|
Slow is Fast posted:Posted in the other thread but I'm loving lazy. put in lines once, rest for 5+ years
|
#
?
Mar 24, 2023 14:02
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 3, 2024 18:25 |
|
|
starting to see more niter but also I am over 600 gals in and expect to blast through another 25-50 today prior season record was 630gal sap.
|
|
#
?
Mar 24, 2023 21:29
|
|
|
..yep, hit 631 exactly last night  I get a couple days off here, then probably boil 2-3 times next week. In 2021 I did my last boil on 4/5 when our younger kid was, at the time, 3 days old; I think I might shoot for a last boil on 4/5 and then fuckin be done, sap or no sap (kid's middle name is "Maple"  ). By my math I'm already art $500 net retail assuming I sell everything, and I haven't even bottled any of the bitchy-but-profitable 12oz bottles yet.If I can net $1000+ I can pay my wife back the $800 she threw at the vacuum and have enough bankroll for taps, filters, etc next year. I am thinking I may not look at any more substantial upgrades for a couple years. CDL has a nice RO unit but the one I'd want is a couple grand, and also, currently, exceeds my needs. Two more years of adding lines.... we'll see.  the outside of these need to be washed and have my logo stickers applied, but they all sealed and ready. New rig seems like it just easily cruises through 100-150gals in a day and poops out 2.5-3 gals of syrup. Even with the more detailed care needed (draining flues at night, etc), it's tremendously more efficient. Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 19:24 on Mar 25, 2023 |
|
#
?
Mar 25, 2023 19:20
|
|
|
Do you guys use refractometers? I got a pair for Christmas and holy poo poo they're nice. I can't believe how easy these things are to read vs. the alternatives. (I don't know how accurate it is, but RO water correctly displayed 0%.) You can see the percent sugar of your liquid down to the first decimal point. My raw sap is 3.6%, the output of the reverse osmosis machine is at 5.2%, and the stuff I just started boiling is up around 7.0% exactly. This is way better than having to boil water and counting up 7°F or calculating off barometric pressure. Just put a few drops on the prism and stare at the sun.
|
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2023 01:15
|
|
|
DreadLlama posted:Do you guys use refractometers? I got a pair for Christmas and holy poo poo they're nice. I can't believe how easy these things are to read vs. the alternatives. (I don't know how accurate it is, but RO water correctly displayed 0%.) You can see the percent sugar of your liquid down to the first decimal point. My raw sap is 3.6%, the output of the reverse osmosis machine is at 5.2%, and the stuff I just started boiling is up around 7.0% exactly. This is way better than having to boil water and counting up 7°F or calculating off barometric pressure. Just put a few drops on the prism and stare at the sun. nope I just use a glass hydrometer like an old timey redneck, which is a pleasing affectation to me (minus the obvious racist, patriarchal elements) but those look cool and I will get one and compare to the hydrometer. No RO here, but, I think that's a necessary next step. I absolutely cannot keep up, boiling around 100gals a day on boil days (7 so far) and I have a nearly full 240gal tank that's down maybe an inch or two from where I started the day. Also I'm sick as poo poo, again, and so my spouse managed stuff a bunch today because the alternative was dumping sap. I think I'm done after this week / weekend. If I went absolutely buck wild and ran it to the end maybe I could fund a $2k CDL RO unit for next year, but, that can either wait another year or I can stop buying synthesizers and beer for a few months, whatever. e: I do think this rig gets close to 20 gph at peak with good, thin chopped wood; startup and shutdown times and needing to cram the startup and shutdown into almost nonexistent space at the beginning of my work day, plus family poo poo, means I only boil at peak for 3-6 hrs depending on day. If 15gals of finished syrup isn't my stopping point, 20 definitely will be. IDK where we are now, but it's somewhere north of 10 by the EOD. I think to shutdown at the end of the year, assuming I'm finishing off everything in the pans -- I would boil water in the back pan while boiling down the concentrate from the last cook, in the front pans? maaan that sounds like a pain in the rear end, I might just wait until I cross 15/20 and dump everything, gently caress it. Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 22:34 on Mar 27, 2023 |
|
#
?
Mar 27, 2023 22:29
|
|
|
 My sap is boiling at 217°F, which is 2 degrees less than I would think it should be before it's syrup. According to the refractometer, it's 68brix. I guess I could be bottling now.
|
|
#
?
