Coal bin contruction for the DF520 coal stoker boiler at efm

Cooler weather has reminded me that I better get busy on the coal bin. The footprint looks large and the walls will be about 60 inches tall, but it will only hold about 3 tons of coal. Thanks to L&I, I have to maintain 30 inches around the entire bin/stoker combination.




Made the concrete pad. Inside the edge of the area where the block will be laid there is a depression of about 3/4" with sloped channels toward the drain. Decided to go to a 6 foot wall.






The walls are laid and the forms built for the pipe tunnel.




The concrete work is done. The walls will be stuccoed. #2 stone will fill the inside of the bin up to the top of the pipe-run walls. 3/4" and 1/2" PT plywood will be laid on top of the stones across the entire area inside the concrete area. There is a recessed area inside the block walls with further deepened grooves leading to a center drain pipe. Shown in one picture is the pipe exiting outside the pad and under the coal pipe. Onto this will be attached a boiler drain. Since the entire floored area is wood, if a wet load of coal would be delivered, a hose can be attached to the drain valve and run outside, which is a good 100 feet away.







The masonry work is done and the next step is to put the plywood over the inside area for the floor of the bin.



The reason why the pipe is off-centered is because I must keep 30" of space between the waste oil boiler on the left.



The floor, 1 1/4" of pressure treated plywood is in place, resting on the stone bed.



The walls are framed out in PT wood, using exterior screws and will be sheathed out with 1/2 PT plywood on both sides.



Here are the remaining pictures of the coal bin in sequence. The only thing left is to paint the masonary base and maybe the walls with efm blue.



I drilled a series of holes on the bottom of the slope for water to drain off, if necessary.



The outermost section of the bin where the worm will pick up the coal. This gets boarded up to contain the coal that falls over the boards in the background.

Wow, what attention to detail Great job, really nice to see photos as you progress.

NICE!! I know from experience that those floors are more than up to the task of holding 3 tons of coal (I saw the hardwood slats & the brick walls ).

I used to drive a 8500 lb forklift through an old mill here in central MA. Was wild to watch the floor flex & creak under the weight. While in the basement of that building I'd watch the gigantic 2' thick x 2'' high x 30+ feet long wood supports flex about 4 inches downward as the forklift passed above. Pretty neat to watch. Nobody can build structures of that caliber these days.....

The floors don't flex a bit. The subfloor support lays directly on a gravel bed.

Is everyone on the forum up 24/7? Seems like the bloodshot eyes must be the norm lately......

Chris, how far away from sparkin' up the 520? Rice or buck? 26 here, my 520 is purring away; 3 clicks, 3 air. 3400 sq ft.

Very over built! Nice work -- but don't you think you have created a lot of work in the future for your self -- I look at the design and think back to how much hand shoveling I did as a kid in my dads coal bins. There were short and low pitched like yours, and he had a 4 foot under the bin pick up for the old Iron Fireman.

Bloodshot eyes? Maybe from watching the Phillies lose last night. The game wasn't over till almost midnight.

I had to build the bin within space parameters and to hold as much coal as possible because we will use alot. It takes all of one minute to rake enough coal into the trap for about 4 days in this weather, no shoveling at all. That still allows me 7 hrs and 59 minutes to get other stuff done at work.

Problem was that I can only go so high and still get the chute into the window, 4 tons into the bin and maybe another 12 tons for the rest of the winter. If I didn't have inner part of the bin boarded up, it would feed 2 tons on its own, but I would regret that decision if something got into the end of the pipe and I had to shovel out the bin. In any case, it has to be better than dumping bags into a 55 gal drum.

I'm running 6 teeth and 10 air. It's as high as I can go on the feed without having live coals fall off the edge. Any air setting less than that and the coal won't burn well. Blaschak coal. The unit has been running for 3 weeks now.