glass cleaner

On a related note.....my glass on my Hitzer is full of small cracks. Looks almost like a shattered windshield, but it is inside the glass. I cannot feel them and both sides are still smooth. Hitzer told me that these are normal from the heat???? Doesn't seem right to me, but it has been this way for three seasons now. Anyone else seen this?

Qball wrote:On a related note.....my glass on my Hitzer is full of small cracks. Looks almost like a shattered windshield, but it is inside the glass. I cannot feel them and both sides are still smooth. Hitzer told me that these are normal from the heat???? Doesn't seem right to me, but it has been this way for three seasons now. Anyone else seen this?

Yes that is normal. The glass gets what I call crazed, looks like small spider webbing inside the glass if the light hits it right.

Ok. My final opinion is......damp cloth dipped in ashes worked the best. (didn't try sandpaper) Glass is pretty clear.....clear enough to see blue flame.

My stove has narrow slots at the bottom and top of the glass, intended to let some air in to wash the glass while the stove is burning. I have started vacuuming the slots when the stove is at idle to remove fly ash, and that seems to help keep the glass cleaner. So far this year -- admittedly it is still very early -- I have just wiped the glass once a week with a dry cloth to remove the ash, and that has been sufficient.

My glass is still fairly new. I wipe it every day with Rutlands. So far, it cuts the crud, but the glass still needs to be cleaned daily. Any sources for glass that anyone can recommend in case I ever want to change mine out in the future ? I know I can Google it, just wondered if anyone had good luck finding reasonable prices. I wouldn't want to get raked over the coals...

McKoker wrote:Ok. My final opinion is......damp cloth dipped in ashes worked the best. (didn't try sandpaper) Glass is pretty clear.....clear enough to see blue flame.

Asking again...how long have you been burning?

I think it is Stove Top Polish, made for those electric stoves that have the flat "glass" tops. I have also seen it at Wally World.

av8r

This is my first year burning coal. We ran the Koker about half of Oct and re-lit this past weekend.

OK..let us know how it looks in 2 months or so....mine was clear until 60-70 days or so...Seems to be the average.

Ok, I just cleaned my glass tonight after about a week of running and here are the results. My glass has 1 season of burning on it and I cleaned it with damp paper towels like I have always done. The glass was hot (225* or so). I took a damp paper towel and scrubbed the ash from the glass followed by 2 more damp paper towels to get everything off of the glass. You can see through the glass but it has an amber tint to it, not clear like when it was new. When I look into the stove I can see the individual pieces of burning coal and the sides of the grate. I can also see the insides of the stove and any ash that is there. Everything is somewhat darkened by the amber colored glass and has a slight haze to it. If you look hard enough you can ever so slightly see the dancing blue ladies. The glass does not get any better than this. By morning the glass will have more white haze on it and I am sure the ladies will not be visible even if you try real hard to imagine them. So the bottom line is, clean your glass once a week to eliminate the daily hassle and enjoy the clean glass for a couple of hours. And if you squint real hard and let your mind fill in the blank you may get a glimps of the blue ladies.

edit: The glass is no where near as clear as it is in my avatar

I didn't see my current solution to this problem so here's my 2 cents.......I tried the vinegar and water (worked OK in the short term)....I tried the windex (same thing thing and I also added some vegetable oil to see what would happen). It was nice and clear for a couple of days but the oil did what cooking oil does...it browned up nicely. Then as I was staring at the coal residue smegma on my hands I got the idea of trying some of that GoJo hand cleaner with the orange citrus smell to it. I used one of those scroungy sponges with the scrubby side applying the GoJo. It's been about six days and I haven't had to clean the glass again. I can still see the blue dancing ladies. This is probably similar to the rubbing compound solution I read about but since I have GoJo in the garage, it's now my preferred solution.....give it a try. It cleans your glass and hands at the same.

After 3 months of burning I tried wet sanding the ceramic with no effect. Buffing compound, etc also had no effect. A wire wheel (brass) on a drill was useless as well.

I am using the Wood'nCoal method. I will let you know how its doing, but so far so good. Time will tell but I wanted to do it before the glass got bad. I coated it after only burning a bag of coal. I feel his idea of prevention might be the best medicine.

I wipe it when I get home from work every night with just a damp cloth, then followed by a damp paper towel to get it real clean. It only takes a couple minutes and we enjoy watching the burn.


http://nepacrossroads.com/post37788.html?hilit=butcher#p37788

http://www.robaxglass.com/clean.htm

Found this on the robax site.

I noticed I can clean my glass with Rutlands, and rub and buff until the glass is clear, then I close the door, and a few minutes later, I can see the streaks from the Rutlands, as If I missed the spots. WTF ? I did everything except drag my nuts over the glass.....Next time I use Rutlands, Im going to finish it off with regular glass cleaner. And YES, I do this all when the glass is cool, and the metal is covering the stove opening.