MODIFICATIONS

Yesterday Durl and Linda came out to visit. It was great to see them and Durl had some ideas on improving our fire-pit to reduce the amount of wood we are burning.

Not only did he make some excellent suggestions he brought the material, tools and pop-rivets to get the job done. I should have taken pictures during construction but was too busy helping. 

Here you see the finished work. Durl cut and fitted a metal strip along the inside of the fire-pit. These were bent to come part way across the top, eliminating the open areas around our evaporator pans.

Another shot showing the metal lined walls. This serves two purposes; provides some protection to the block walls and more importantly keeps the fire from licking up the side of the pan and burning the sap.

Thanks Linda and Durl for the great improvements. Now we should boil faster with less wood consumed. It will be Friday or Saturday before we test out the improvements as the days have turned cold and the sap isn't flowing at the moment.

Once we get everything working again I'll let you know how successful we were.

Living in the north we really appreciate the help from those who know what they are doing.