Mar 28, 2023 22:21
|
|
|
DreadLlama posted:
What altitude? I missed a bunch this week, haven't been running the pump, full tank and I got sick as poo poo  Hoping to get to it before it spoils but I'm already drowning in syrup so I'm not going to push it. gently caress being sick, ugh
|
|
#
?
Mar 29, 2023 09:49
|
|
|
150m isn't that high, is it? I blame it more on being overcast. You know the nicest thing about RO isn't the energy savings, but the fact that you can leave it running overnight. In my case the sap tank and the concentrate tank are the same tank:  I don't know how it works but It sucks that you're sick bro. What helps me is a solution of 50% maple syrup 50% coffee.
|
|
#
?
Mar 29, 2023 16:13
|
|
|
Anybody have experience putting a UV lamp and/or lump of silver in their sap and/or concentrate tank? I'm looking for a way to keep bacterial growth down when temperatures rise.
|
|
#
?
Mar 30, 2023 17:01
|
|
|
DreadLlama posted:Anybody have experience putting a UV lamp and/or lump of silver in their sap and/or concentrate tank? I'm looking for a way to keep bacterial growth down when temperatures rise. nope my plan this year is to start dumping everything the second this poo poo gets any harder than it already is  sorry. Despite not running my pump the last couple days, still overflowed a 240gal stainless tank last night. Mostly concerned with boiling through what's there while there's snow under it, I may or may not do much more pumping, really gonna play it by ear based on my desire to keep pushing on this next week. We're approaching the "chore" point. Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 21:01 on Mar 30, 2023 |
|
#
?
Mar 30, 2023 20:32
|
|
|
What's this thread's opinion on freezing to reduce water content? I live in an area where tons of people make syrup, and all the olds claim that you can partially freeze your sap to remove water and increase the sugar ratio before boiling. While this probably chemically checks out, I argue that "leaving a bucket outside over night" isn't exactly a scientific process, and you probably have a net loss of sugar over all due to sugar caught in the ice. I've tried it and it seems to make no difference as the ratios of ice reduced sap and non reduced produce roughly the same amount of syrup.
|
|
#
?
Mar 30, 2023 22:38
|
|
|
You absolutely could dump your sap. But before you do, check this out: https://drinksimple.com/collections/all-products They sell sap to drink. Sap. They sell sap. Unboiled sap. I can't see if it's raw or pasteurized, but it's sap. They're selling sap for money. https://www.amazon.com/stores/DRINKSIMPLE/Homepage/page/148E34C5-E797-42AB-876C-CEAC873E2238 https://drinksimple.com/collections/maple-water/products/copy-of-32-oz-maple-water-pack-of-4 If my math is right this sap sells for $8/L or $30/Gallon $US.  Arven posted:What's this thread's opinion on freezing to reduce water content? My rule of thumb is that if it's a little bit of ice, there's probably not any sugar in it. If the entire bucket is frozen, there probably is. If I have a layer of ice on top of my buckets, I hang it to melt over a bucket I combine into my RO water. But I didn't have a refractometer last year so I couldn't see I was introducing sugar. This year I do, so I can test the idea. Actually, I could just melt some sap ice onto a refractometer objective and see if there's any sugar in it. And I just had a cold snap, so I have ice to test with. I would run out and so it right now but there is a dog sleeping on my lap and I can't move for the forseeable future.
|
|
#
?
Mar 31, 2023 00:10
|
|
|
DreadLlama posted:My rule of thumb is that if it's a little bit of ice, there's probably not any sugar in it. If the entire bucket is frozen, there probably is. I agree with this; I also have a very, very unscientific test for the middle case of "giant rear end block of ice in a tank with some liquid", which is to bust a piece of the ice off, and taste it. If it's at all sweet, I let it melt. If not, I toss it. I have a sap hydrometer, I suppose I could thaw some and test but I've never bothered  On that note, as of yesterday I was still seeing 2% sugar content coming out of the trees; we're clearly very late season now (string of 4 days in the 60s a week from now with no freeze, my guess is that's gonna do it) but I think 2% was the same thing I saw back in Feb, so it's been really consistent. DreadLlama posted:If my math is right this sap sells for $8/L or $30/Gallon $US. If I could avoid pasturizing, packaging etc I would happily sell sap for like $0.25 a gallon, which is well under the market rate, but a 240gal reservoir isn't big enough to get anyone's attention. Also, it was cold as heck today and I managed to get close to half empty, so if I am able to run it hard again tomorrow then I might turn the pump back on and catch whatever happens when it warms up for real tomorrow. Still pretty sure I'm close to done, though. Running out of room to store this poo poo!! 
|
|
#
?
