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Thread: Sap is running

  1. #11
    Join Date
    Mar 2006
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    west virginia
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    Canaanmaple,
    If I remember correctly you joined the WV Maple Producers Assoc. Can't wait making your acquaintance.

    Mark 220 maple
    1100 taps on low vaccum, 900 on gravity.
    900 plus taps leased and on high vacuum
    35 cfm Indiana Liquid Ring Vacuum Pump
    80% Sugar, 20% Red MAPLES
    http://s247.photobucket.com/albums/g...Maple%20Syrup/

  2. #12
    Join Date
    Dec 2017
    Location
    Wv
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    17

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    1800 gallons of sap into the season. 4x150gpd RO and 2x4’ flat pan sure leaves a lot to be desired. RO is always behind on good runs. I knock out half the volume with Ro and boil the rest. Over 100 hrs on the arch street far and made 36.75 gal of syrup. Going to limp through this season with what we got and try to get 50 gallons of syrup. Dreaming of a 330 you procon with a 1 1/2 hp feeding a 4x40 membrane to get to 8% on the concentrate. Is an elevated feed tank enough or is a feed pump necessary? Hoping to tap 50 more next yeAr and want to allow for expansion on the ro. Any advice? Tired of cutting fire wood. Please help. Or what wood you do? Pun intended.

  3. #13
    Join Date
    Dec 2017
    Location
    Wv
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    17

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    Forgot to add keeping concentrate below 40 *F by freezing 1/2 gallon blocks and adding back to an insulated barrel.

  4. #14
    Join Date
    Feb 2018
    Location
    Canaan Valley, WV
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    220

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lilshot View Post
    1800 gallons of sap into the season. 4x150gpd RO and 2x4’ flat pan sure leaves a lot to be desired. RO is always behind on good runs. I knock out half the volume with Ro and boil the rest. Over 100 hrs on the arch street far and made 36.75 gal of syrup. Going to limp through this season with what we got and try to get 50 gallons of syrup. Dreaming of a 330 you procon with a 1 1/2 hp feeding a 4x40 membrane to get to 8% on the concentrate. Is an elevated feed tank enough or is a feed pump necessary? Hoping to tap 50 more next yeAr and want to allow for expansion on the ro. Any advice? Tired of cutting fire wood. Please help. Or what wood you do? Pun intended.
    where are you at? I fear the season is almost done, not based on temps, but I noticed buds on the big sugars that are out in the open full sun pastures today, and I am pretty much at the highest and coldest elevation Ran for weeks in Feb and pretty much no snow, which is very very odd here. No buds visible on the northeast facing hills though, so should be a good week for those

    IMG_7017.jpg

  5. #15
    Join Date
    Dec 2017
    Location
    Wv
    Posts
    17

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    We are hoping to get another week to ten days before we call it quits. We have some reds and silvers tapped that get full sun and they are not quite as far along as the buds in your pic. The bulk of our trees are on northerly slope so have a bit of time yet. You definitely have us on elevation. We are just outside of Masontown in Preston county.

  6. #16
    Join Date
    Feb 2018
    Location
    Canaan Valley, WV
    Posts
    220

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lilshot View Post
    We are hoping to get another week to ten days before we call it quits. We have some reds and silvers tapped that get full sun and they are not quite as far along as the buds in your pic. The bulk of our trees are on northerly slope so have a bit of time yet. You definitely have us on elevation. We are just outside of Masontown in Preston county.
    awesome! its running good now and looks like a few nights in 20s this week and snow next weekend. I may call it quits at that time because I'm burnt out! need bigger evaporator!

  7. #17
    Join Date
    Mar 2005
    Location
    Albion PA
    Posts
    5,099

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lilshot View Post
    1800 gallons of sap into the season. 4x150gpd RO and 2x4’ flat pan sure leaves a lot to be desired. RO is always behind on good runs. I knock out half the volume with Ro and boil the rest. Over 100 hrs on the arch street far and made 36.75 gal of syrup. Going to limp through this season with what we got and try to get 50 gallons of syrup. Dreaming of a 330 you procon with a 1 1/2 hp feeding a 4x40 membrane to get to 8% on the concentrate. Is an elevated feed tank enough or is a feed pump necessary? Hoping to tap 50 more next yeAr and want to allow for expansion on the ro. Any advice? Tired of cutting fire wood. Please help. Or what wood you do? Pun intended.
    Wow you folks down south are doing good! Lilshot, you have done great with the equipment you have and the amount of sap processed into syrup. Larger faster equipment will surely cut your boiling time and wood consumption too! I have never boiled on that small of a evaporator, maybe someday when I retire! So you thinking the bigger RO first?
    Keep boiling!
    Regards,
    Chris
    Casbohm Maple and Honey
    625 roadside taps + Neighbors bring some sap too!
    3x10 King, WRU, AOF and AUF
    12" SIRO Filter Press.
    2015 Ford F250 PSD sap hauler
    One Golden named Maggie, Norwegian Forest Cat named Lucy
    Too many Cub Cadets
    Ford Jubilee and several Allis WD's, and IH tractors
    1932 Ford AAB ton and a half, dump truck

    www.mapleandhoney.com

  8. #18
    Join Date
    Feb 2018
    Location
    Canaan Valley, WV
    Posts
    220

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    Think I am calling it quits! the temps the next 60 hours wont be under 50 even for the lows. Looks like more sap weather after, but been making syrup for a month now. I didn't keep great stats, but over 25 gallons syrup on my 2x4, and ended up dumping sap sometimes because I couldn't keep up. (I didn't use my RO kit too much, because I just don't think it tastes the same, regardless of what studies may say about mineral content)

    Ended up dumping one boil because it started to smell a little sour to me, from sap sitting too long I guess. But a local distiller picked up the concentrate, and a mead maker got the rest for making maple-honey mead, so got to spread the love! They thought it tasted fine, so I guess I am picky.

    Found a guy to buy 2% sap at .35/gal though, so will probably do that on the next weeks run!

    Time for a bigger evaporator!

  9. #19
    Join Date
    Dec 2017
    Location
    Wv
    Posts
    17

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    Sugarmaker, I think our next step is a bigger RO. Makes the most sense to me. Evaporator has to be watched and fed. An Ro set up with low pressure cutoff could be walked away from. As much as I like force feeding the fire I am sure it would be more efficient to concentrate sap to a higher sugar content before boiling.

    Canaan, we are going to let it go until Wednesday of next week. Still getting 150 gallons a day and it should freeze up decent this weekend and run good first of the week. Really hoping to get 50 gallons. Getting very difficult to filter with the cone filter though. Almost looks muddy coming off the evaporator. The end is near.

  10. #20
    Join Date
    Dec 2017
    Location
    Wv
    Posts
    17

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    Just pulled the pan off the arch. Almost syrup at 216f. Had three pre filters had to pull 2 and barely got the remainder through the third. Brown funky mess! Darkest so far this year. Should make 4.75 gallons syrup if I did the math right. Hope it does and we will hit our season goal of 50 gallons syrup with the next cook. Had the arch cooking hard when we pulled the pan, my kids were thrilled to have a hotdog roast and s’mores. Redneck livin at it’s finest.

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