with a contractors compressor and will have to look at it to see how many cfm it is. It provides more than enough air though, these pump don't need much. As far as pressure goes, it starts out low and gets higher as the press gets dirty. I never have to run mine with the air valve more than 1/2 way open. With the air pump slow and easy works best.

There is such a thing as light duty and heavy duty filter press papers. I got a case of the light duty papers with my press when I bought it used. When I put the air pump on it I was constantly blowing papers. When I bought a case of replacement papers and the box said heavy duty filter press papers on it and they were much thicker and stronger than the light duty ones. I have gone through a case and a half since and haven't blown any papers.

[dsaw]

I got my air pump, went with an ARO since it was the cheapest I could find. I did what I could at home without the filter press to pre-plumb it and will hopefully finish it while the RO runs tomorrow.

As for sap; I checked my 4 far barrels tonight and had about the 2/3’rds of last weekends amount. I thought it’d be 1/2 or less without a several day freeze; sometimes it’s nice to be wrong. 6 more barrels to check tomorrow.

[Andrew Franklin]

Driving to work today I realized I didn't turn off the water at our lake cottage (heat is off). Drove down in a panic, and it must have been divine intervention because it was 11 degrees and no frozen pipes. What WAS frozen was about 120 gallons of sap. May try to get down tomorrow, but with a high of 39 late in the day and then back into the deep freeze I may just let it be a big popsicle and wait for the next thaw.