Serious operations run tubing from tree to tree and pull a vacum to suck the sap to central holding tanks and then after filtering, they will reverse osmosis to take out 60+% of the water before boiling.
HOwever lots of folks swiched over from wood to oil or propane in recent years to finish, so expect to pay $60+ a gallon for syrup this year.
I figured I could save a few bucks and have a little fun by making my own this year. I usually rent my trees out to a local sugar house, but for several reasons they didn't boil this year so I cobbled up some stuff.
My hi tech operation consisted of a cabin sized woodstove and two canning pots. I fed it with old wood from my house I am tearing down and kept a blower on it so the stove literally glowed. 5 hours later I had some decent stuff and it was fun, but hardly cost effective if you consider my time.
I may very well make an sugaring arch next year and feed it with the slabs from my lumber mill to make it a little more worthwile.
Dean,
I see your brother isn't fooling around...nice setup!