Mar 31, 2023 00:30
|
|
|
21pt bottled yesterday, about 16gal total. Taking today off I think, also it's very cold. I made the best snow fort I can around my tank, it will melt this week. Once I'm dealing with spoilage concerns I'm dumpling and untapping. Let's see what we can cook in the mean time.... 950gals sap in, we'll crack 1000.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2023 14:37
|
|
|
 l
Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 00:08 on Apr 3, 2023 |
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2023 17:17
|
|
|
So -- fire is REALLY dangerous, kids. Sugarhouse burned to the ground on sat night, I will post some gore pictures later. Just heaps of twisted metal. April Fools on me!! I was sick and a little spacey but I did my full normal shutdown, no more wood after 5pm, checked it at 9, basically cold, left small space heater running as usual inside arch to keep flues from freezing woke up to smoking rubble. Almost certainly a spark that got somewhere, smoldered for a while, poof. Impossible to say if it was sloppy practices on Sat, or if it had actually been smoldering in the floorboards under the insulation for some period of time, I'll never know, and so wondering if I was constantly close to death while working in there isn't super useful. From an insurance perspective, if I'd fallen asleep in there smoking a cigarette and that had been what torched it, still covered, accidents are accidents, I guess. I couldn't really stand to post about this Sun, but, now that I've had the insurance adjuster through -- we are fully covered at full replacement cost for the structure and all equipment inside, and further, the adjuster said that the best thing I can do for myself to get a fair replacement on the gear, is to make a list of exactly everything I had, take it to CDL, and ask them to price out a comparable set of gear in 2023, and that is the number insurance will use. As I am substantially likely to use CDL for all replacement gear (assuming we do, indeed, rebuild), that ought to work out fairly nicely. So, there's some substantial lessons learned here: 1) fire is loving dangerous 2) the former owners built this thing with a wood floor. Sugarhouses usually have dirt or concrete, and there's a good reason for that. Will not rebuild a dirt floor 3) wood is, generally, a pain in the rear end, and at the scale we run at I am fairly tempted to start looking at propane or oil arches instead of wood. Of course you have a fire risk any time you have a stack temp at twice the burning point of paper. I had put substantial effort into fireproofing the existing structure, as the former owner's setup scared me, but, it turns out that was insufficient. Final thought: This isn't that bad, I can think of 2 things instantly that would have been unlivably worse: * kid is in sugarhouse unattended for ~5-10 mins, as I sometimes did, and the shack gets consumed by flame during that interval * if I had seen the loving thing burning, dumbass that I am, I might well have charged in with a fire extinguisher to try to save the gear, if not the structure. Based on the structure and how it seems to have collapsed, I think there's a real good chance that this would have been "step inside, instantly fall through already compromised floor, get buried under burning wood and metal, die painfully" anyway I made 17gals, I'm not loving selling any of it because that's enough for us for 3 years and that very very much takes the stress of any time frames around rebuilding. From talking to insurance, if we decide to punt a year on the actual work there's some mild headaches involving escrow accounts (as the insurance co will want the payments off the books ASAP), but there's absolutely no reason we need to rebuild this year. Or at all. I would like to rebuild this year but I would also like my spouse to be substantially involved; she's in the process of applying for full time work again and doesn't want to hear about any of this right now (though she's been INCREDIBLY supportive), so, I think I just need to fuckin not stress and sit back. I don't need to boil next year, also, my lines etc are all fine and so if I want to just do a couple hotel-pan boils on an outdoor cinderblock arch next year, I can :100: do that with no additional work. loving christ, though, it was so surreal to walk out and the structure is just gone. When I get outside again I will get some pics of my rubble pile; I've been told that insurance is very unlikely to want to do a cause of origin investigation here (since "wood shack with wood stove in it burned down overnight", is, uh, pretty self explanatory); once the site is released I still have to wait until the initial insurance check clears, because site cleanup of the existing hosed up poo poo is part of what is covered. I mostly feel bad about absolutely destroying that beautiful D&G evaportator. Yea, it does sound like I am covered at replacement cost which is GREAT. But that was just an absolutely beautiful machine and now it is twisted metal. Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 14:29 on Apr 4, 2023 |
|
#
?
