Bubblemaster 1.0!

[heus]

Russ when you soldered the compression fittings to the 1" tube did you simply drill a hole first the size of the fitting? Also, how big are the actual air holes, and do they point straight down or at alternating angles?

[Russell Lampron]

Russ when you soldered the compression fittings to the 1" tube did you simply drill a hole first the size of the fitting? Also, how big are the actual air holes, and do they point straight down or at alternating angles?

I drilled holes in the 1" pipes to put the compression fittings into then I soldered them in place. The holes in the tubes are 1/16" and point straight down.

[Russell Lampron]

Russ, one interesting variable is hot-air versus cold-air injection. It seems to me that the air injection does two things; 1) agitate the syrup and 2) cool the bottom of the pan. I'm wondering which variable is the most critical. I'm just guessing, but to me it seems that injecting hot air, drawn from a plenum around the stack for example, would do the agitation just as well AND might increase the boil rate by increasing the temp significantly since the stack temp is probably at or over 400 degrees. Perhaps this would increase the evaporation rate enough to keep the syrup from carmelizing and darkening. My fear is that cold air injection might have the negative effect of lengthening the boil-time over that of hot air. I haven't read-up on it, I'm just speculating. (more things to try...more things to spend money on....it never ends.).

Doc

Doc, you pose an interesting variable and my thought is that I want the cold air to slow down the caramelization process. The cold air doesn't seem to have a negative effect on the evaporation rate of my evaporator. If anything it is the same or better. With the amounts of sap that I got in a run this season I rarely boiled for more than an hour and a half at a time which made it hard to put a number on the evap rate. It was close to 40gph before and after the Bubblemaster.

[802maple]

Russ, i am trying to remember, are you wood or oil fired?

[Russell Lampron]

Russ, i am trying to remember, are you wood or oil fired?

Jerry, my evaporator is wood fired.

[moeh1]

this sounds like a great thing for the birch guys as well. I keep eyeballing my few birch trees as I drive by them....
thanks for sharing - another dang thing I've got to think about making.

[relseek]

Just curious as to whether you had to change the depth at which you run your pans to compensate for the extra bubbles? (so to not scorch pan) What sap depth do you run ?

[Russell Lampron]

I didn't change the sap depths in my pans. I run 1" in my front pan and just cover the feed pipes in the flue pan.

[Uncle Tucker]

Has anyone tried this in just the front pan? This is the only pan I could put this in, and I like to make light syrup. Im wondering if it would be worth it.

[Russell Lampron]

Has anyone tried this in just the front pan? This is the only pan I could put this in, and I like to make light syrup. Im wondering if it would be worth it.

I made bubblers for both of my pans. The guys that only put them in one pan put them in the flue pan. You may or may not notice any difference doing the front pan only. My thought is that it won't make much difference.