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Thread: Getting Sap from Woods Tanks to Sugar House - Push? Pull?

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Feb 2012
    Location
    Raymond, NH
    Posts
    347

    Default Getting Sap from Woods Tanks to Sugar House - Push? Pull?

    Right now I am hauling sap out of the woods with a UTV that has a small tank in the back. Lots of fussing with lines and a WX10 pump. Gets interesting when there is deep snow cause if I try to plow these trails, I just end up with a stuck plow. I would love to set something up to get the sap all pulled/pushed into my tank behind my sugar house. I am gonna attempt to include a drawing...
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    I have 3/16 lines on natural gravity across the street. I can't go over the road with anything, but there is a culvert under the road that I could probably get some tubing through. I do not have a good way to get any kind of power over there, and I really don't want to. I thought about putting a lunchpail over there, but 150 trees would probably overwhelm it and I also don't think it would have the power to get the sap all the way up to the sugar house.

    Thought about doing some ladders to suck the sap from those 3/16 lines up the hill and into the mainline that is running on vac now. Then I could pump everything from there up to the sugar shack. But doing that would require me to have power out where the releaser is in order to run the pump and provide freeze protection. And getting power out there would not be cheap or easy. It's 200 ft away from the electric panel in my barn, across my yard.

    Another thought was to put the vac pump and the releaser in the sugar shack and get crazy with ladders or some system to just suck all the sap up to the shack. But I have no idea how to make that work or if it's even a good idea to attempt.

    Another thought I had was to leave everything set up like it is now, and put a guzzler in the sugar shack and run a 3/16 line from the guzzler to each woods tank. Then I can just slowly suck the sap from each woods tank up the hill to my shack.

    Does anyone out there have any input or experience with what should work, or what won't work?
    More taps than the year before. Bigger shack than the year before. Leader Patriot 2x6 w/hood. 3-post Dolly, but still too much sap and not enough wood or time.
    www.wickedsappy.com

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jan 2006
    Location
    Oneida NY
    Posts
    11,547

    Default

    Lots of questions. I'll try to answer some of them as best I can, in no particular order.
    Using a guzzler trying to pull sap may work, but I doubt it could move sap that is over 20-25' below the pump, especially in a 3/16. The maximum lift with perfect vacuum on a std. air pressure day at sea level is 29' and a few inches. If the atmospheric pressure drops, it is less. Then comes the question of line friction. Even if it would pull sap thru a 1" pipe, it may not thru a 3/16 nor even a 5/16 because of line friction.
    Pushing the sap may be your option OR get a good vacuum pump and use sap ladders.
    While I pull 3/16 lines from 5 and 6' below the main and then pull it up about 12' above the main, across the driveway and then back down to the mainline with 26-27" of vacuum on it, I've been told by experts that I lose some potential to line friction. I am OK with that, but my lines when running are maybe half sap and half gases, thus my lift is really only about half. Once I cross the driveway, the 3/16 slopes down at about a 35 degree angle to the mainline too, that helps too, along with the 26+" vacuum on the mainline using a piston pump, nowt a diaphragm pump. In your case you said you would be sucking the sap from each of the tanks, thus no air, just sap.
    I may try to answer this more, later.
    Dave Klish, I recently ordered a 2x6 wood fired evaporator from A&A Sheet Metal which I will be converting to oil fired
    Now have solar, 2x6 finish pan, 5 bank 7x7 filter press, large water jacketed bottler, and tankless water heater.
    Recently bought another Gingerich RO, this one was a 125, but a second membrane was added thus is a 250, like I had.
    After running a 2x3, a 2x6, 3x8 tapping from 79 taps up to 1320 all woodfired, now I'm going to a 2x6 oil fired and a 200-425 taps.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2012
    Location
    Raymond, NH
    Posts
    347

    Default

    I know that I'm all over the place and probably did not describe it too well! I appreciate your input. I have a million ideas, but not sure if any of them are good or not. I want to try to make things easier. I don't wan't to make more headaches. I could get the vac pump in the sugar shack with the releaser and just eliminate the woods tanks, but then I fear that I would be running around trying to thaw out ladders everywhere and this would all be going through my yard so it would be a pain to set up every year (or leave it year round, but it'll look ugly.)
    More taps than the year before. Bigger shack than the year before. Leader Patriot 2x6 w/hood. 3-post Dolly, but still too much sap and not enough wood or time.
    www.wickedsappy.com

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