Steam Table Pan Evaporator

[TDVT]

It seems as though there are alot of us doing the backyard sugaring, so I thought I'd throw one more home-brew setup out there. I've posted this photo in a couple other threads so you may have seen it.

We did our first year with the requisite cinder-block, wood-fired arch, then used a little gas burner with 1 hotel pan & I built this one three years ago.





We bought a few more pans & some 185,000 btu burners (the same ones are available from Bayou Classic for $12) & I welded up a frame of square steel tubing to hold all the pans & burners. There is a burner centered under each pan & each one has a valve so you can run them individually.

I used 1/2" tile-backer for the sides but it isn't really up to the heat & most was replaced with sheet metal. I'm not sure if the stove pipe helps or not. The burners would be happier with out any sides at all but you hate to lose all that heat.

We run it as a batch unit starting with the pans (usually only 3 of them) at about 4" depth then combining them into one & taking that pan almost to syrup. I added the handles (SS cabinet pulls) on the pans so you can just lift them up & pour them out.

We didn't sugar last year, but I think we ran 3 pans (10 gals?) down to one in about 1.5hrs, then the single pan about another 45mins down to nearly syrup & we'd have a little over a quart.

Overall a cheap solution. I think we have less than $175 in the whole thing & it's still functional though not as clean anymore (owner neglect) but it's presently being refurbished while we wait for the 2'+ of snow to go away.

We've decided to go back to wood for next year, this time with a proper pan & arch but will probably keep this around for my Dad (in photo) & for finishing.

[VT maple maker]

That is a cool looking rig. That would work great as a finishing rig im sure if you go back to wood. Very neat.

Kyle

[325abn]

Why the stack if your burning propane?

[TDVT]

Why the stack if your burning propane?

It's more of an exhaust pipe, since we had sides on it.

It vented all the hot exhaust out at one spot where it wasn't going to burn us as we tended the thing.

I was hoping it would offer some heat control/retention too (damper), but didn't really do much in that regard.

[TDVT]

We were a little bit late for the party but overall things are pretty far behind up here in the Northeast Kingdom anyway. We tapped around the 26th but didn’t really get much until this week. I had to rehab the propane rig because of neglect mostly, but changed a few things with the hope of improving its efficiency.

I really made only two big changes but it seems to be working a lot better.



In the past we had a lot of problems with wind & the burners, so I enclosed the sides completely & added a lining of firebrick at the same time. This keeps the heat in better & the wind out. The bottom is open under the three burners furthest from the pipe & is then closed under the 4th pan , then angles up toward the stack. The 4th pan is a sort of flue pan/pre heater without any direct heat but will eventually reach a light boil.



Because of the sides being fully enclosed, I lengthened the burner stems so that the valve & orifice/air shutter are outside of the enclosure, drawing in fresh air.



We are still batch processing, start from cold & take off about a quart of nearly finished syrup in about 1 ½ hrs. I figure we’re boiling off about 7+ gals an hour, not too bad for a small rig & all I really have to do is watch it & shut it off when it’s done.

[TapME]

nice looking rig. What has been your cost for propane?

[TDVT]

That is a question I can't answer yet.

We are running it off a 100gal bottle that was intended for a heater in a room over our garage & was pretty full but not quite. I'm keeping tabs on the gauge as we go so I'll try to figure it out at the end.

It uses enough that a small bottle will start to ice up but we ran our test run the other night on a bbq bottle & used less than I thought we would.

[Sugarmaker]

TDVT,
Very Nice clean rig. Lot of detail went in to building it. Lot of good ideas! Thanks for posting such good pictures too. 7 GPH not bad at all.
I have a friend that uses same pans on a barrel stove.
Regards,
Chris

[TDVT]

Our gas man showed up yesterday & refilled the tank we've been using for our evaporator. It took 33 gals to refill the tank, which is now more full than when we started boiling & we have made about 3 1/2 gallons of syrup. So we are using about 8.5-9 gals of propane per gallon of syrup.

Not great but it's ours.


I should add that when I built it a few years ago propane was about $1/gal, QUITE different form today's prices. As easy as this thing is to use we want to make the switch to wood next year & try to make a little more at the same time.

[Chris1971vermont]

[QUOTE=TDVT;47750]Our gas man showed up yesterday & refilled the tank we've been using for our evaporator. It took 33 gals to refill the tank, which is now more full than when we started boiling & we have made about 3 1/2 gallons of syrup. So we are using about 8.5-9 gals of propane per gallon of syrup.

Not great but it's ours.


I should add that when I built it a few years ago propane was about $1/gal, QUITE different form today's prices. As easy as this thing is to use we want to make the switch to wood next year & try to make a little more at the same time.[/QUOTE My Brother And I Are Also Using Propane To Boil Our Sap As Well. We Started Last Year With 4 Steam Table Pans, With 4 Turkey Fryers Getting About 6-8 Gph. We Figured Around 8-10 Gallons Of Propane To Boil 42 Gallons Of Sap At 2% Sugar To Make A Gallon Of Maple Syrup. Costed Us Roughly $25-$30 In Propane Per Gallon Of Syrup. $2.50-$3.00 Per Gallon Of Propane, Expensive But Fun To Do With The Family. This Year We Bought A 2x4 Flat Pan/ Preheater, and Set The Flat Pan On The Turkey Fryers. Still Using About The Same Amount Of Propane, Like You Said, Losing Alot Of Heat Out The Sides. So We Made A Homemade R.O For Around $400 That Processes About 12 Gallons/Hour Of Sap. And Takes It From 2% Sugar And Brings It Between 6-8% Sugar. We Can Now Make A Gallon Of Syrup Using About 2.5 Gallons Of Propane. We Think We Could Do Even Better With A Similar Design That You Have Built To Put Our Pan In. We Love The Simplicity Of Propane,And Even More With The R.0. Thanks For Sharing Your Design. My Brother And I Will Be Building This For Next Season. Chris