I like the SS Bain Marie Pan Idea! The last one I built hat a 1/2 a hot water tank as the evaporator, but then I wasn't trying to sell any syrup.. I'll have to look into getting a couple of those...
I"ve been thinking of doing this for a while. One thing I was noticing. You should have thermal mass around your half barrel to retain the heat. It's more heavy and not portable but maybe you could make one on a sturdy trailer or something. I need portable so I haven't dont anything yet with the rocket stove design. It would definitely work much better you designed it more like a rocket mass heater and have the barrel pan nestled into the thermal mass. I'm no engineer but I've been looking at rocket stoves for a while. You have to figure a way to not lose heat thru the sides of the barrel. Like at least 6 inches of thermal mass. Once the mass is preheated you'd keep a boil like nothing else
I think that could work, the only problem would be it would be "massive" and I don't have a spot to set up an evaporator permanently. So I need it to be light enough that I can tear it down and store it out of the way. I actually didn't do any syrup this last spring due to some other things that took all our time while sap was flowing.
Check out Paul Wheatons portable mass heater design. Might give you and idea. You just build a wood frame and fill it with rocks. Its not as good as a permanent sealed in mass but it's better than thin metal throwing off heat like crazy. IT would probably take you a couple hours to remove rocks and disassemble the frame for storage.
It doesn't throw off heat at all. Its filled with clay/straw insulation. It barely gets warm even after you've been boiling for hours. The heat that gets lost is the heat that goes up the flue. Which is probably a pretty high percentage.
Ahh ok. I spaced out that section of your video. It's kind of tricky to imagine how to design it where you could could keep the flue going around the mass but yet still have direct heat. Haven't had enough time to ponder it but it's worth it if you could burn way less wood and mainly scraps. Looking forward to seeing more people monkeying with this idea.
I love the fact that you are trying things out with the rocket stove...but let me share my thoughts on the previous 3 years of building evaporators using the rocket stove. I have made several prototypes and found that the flame needs to kiss the bottom of the evaporator pan. It will work much better if you use the pans to seal the top of the burn chamber and use the exhaust to preheat what goes into the pan. Every year my wife and I make anywhere from 3-8 gallons of syrup from our trees and when I stumbled across the current design it cut my wood usage to an 1/8 of what if was and I'm currently using sticks from the woods and cut up pallets only to cook sap. Also another helpful hint is that the thinner you keep your sap in your pan...the faster it will boil off. it takes far more energy for a steam bubble to travel through 4" of liquid vs. 1". when I cook this weekend for the first time this year, I will try to post a video for you of my current rig...although I am already in the process of welding up a new one. great job on the build and if your like me...this is just the first step of many to improve the process...make it easier and more fun for friends and family to enjoy.
Sounds good pipeboy98. I'm not really understanding how your exhaust is working honestly. I did do lots of internet research prior to building this, too bad you didn't throw up some vids of your rocket maple set up. I do remember looking at your video of the barrel stove set up, but I rejected it as I do not have the ability to weld up a pan like is shown in your evaporator vid.
Hey Dale, thanks for the constructive criticism. Unfortunately I don't have time to go look at your channel and make equally useful critiques of your stuff.
:) Sorry couldn't help myself. A for effort. As an experimenter myself I have way more failures than successes, keep trying I'm sure you will come up with something that works really well.
I like the SS Bain Marie Pan Idea! The last one I built hat a 1/2 a hot water tank as the evaporator, but then I wasn't trying to sell any syrup.. I'll have to look into getting a couple of those...
I"ve been thinking of doing this for a while. One thing I was noticing. You should have thermal mass around your half barrel to retain the heat. It's more heavy and not portable but maybe you could make one on a sturdy trailer or something. I need portable so I haven't dont anything yet with the rocket stove design. It would definitely work much better you designed it more like a rocket mass heater and have the barrel pan nestled into the thermal mass. I'm no engineer but I've been looking at rocket stoves for a while. You have to figure a way to not lose heat thru the sides of the barrel. Like at least 6 inches of thermal mass. Once the mass is preheated you'd keep a boil like nothing else
I think that could work, the only problem would be it would be "massive" and I don't have a spot to set up an evaporator permanently. So I need it to be light enough that I can tear it down and store it out of the way. I actually didn't do any syrup this last spring due to some other things that took all our time while sap was flowing.
Check out Paul Wheatons portable mass heater design. Might give you and idea. You just build a wood frame and fill it with rocks. Its not as good as a permanent sealed in mass but it's better than thin metal throwing off heat like crazy. IT would probably take you a couple hours to remove rocks and disassemble the frame for storage.
It doesn't throw off heat at all. Its filled with clay/straw insulation. It barely gets warm even after you've been boiling for hours. The heat that gets lost is the heat that goes up the flue. Which is probably a pretty high percentage.
Ahh ok. I spaced out that section of your video. It's kind of tricky to imagine how to design it where you could could keep the flue going around the mass but yet still have direct heat. Haven't had enough time to ponder it but it's worth it if you could burn way less wood and mainly scraps. Looking forward to seeing more people monkeying with this idea.
I love the fact that you are trying things out with the rocket stove...but let me share my thoughts on the previous 3 years of building evaporators using the rocket stove. I have made several prototypes and found that the flame needs to kiss the bottom of the evaporator pan. It will work much better if you use the pans to seal the top of the burn chamber and use the exhaust to preheat what goes into the pan. Every year my wife and I make anywhere from 3-8 gallons of syrup from our trees and when I stumbled across the current design it cut my wood usage to an 1/8 of what if was and I'm currently using sticks from the woods and cut up pallets only to cook sap.
Also another helpful hint is that the thinner you keep your sap in your pan...the faster it will boil off. it takes far more energy for a steam bubble to travel through 4" of liquid vs. 1". when I cook this weekend for the first time this year, I will try to post a video for you of my current rig...although I am already in the process of welding up a new one.
great job on the build and if your like me...this is just the first step of many to improve the process...make it easier and more fun for friends and family to enjoy.
Sounds good pipeboy98. I'm not really understanding how your exhaust is working honestly. I did do lots of internet research prior to building this, too bad you didn't throw up some vids of your rocket maple set up. I do remember looking at your video of the barrel stove set up, but I rejected it as I do not have the ability to weld up a pan like is shown in your evaporator vid.
That is the slowest boil I have ever seen.
Hey Dale, thanks for the constructive criticism. Unfortunately I don't have time to go look at your channel and make equally useful critiques of your stuff.
:) Sorry couldn't help myself. A for effort. As an experimenter myself I have way more failures than successes, keep trying I'm sure you will come up with something that works really well.
I just tapped my maple tree today. Great video, very inventive.
keep your sap at about one inch deep . Way too much in the pan
Thanks Chris, I'll try that. Though its shaping up to be a miserable syrup season this year. Its been way up in the 50s a bunch the last two weeks.