January Journal

[Gary R]

Those days of nasty presents are way behind me. It was a SIHI liquid ring vacuum pump. I couldn't fit the wood in my van

[acers]

in a pinch here sugar house still not done and still need to get evap

[farmall h]

Mighty cold this am. -15 on the thermometer plus the wind chill. Got to the barn this morning around 10am and dragged out the Universal pump and took it home to the garage. I need to check the vac tank for leaks, fact is I don't know if the motor even runs. It might be 220v. I believe the pump draws vacuum 'cause I cranked it over by turning the pulley and pretty near sucked my hand up the 1 1/2 pipe! I am new to vacuum. A pump this large must need a regulator? I remember the old Universal pump at the farm had weights in the oiler...this was the way to regulate vacuum? Maybe too big? Is that possible? We'll see. I must add... it was colder in the sugarhouse than it was outside!

[3rdgen.maple]

Okay this cold is rediculous. I did run into a bit of luck friday. I'll tell you the delima I have first. I have been considering alot of running vac across the road where most of my trees are. I will have something like 400 buckets on that side this year and there are way more trees to get. So the problem is no elecricity on that side and I do not want to run gas driven pumps because of the cost of running gas and how often I will have to feed it. I have the pumps already with 220 motors on them. Well friday a customer who has felt the pinches of the economy needs about 2000 bucks of labor and will struggle between paying his employees this week or paying to fix his press. He has a brand new deisel generator that is like 4 months old he bought for a backup and not used even once. Brand new this thing is 6500 bucks. He said if I fix the press it is mine. Hmmm what is a man to do. This thing is pretty sweet. dual 120,s and 230 a dc converter, onboard battery charger 9500 watts electric start with remote controls completly weather tight and on wheels 413cc motor with silent muffler system and runs 20 hours on a 5 gallon tank. Problem solved I will have a bush on vac next year now. Almost forgot yes Haynes it is a food grade generator now I have to find some food grade diesel to run in it....

[vtsnowedin]

Okay this cold is rediculous. I did run into a bit of luck friday. I'll tell you the delima I have first. I have been considering alot of running vac across the road where most of my trees are. I will have something like 400 buckets on that side this year and there are way more trees to get. So the problem is no elecricity on that side and I do not want to run gas driven pumps because of the cost of running gas and how often I will have to feed it. I have the pumps already with 220 motors on them. Well friday a customer who has felt the pinches of the economy needs about 2000 bucks of labor and will struggle between paying his employees this week or paying to fix his press. He has a brand new deisel generator that is like 4 months old he bought for a backup and not used even once. Brand new this thing is 6500 bucks. He said if I fix the press it is mine. Hmmm what is a man to do. This thing is pretty sweet. dual 120,s and 230 a dc converter, onboard battery charger 9500 watts electric start with remote controls completly weather tight and on wheels 413cc motor with silent muffler system and runs 20 hours on a 5 gallon tank. Problem solved I will have a bush on vac next year now. Almost forgot yes Haynes it is a food grade generator now I have to find some food grade diesel to run in it....

I'd chain and padlock that to a good big NON-maple tree so it don't come up MIA.

[mapleman3]

heading out to the woods to set my mainlines... Last year I used the wire tighteners.. this year I bought load straps that are about 2 inches wide and 20 ft long... I will tighten my mainlines up with those and the grippers... that way no damage to the tree when the strap goes around and they hold like a thousand pounds. I'm looking for quick install and quick de-install when I'm done since I have to take ALL my tubing down each year. imagine I'm starting today and will have everything back down by April 30.. sucks but what are ya going to do.

I'm looking at 2 sets of woods on nice slopes that if I can get in there no more putting up and taking down tubing and much closer as they are in my town!! we shall see this spring / summer when the leaves are out.

[vtsnowedin]

Warming right up. Only -10 this morning. We set the pans on the arch yesterday afternoon. The only trouble I'm having is the ceramic gasket between the pans is so thick that the nipples on the flue pan aren't long enough to get through the float boxs on the finish pan to the point that I can get the steel washer and rubber gasket on them. Perhaps when I test fire/cure refractory cement/wash fluepan today the heat will work the kinks out and I can snug them up compressing the blanket and get them on. If not I'll have to take the finish pan back off and split that gasket in half or leave it out. There wasn't one between them when it was setup before. Took a hike up through the north slope I'm going to tap. plenty of 24"plus maples that havent been tapped in twenty five years and some have never been tapped.I don't have anywhere near enough pipeline and tubbing as yet. Just to big an area with steep slopes and random gaps between bunches of tapable trees.

[Sugarmaker]

Heading to the sugar house to try to do something constructive!

Chris

[dano2840]

plumbing up the releaser and bringing it over to the woods delivering some syrup collage scholarship essays boring day

[3rdgen.maple]

Hey Gator are you gonna stay up till 12:01 and get the Febuary journel started or do I have to do it again No sleeping at the computor this time....