My plan 2022/23

[bigschuss]

Thanks, that is helpful, and yes it was all raw sap.

I won’t likely have another boil for a week or two depending obviously on the weather. I drew off all of the sap from the pans. I put the first two draw offs in stainless steel pots for possible boiling into syrup, but now I think I will save it with the other sweet and just return it to the pan in the correct order, giving myself the chance to draw syrup sooner the next time I boil.

I was really pleased with the 13 gallons per hour boil rate. (I know that is slow for the professional rigs). Next time I will be more careful with how much wood I will put in it. It will still be to the top of the pan, but I will not push as much back into the firebox, to prevent the super heating of the stack.

Great plan. Haven't even tapped yet here....forecast isn't good all week. Just got several snow storms in a row. Today is my historical average for 1st day of tapping. Going to get out this week and tap.

When your season comes to an end Gary you're going to have a lot of syrup in your pan. If you're running a 2" sap depth that's about 10 gallons of sap in a 2x4, and of that 3 or 3.5 will be syrup, if you've been drawing off regularly and have the pan nice and sweet. What I do is SLOWLY and CAREFULLY take the level down to 1"...or about 5 gallons (with 3 gallons of that being syrup). I've gone as low as 3/4" of an inch but don't recommend it. Then when you empty the pan of that 5 gallons you'll have a lot less finishing to do compared to draining it at 2" and 10 gallons.

Good stuff! 13 GPH is impressive for your rig.

[Bgreisch]

You talked about freezing your sweet that you drew off your pan, if it freezes remember it will probably take a few days to thaw. If you are only waiting a week to boil again maybe just putting it in the fridge would be better. But getting a cinder block arch to boil at that rate that is awesome. Also the dark stuff floating in your channels is normal, just concentrated niter.

Bryan

[Swingpure]

Great plan. Haven't even tapped yet here....forecast isn't good all week. Just got several snow storms in a row. Today is my historical average for 1st day of tapping. Going to get out this week and tap.

When your season comes to an end Gary you're going to have a lot of syrup in your pan. If you're running a 2" sap depth that's about 10 gallons of sap in a 2x4, and of that 3 or 3.5 will be syrup, if you've been drawing off regularly and have the pan nice and sweet. What I do is SLOWLY and CAREFULLY take the level down to 1"...or about 5 gallons (with 3 gallons of that being syrup). I've gone as low as 3/4" of an inch but don't recommend it. Then when you empty the pan of that 5 gallons you'll have a lot less finishing to do compared to draining it at 2" and 10 gallons.

Good stuff! 13 GPH is impressive for your rig.

Thanks I was going to first search and then ask about how to get the last of the syrup out on the last day. That is helpful.

[Swingpure]

You talked about freezing your sweet that you drew off your pan, if it freezes remember it will probably take a few days to thaw. If you are only waiting a week to boil again maybe just putting it in the fridge would be better. But getting a cinder block arch to boil at that rate that is awesome. Also the dark stuff floating in your channels is normal, just concentrated niter.

Bryan

Double thanks regarding the niter and the advice about the sweet.

I have a “bunkie” that I keep to just above freezing and can keep it in the building. That will be as good as a fridge. The sap I drew off the barrel are in 6 different pails, with different volumes of the sweet in them. They are all numbered, so I can put them back in the right order.

[aamyotte]

I read on here somewhere that the sweet levels would find their path to the right spot when poured back in. I don't know how it does that though.

[Swingpure]

You talked about freezing your sweet that you drew off your pan, if it freezes remember it will probably take a few days to thaw. If you are only waiting a week to boil again maybe just putting it in the fridge would be better. But getting a cinder block arch to boil at that rate that is awesome. Also the dark stuff floating in your channels is normal, just concentrated niter.

Bryan

I put the sweet in the bunkie where it will stay refrigerator cold.

The funny thing, which I meant to put down on my third email of things that did not go quite perfect, was I had frozen a fair amount of sap for yesterday’s boil. Two days prior I put the pails into my heated garage. Some totally thawed and most looked like they were mostly thawed, with just a top layer of ice. I never looked closely at them. On Sunday morning went I went to bring them out to boil I was surprised to see that they were mostly all frozen to the bottom and open only on the sides.

My solution was to put them on top of the pan or if small enough, in the channels and let the steam and hot sap melt them. I knew they would increase the sap level in the pan and nothing was entering the pan via the float box as a result. The volume of sap that melted off them, superseded what was steaming off, and the sap level went to the full six inches of the channel. What was amazing, was once all the frozen sap melted and the sap level was 6 inches, it was boiling hard. Eventually it got down to the prescribed level and as soon as the float box started allowing sap from the feed tank to flow into the pan, that is where I measured my boil rate, by hour, for three hours.

I collected 28 gallons of sap today, I have put that into my heated garage, but I have lowered the heat in the garage to be just above freezing.

The 28 gallons of sap today, plus the almost 20 gallons of “sweet”, will give me a good start for the next time I boil. I suspect there will be other minor flow days before I boil again, so I might get that closer to 80 gallons.

[bigschuss]

I read on here somewhere that the sweet levels would find their path to the right spot when poured back in. I don't know how it does that though.

The gradient is reestablished fairly quickly once you start boiling again.

[The Heldeberg Sapper]

Vigorously boiling.

I think I know what is going on, it did it last year with my steam pans. All of a sudden the fire takes off and you can hear it roar and the flames are racing across the ramp.

My firebox is two logs deep and I fill it to the bottom of the pan. It is also likely that some of the back row is on the slanted ramp. I think it may take off like that when I put too much wood in it.

I had the same problem with my 2x5 oil tank arch, what ive learned over the past 3 seasons is that i no longer fill the firebox completely to the brim but instead i put 4 or 5 pieces in once i hear the rig starting to slow down (about 4 minutes or so but ive never timed it but its not long). This has helped me tremendously with not melting the stack down, but it still will get dull red from time to time after i fire it again for a minute. I am averaging 20gph doing it this way with a 2x3 flat back pan and 2x3 front syrup pan and 2" of insulation in the arch. I would experiment with different firing options and see what works best for you.

[Swingpure]

I had the same problem with my 2x5 oil tank arch, what ive learned over the past 3 seasons is that i no longer fill the firebox completely to the brim but instead i put 4 or 5 pieces in once i hear the rig starting to slow down (about 4 minutes or so but ive never timed it but its not long). This has helped me tremendously with not melting the stack down, but it still will get dull red from time to time after i fire it again for a minute. I am averaging 20gph doing it this way with a 2x3 flat back pan and 2x3 front syrup pan and 2" of insulation in the arch. I would experiment with different firing options and see what works best for you.

Thanks next boil I will put less wood in it. I was putting in almost two armfuls each time I added wood. I will watch my boil and only put in enough to maintain the vigorous boil.

Despite my pan maker and base stack maker saying I want the stack red hot, “he says that is how it makes syrup”, I found it a little scary. I will dial it back.

[Swingpure]

Just a little note I did not add in my initial review, is during my water test boil and with this sap boil, I discovered just how much sap I need in my feed tank, once I stop adding wood and I am shutting down. In both cases 15 gallons of water/sap in the feed tank is perfect to provide all of the sap that the pan needs until it cools down and also empty the feed tank so that the sap in it does not freeze in the tank and does not freeze the feed valve.

I also keep a 4 gallon of emergency sap, just in case I need a little more.


And just as an aside, although none of my taps are racing, not even close, but the taps I did on December 27, are still flowing just as well as the ones I did in February and March.