Bigsap Warning 2009

[maplecrest]

good thing you have youth behind you theron. i feeling the growing pains and i have not boiled yet. finishing in the sugar house today. water in the r/o , soak for 24 hours then rinse. new air pump on filter press replacing gear pump. welder comming to fix leak in 1500 perm tank. put my new draw off tank on cart next to other one and plumb them togather to filter press. ran other one over all the time last year and tended to make some heavy syrup. put my new pan washer togather and i will be ready for sap in the am friday. not going to freeze here for three days the way it looks. got 7200 tapped 4 vac stations and releasers.

[michelle32]

Just starting to drip here in the buckets by the house.

[PATheron]

Jeff- I got the youth but I think its on its last legs. Pretty sore. Started running yesterday but the ground is still rock hard. Ran though the night and Id say just guessing Ive got maybe 1500 gallons. I think the ground needs to thaw which it did last night some. I think today may be pretty good. Had awefull time with my vac yesterday. Couldnt get over 22 or 23". Tunked spiles. Made a better cooler setup for the pump lines. Finally found an open 3/4 mainline. Fixed it and now Im at 26 at the sugarhouse releaser and 25 across the road. Very happy with that. Hard to believe with the pump per tap ration. Now Im ready for a good hard run which looks to be coming. Started putting buckets out last night and hope to get maybe a 100 in this weekend and neighbor wants to run a 100 too. Basically any component laying around that will make a hole in a tree and hold some sap goes in the woods this weekend. Other night ran a 1000' lateral with roughly 60 taps on it and stuck it on the system. Ill tell you what Im sure the vac is terreble but boy the sap really runs in it. Basically now Im at the point where Im gonna just throw things at the woods and see what sticks. Hopin to make a little syrup this week. Hope everyones havin fun. Thats what its all about. Forgot to mention this, My coolant line was getting a little warm on the pump so Had a brainstorm and went downstairs and got my 14' rowboat and filled it with cold wanter and put some of the loops in it and went up to the pond and cut big blocks of ice with the chainsaw and threw them in it. Worked dang good. Gonna rig up a better system for next year but Ill tell you what the boat worked pretty good. Hopefully today Ill have good vac and can just go have fun stringin buckets. Theron

[PATheron]

SAPS RUNNIN HARRRRRRRRRRRRD!!! Stringin buckets and ro'in sap. Big boil tomarrow. Theron

[caseyssugarshack93]

saps running hard here, pumps still running, just got done filling the honda up with gas,

[PATheron]

Update from BIGSAP ZAR residence- Think dad and I have kind of found our groove finally. Had the normal setbacks and mess ups like everyone but things are starting to smooth out. Got quite a bit of sap so far but sugar has been light so its not making as much syrup as last year. R.O runs pretty steady. Weve kind of settled in to 20% concentrate and it seems to work good for us. Were making nice syrup, color and taste, and it comes off at around 20 gallons per hour which is pretty fast for a 3 by 10. Makes it nice. Im still tapping in. Put out 150 buckets this weekend and made a setup for the kids to collect. Should be pretty fun. Have good vac on the bush. Runs at right around 25" which Im very happy with. Hope everyone is having fun. Jeff E- Whats the latest? Is your stuff running like heck? Theron

[danno]

Update from BIGSAP ZAR residence- Think dad and I have kind of found our groove finally. Had the normal setbacks and mess ups like everyone but things are starting to smooth out. Got quite a bit of sap so far but sugar has been light so its not making as much syrup as last year. R.O runs pretty steady. Weve kind of settled in to 20% concentrate and it seems to work good for us. Were making nice syrup, color and taste, and it comes off at around 20 gallons per hour which is pretty fast for a 3 by 10. Makes it nice. Im still tapping in. Put out 150 buckets this weekend and made a setup for the kids to collect. Should be pretty fun. Have good vac on the bush. Runs at right around 25" which Im very happy with. Hope everyone is having fun. Jeff E- Whats the latest? Is your stuff running like heck? Theron

20 gph on a 3x10 - amazing.

I've heard a few talking about low sugar. I've been between 1.5 and 2, but closer to 1.5. Without an RO, that's allot of boiling for not so much syrup. Wondering what all this rain is gonna do - probably increase sap volume, decrease sugar? Our ground is just saturated - gotta figure 3" rain this weekend with more tomorrow.

[Parker]

TTHHHEEE(littelpress)RRROOONN-How much have you made-and where is Dave Y?

[PATheron]

Parr(so much wood even marvin cant eat it up)ker- Near as I can tell right now weve got with what Im concentrating right now close to 450 gallons maybe. I just cap em and see if I can wait dad out on moving them. Figure if he has to stumble over them maybe hell move them when Im gone. Those 55s are toughys. My sap has been low in sugar compared to last year so Ive tried to counter act it with more taps. Done a pretty good job on that front. Looks like two weeks of constant freeze thaw so Im going to be pretty tired but once its over itll have been worth it I think. Got a call from Dave Ys friend last night. Hes got bout the same taps I have I think and that big run last week in 24 hours I guess he got like 8000 gallons. Well they started boiling on friday and havent shut down since. Dave boils all day and his buddy boils at night. They figure they can boil 2000 gallons in 24 hours. He said itll take till this thursday to catch up on everything but I think its going to start running hard tomarrow so it might get ugly. Im roing nights and boiling days. If I run it to 20% I can keep up ok. Little hairy first draw. Kind of makes dad a little jumpy but hell get used to it. I asked him about 25% but hes apprehensive( a little chicken). Ill wait and surprise him one of these days when he gets this down. Only thing that sucks about the high concentrate theres always BIG MONEY in a small area. I fill the head tank theres several thousand dollars in there kind of makes a guy paranoid but I guess you gotta be tough. Oh well, keep us posted. Get Marvin something to boil. Theron

[Jeff E]

Well, we got sap in the sugar house...We started tapping on Thursday, and had trouble getting the pumps to perform, getting the sap up the hill to the sugar house. I resolved it by adding another pump station partway up the hill. The real solution may be putting in a larger transfer tube, so I have less line friction loss...$$$$

We have a big storm coming, going from 45 today to -6 tomorrow night, 10 to 15 inches of snow and 40 mph winds...a doozy.
Since this storm is coming, I shut down the vac tonight, with 450 gallons of sap in the tank. Drained the lines, opened valves at the ladders, etc and prepared for the big freeze.

Starting Friday, we will get into a spell of good sap weather.

I am learning a LOT about this now that I have the equipment running. Finding leaks, learning about hollow trees. I am still needing to resolve my sap transfer issues.
Here are the details. 1 pump has to move sap uphill 47', over about 500'.
I have a 1 horse pump into a 1" line for this, going up maybe 35', then a 3/4 horse to finish the lift, into another 1"

The other is a 1200' run, going up about 32'. This is a 3/4 horse into a 1" for the whole run. It is pretty slow, and will probably not keep up on a big day.

ANY thoughts or advice?