BBKA Forum

NigelP wrote: ↑

24 Aug 2021, 12:29

I usually add the thymol afterwards to the syrup containers.
Adam why not use the extractor cage as a mixer for the sugar solution?
I'm a little jealous of Steve's sump pump that will suck gravel through. My cheap job clogs up if you add too much sugar too fast. I have to add water first then add the sugar a few kgs at a time . Once it's all added and sumping I leave it for 30-45 minutes for it all to dissolve.

The motor wouldn't cope with that - a good idea though.

I have used a pond submersible pump before in a duck pond - and you can imagine the sludge, sticks and feathers that had to pick up as the pond emptied - and it handled it quite well. (No I won't use that pump for syrup as it had an electrical fault) but a new one should work just fine.

Another alternative is to fix a plaster mixer on top of a barrel, but I think they are more expensive than sump pumps.

I bought a submersible pump (Draper) and a 100 litre water butt from Toolstation and set them to work. The pump works well - for about 15 minutes then has to stop to cool down once sugar has been added. The picture below was after 20 litres of water had been put in with some of the sugar.


The pump sounds like it's working fine although it must struggle with the viscosity of the syrup and shuts down periodically but for my first experiment, it worked well enough with 20 litres of water and a little over 25 kg of sugar. The outlet is a little small however.

Could you swap out the rainwater tap for a plastic honey gate maybe?

AdamD wrote: ↑

27 Aug 2021, 09:09

The pump sounds like it's working fine although it must struggle with the viscosity of the syrup and shuts down periodically but for my first experiment, it worked well enough with 20 litres of water and a little over 25 kg of sugar. The outlet is a little small however.

Sounds strange, are you sure it's not clogged up with sugar Adam? Or are you using hot water? I use cold tap water.

My tank doesn't have a bottom tap, so attached a hose to it with a tap (control the flow rate) and use the sump-pump to pump the finished syrup into the containers.

I'm using cold water - and the syrup was not particularly thick; I will try another batch but just add water and see if the pump fails without any sugar being added as the pump might be faulty. The last submersible pump I had was abused a lot by picking up loads of junk and really thick pooey sludge, soil and feathers from the bottom of a pond and was fine until it developed an electricl fault.

Here is my weapon of choice..the size of the holes in the bottom give you an idea what it can suck through..it is overkill for mixing sugars syrup but it does the job... i have just finished mixing 60kg of sugar and water which give me 80L's of sugar syrup..6/5 ml of thymol mix is put into my 5L water bottles before i fill them with sugar syrup..it will be more than i need but i have some left from last year that is still clear with no mould ..so any excess will do for next year..

AdamD wrote: ↑

28 Aug 2021, 09:41

I'm using cold water - and the syrup was not particularly thick; I will try another batch but just add water and see if the pump fails without any sugar being added as the pump might be faulty. The last submersible pump I had was abused a lot by picking up loads of junk and really thick pooey sludge, soil and feathers from the bottom of a pond and was fine until it developed an electrical fault.

The pump runs continually with clean water - so I guess the viscosity of the syrup puts a heavy load on the motor. I've done a second batch with a similar shutting down after a few minutes. However the pump re-sets itself so I can just leave it for an hour or two to cycle on and off and the syrup is done.

Ok chaps I'm trying to make 2:1 syrup and the pumps I've tried overheat a trip out. what am I doing wrong?

Is 2:1 with sugar unachievable and I should aim lower? If so, whats your sweet spot [pun intended]

No idea, but an old commercial size food mixer would do the job perfectly I think but the problem would be acquiring one?!
I am very small time and use my food mixer for each batch of 3kgs of sugar and leave for 10 mins when it has mixed with hot water. Large scale you need something big and strong so if you know of any bakeries or food producers closing down one of these would be perfect!