Apr 4, 2023 14:19
|
|
|
Hey, so I've followed this thread (and your informative posts specifically) since it started because I found it interesting, never really had much to add because I don't live in an area where doing what people in this thread have done is remotely possible. That's probably what made it interesting to me, but also why I never really posted. Just wanted to offer my condolences, and that I'm glad you and your family are safe. Thanks for the info, and best wishes.
|
|
#
?
Apr 4, 2023 15:57
|
|
|
I'm sorry for your loss, and I'm glad you learned the easy way why not to be a hero. Good luck with your rebuild and I am dying to see pictures.
|
|
#
?
Apr 4, 2023 16:26
|
|
|
H110Hawk posted:I'm sorry for your loss, and I'm glad you learned the easy way why not to be a hero. Good luck with your rebuild and I am dying to see pictures. I grew up with fire heating, in my teen years I did a lot of redneck woods pyrotechnics and was always mindful of, you know not burning down the woods, having water and/or a dirt pile on hand, etc. We heat the house with a mix of wood and oil and elec. It's fair to say that just by the nature of what an evaporator is, and the nature of a sugar house, a sugarhouse stove requires more attention than a domestic stove. I thought I was pretty painfully aware of the fact that all it takes is a single spark in the wrong place to turn a structure into rubble in very short order. None the less, this has still permanently changed the way I view fire, because things get a lot less abstract when you're doing a walkthrough of a smoking hole, and knowing you were sitting there playing Terra Nil the day prior. I do want to rebuild but it's going to take a bit of time and thinking to figure out what we do. It would make substantial sense if the space included a small (4x5 is my thinking) area which is walled off from the rest of the interior with a large observation window. Then that space (only) could be insulated and used year round as a small detached office, and also used as the sitting-and-observing-the-boil room without any of the issues of tons of steam etc impacting computers/phones. Likewise, I really want to understand costs and fuel options before I think about another evaporator, because for both safety and convenience reasons, moving away from wood is making a lot of sense to me. Twenty Four posted:Just wanted to offer my condolences, and that I'm glad you and your family are safe. Thanks for the info, and best wishes. I had a detached office down there, it was just jank as hell. Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 19:19 on Apr 4, 2023 |
|
#
?
Apr 4, 2023 19:15
|
|
|
Have been following but not posting this year, really sorry to hear that man. RIP sketchy shack, grateful nothing truly awful came of it.
|
|
#
?
Apr 5, 2023 03:27
|
|
|
Postess with the Mostest posted:Have been following but not posting this year, really sorry to hear that man. RIP sketchy shack, grateful nothing truly awful came of it. yea, unless I get boned dealing with insurance it's going to be hard for me to feel any worse about this than the handful of serious car wrecks I have walked away from over the years: this was a serious, massively dangerous accident which could trivially have caused death or forest fire under slightly different circumstances, and yet, no one is hurt and so far I'm being told the financial angle is not my problem to deal with. I am already starting to mentally see the wreckage of the shack the same way I viewed this  When I got out of that prius after someone (with bald tires) came into my lane, I was furious that someone else had deployed an airbag on me because that poo poo is loud as gently caress and can cause hearing loss and worse tinnitus (my nemesis). I had the common sense, in that moment, to realize that if that was my concern, things were much better than they could have been, and I managed to drop all the anger from my face and voice before I spoke to the other driver. They were clearly shocked and scared, and when I looked up and just said "so, I think we need to call the cops, and I don't have service" their reaction was "holy poo poo man I am sorry are you okay". World has some okay people in it, bald tires or not. The point is, poo poo gets hosed up, and I was able to almost instantly forgive this dude for taking his dad's beater out while his car was in the shop. Yea, his tires caused the accident but his insurance bought us a Forester, whatever. So, I think in this case I need to likewise forgive myself for whatever unknowable protocol failure led to a serious accident.
|
|
#
?
