Great Lakes Guardian Efficiency Setting

Your Great Lakes Guardian will diligently monitor the temperature in your stack so that you can maintain your heat within a target zone. This will help you maintain a nice even boil for great fuel savings.

Customizing The Setting

If you are having any issue changing the efficiency setting, make sure that the LCY mode is set to 0. From the home screen on the Stack Temperature module, press and hold SET for 4 seconds. The efficiency setting will appear. From there, give the SET button another quick tap to toggle to the LCY mode. Change the LCY mode to 0. Then, quick tap SET to return to the efficiency setting.

For more information about changing efficiency settings, see page 31 – 32 of the Great Lakes Guardian Instruction Manual.

How To Determine Your Optimal Setting

You can ask ten different sugar makers what their preferred stack temperature is and you will likely get ten different answers. Everyone’s setup is a little different, and there are a lot of variables which influence this answer. Keeping all other variables the same, take note of the amount of wood required to achieve different stack temperatures as well as the evaporation rate at each of those stack temperatures. Divide the number of gallons evaporated in an hour by the amount of fuel used. Whichever yields the largest number is your most efficient stack temperature.

Other Considerations:

•  A rolling boil should not toss sap out of your pan. Keep sap contained.
• If you are low on sap, you may want to run your evaporator at a lower temperature in order to be able to shut down quicker and/or maintain greater control.
• A maple evaporator is typically run at a MUCH hotter temperature than a house wood stove. The function and purpose of a house wood stove vs a maple evaporator is different.
• The length of your evaporator will affect your stack temperature. The longer the evaporator, the more time/opportunity the heat has to transfer itself into the sap before it exits. You may be interested in our related efficiency article “Would a Bigger Firebox Be Better?”.