Yesterday was too cold for sap flow here, it got to 33 F but the trees didn't thaw. It was our first Maple Weekend day of 4 this year. Because the temperature was cold we ran the evaporator at medium cruising speed so we would not run out of sap. Traffic was slow too because of the temperature is my guess, we only had 14 cars all day, but they were buying product.
Today the sap will start by 10:00 and the temperature will get up to 49 F according to the forecast. We will thus be running full speed ahead, run the RO, the vacuum pumps. We still have about 700 gal of sap from Friday and before that is gone we will get plenty more to work with.
This might in that respect be the best Maple Weekend I ever had. Most I either need to nurse what little sap I have or sometimes just feed the pans with permeate. With the forecast more than 15 degrees F higher today, traffic should be much better too.
I hope everyone else is getting good sap flow too.
The forecast for this week looks like lots of sap too, but by the weekend it could get too warm for too long. That could end it all, time will tell.
Dave Klish, I recently bought 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.
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