Apr 5, 2023 15:20
|
|
|
Man that sucks. I'm glad you weren't in there. Does your insurance absolutely require you to rebuild as you were before? You said you aren't rebuilding with wood floors in the future, which is a good upgrade. But another good upgrade might be to try the D&G ecovap, which runs on electricity. It's not impossible to have an electrical fire, but I don't think the risk is as high as it is for a sugar shack.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2023 08:01
|
|
|
DreadLlama posted:Man that sucks. I'm glad you weren't in there. Nope, but it's also not just a fixed amount of cash -- example, if I want to get a fancier evaporator or one that uses a different fuel source, i pay the difference compared to the replacement cost of an identical unit. On the other hand if I get a cheaper evaporator, that money isn't in the same pool as rebuilding the structure. I think the former owner was silly to put a wood floor in there, and I won't repeat that! At least, that is my understanding based on 2 conversations with the adjuster. CDL clearly has experience with this process, so I am going to try to leverage that. The insurance company released the site today, so no cause of origin investigation. It would have been nice to get CSI guy to say "the fire started under THIS board", but.... I will check out that evap; propane is higher on my radar, electric sounds hideously expensive but I could be out to lunch. Just basing that on cost of home heat with wood/oil vs elec. e: the smallest one of those suckers is 80 gph which is about 4x the scale I want to run at  . If we rebuild we'll rebuild better but not bigger.
Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 02:44 on Apr 7, 2023 |
|
#
?
Apr 7, 2023 02:41
|
|
|
Well, my guess at this time is there will be more syrup, but probably not until the '25 season. Everything has settled with insurance; more or less, $25,000 to rebuild the structure and another $8000 for the evaporator and pump and $3000 for odds and ends (the latter we already spent, since much of that poo poo was stuff which was just incidentally down there and not really sugaring related. Music gear, cookware, etc). I talked to one local builder who thinks they can build something pretty good without exceeding budget, and include some extra space so we can do an office build out in there. I believe we're going to try to get plans nailed down and contractors lined up this summer, and then let work happen as soon as it's work-season next year. edit: we could just take about 30k and walk. But I don't think we will.
|
|
#
?
Jul 21, 2023 18:03
|
|
|
Is anyone else tapping now, like right now? https://northernontario.ctvnews.ca/maple-syrup-tapping-season-begins-early-in-northern-ont-1.6754910 posted:Canadian maple producers are coming off one of their worst years in a long time – but unseasonably warm temperatures to start the year mean maple sap is already flowing. I'm washing all my kit and otherwise getting ready but this feels weird. It's February.
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 21:02
|
|
|
I tapped two weeks ago and have already boiled once.
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2024 21:12
|
|
|
We may be tapping later this week or this weekend.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2024 20:23
|
|
|
First run is already 2 weeks in. Season has been a normal to better one. 2023 was two weeks and like 2 or 3 burns total with water coming out of trees at end. 2024 im am already at 4 gals with two burns at grade A dark here (wv). 1.25% sugar which is normal range this far south. Also if you dont have one get a robucket. Ive upgraded mine with 200-300 bucks each year and now have a setup mounted to board with 44gph going through it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2024 21:23
|
|
|
I'm not tapping this year, still sitting on 8+ gals and have not rebuilt. I might do some buckets and a hotel pan boil next year. Plan is to rebuild in spring 2025 but I am trying to figure out the absolute minimum spec for what I want and then I will chase down another used evaporator. Insurance paid out $27,000; I would like to pocket 10-15 of that and build something smaller. I also don't want another drop-flue evaporator, emptying the flues is too loving annoying, so it's either going to be raised flue or flat pans again.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2024 17:44
|
|
|
Tapped a bunch more trees this year. We could have kept taps in next week but we hit our 3gal mark. 4 boils and I'm already thinking about permanent lines and an RO setup.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2024 02:27
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 3, 2024 18:25 |
|
|
I only made a gallon this year, I was forced to do three small boils because it kept getting too warm to store the sap outside. Global warming is really screwing with the trees, we had a stretch of 3 days last week that should have been perfect sap weather here in PA where it went to 25 overnight and 50 during the day and it didn't run at all.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2024 03:43
|
|