Back even when I had 1320 taps, my highest number ever, and I processed sap from others , bringing my total # of taps to just under 2500 (but I rarely got more than 1800-2000 taps worth on any given day, I only had a 150 gal head tank. I had it elevated on a platform on the north side of the sugarhouse. I supplied it from 3 SS tanks on the ground as well as 2 caged totes on my gooseneck trailer, which each held 280 gal when filled to the very top, which I did most times when sap enough was available. To fill the head tank, I hooked up to whichever tank on the ground had the oldest sap in it, I ran it thru the RO, and sent it to the head tank at about 8%. Then as the head tank got to about 40-50 gal in it (the evaporator was already full to operating depth) I fired up the evaporator. My RO did 250 gph from 2% to 8% in one pass if I held the operating pressure at 275PSI. Often asthe head tank got near full, I started recirculating from the head tank back through the RO and back to the head tank. When doing that I usually lowered the operating pressure to about 225PSI. As the head tank got down to about 40 gal, I switched back to RO fresh sap from a ground tank and sending the concentrate to the head tank.
My RO output was slightly higher output than my evaporation rate, thus in time I again switched to recirculating through the RO and back to the head. I continued that until all new sap had been run thru the RO and the head tank was down to my stop fueling mark on my tank level gauge, and I stopped adding wood. I then let it burn out, shut off the AOF/AUF blower pumped all drawn syrup from my draw off tank and sent it to my finisher. I generally was filtering and bottling as this went on, but I didn't always finish all of the syrup that day. If held over, it was finished the next day as soon as the evaporator was at full boil.
As I bottled, I always filled bottles and jugs as needed for the grade I was producing until my rack was up to proper inventory, then I let the rest sit in the finisher until I had enough to till another barrel. At that point I brought the finisher contents back up to 190-200F, filtered it and sent it to a clean empty barrel. I never left a partially full barrel to finish the next day, I had marks near my draw off box which showed when I had 26.5+ gal and 40+ gal in the finisher. I had both of those size barrels, I also had 16 gal and 15.5 gal barrels, but I didn't have those marks on the side of my draw off box.
I really liked the 150-gal head tank. Before I got that tank, I used an old SS milk tank that held 200 gal and before that my head tank was 415 gal. I liked the smaller tank because it kept the concentrate fresher. If I for some reason was not able to finish all sap, I wanted it kept as sap, not concentrate.
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.