What if I poured a gal or 2 of vinegar and filled the evaporator with water and fired it up. Would that help clean it?
What if I poured a gal or 2 of vinegar and filled the evaporator with water and fired it up. Would that help clean it?
Yes. And at the end of the season you can leave your last sweet or even sap in the pans for a few weeks, it will turn to vinegar and soak into the niter and leave your pans sparkling like new with very little scrubbing. There are dozens of posts on here about that, some including myself leave the pans soaking in maple vinegar for a month or two after the season.
'12 15 jugs - Steam pans
'17 125 3/16 - 18" x 72" drop flue on homemade arch
'18 240 3/16 - Deer Run 125
'19 450 3/16 - Converted RO to electric/added a membrane
'20 600 3/16 - Maple Pro 2x6 Raised Flue, added AOF/AUF
'21 570 3/16 - Built steam hood, Smoky Lake filter press
'22 800 3/16 - Upgraded RO to 4 4x40
'23 500 3/16 - Re-plumbed RO, new "Guzzler"
'24 500 3/16 - Steam Away, DIY 8x40 RO
I do like bmbmkr and do the sap soak, If you catch it before it molds or get's too funky you can filter off some of the Maple Vinegar for salad dressings and cooking. You'll need to pasteurize it though. I just heat it to 180 for a few minutes to stabilize it. If it goes too far the mother consumes the whole pan and then spoils. Doesn't make any difference for cleaning but ruins vinegar. I also made vinegar independent of the evaporator....actually works better for vingegar. I save some mother in the fridge from each year.
125-150 taps
Smokey Lakes Full pint Hybrid pan
Modified half pint arch
Air over fire
All 3/16 tubing
Southern Ohio
Thank you both for the reply.
Wow....when I tried that pan cleaning method, nothing I saw in the evaporator made me think 'I'll put that on my salad'
I use chemicals now, like vinegar or milk stone remover acid, or pan cleaner from a Maple dealer. Less mold in the sugar house is better for me. Also I don't have the waiting time.
Heat is the key to get the niter loosened up.
Jeff Emerson
www.emersonsmaplehill.com
3x12 Leader with over air, custom piggyback, 600gph CDL RO
2500 on 25" vacuum
350 4 wheeler, 500 snowmobile, and 1950's Ford 600 tractor, Husqvarna! (261, 372xpBigBore, 562xp), Stihl MS193 for in tree work
We generally leave the fermented sap in the pans until it makes you gag when you come through the front door of the camp. I've never once been tempted to eat it! I've seen the contents get so ropey that it would barely drain out a 1" pipe. It kills a large patch of grass on the hill beside the camp where we've drained the contents.
We drained and washed our pans last weekend after letting them sit for 7 weeks. We had more tartar than ever on the flues and they came clean with a little pressure washer time. The syrup pan is sparkling!
4,600 Taps on vacuum
9,400 gallons storage
3 tower CDL RO
3.5'x14' Lapierre Force 5
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I think your first idea would dilute the vinegar too much. Cutting the vinegar with too much water is not a good idea. I use straight vinegar, but many get good results adding 1 or 2, maybe 3 gal water and get good results. Reducing the strength more than that I'd think would dilute it too much.
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.
if you want any vinegar, you got to keep an eye on it. Heat and time just makes it spoil, as your culture dies. By the time most check their pans it's a slimy goo. It doesn't always make vinegar. When it does the vinegar lies under the mother or goo. Light and heat affect this process, I cover my pan. Like I said I do my vinegar in 2 gallon glass jugs when I want true usable vinegar, but I have seen it come off the pan. A sugar content of about 10% is best for vinegar, too sweet and it totally ferments and then rots.
125-150 taps
Smokey Lakes Full pint Hybrid pan
Modified half pint arch
Air over fire
All 3/16 tubing
Southern Ohio
We use the acid from the maple dealer. Our pans were sitting empty and dirty until 2 weeks ago. Filled them up with acid/water. Turned the oil burner on and waited for a boil to start. Shut it off and went back a week later and used a wash cloth to remove anything left. As mentioned, heat is key with the acid. Pans are shiny new. Shack serves as more than just a sugar house so letting sap sit isn’t an option.
305 taps on 2 Shurflo's, 31 taps on 3/16" and 229 taps on gravity. 565 in all
Mountain Maple S3 controller for 145 of the vacuum taps
2x6 Darveau Mystique Oil Fired Evaporator w/ Smoky Lake Simplicity Auto Draw
Wesfab 7” filter press
We have someone near us that goes to farmers markets with the vinegar,people lap it up because it has the term “ maple” in it. Funny thing was one day an elderly outspoken lady was at his booth and declared that the vinegar was the garbage that she knew we cleaned our pans with and dumped. Really hard to keep from laughing out loud at that comment
7th generation maple producer in sugarhouse built in 1892
2x World Champion Maple Syrup Producer
1250 taps on cv adapters
Leader Vortex 3x14 with Max Flue and Revolution Syrup Pan,Enhanced Steam Away
www.leggettmaplesyrup.com