Soot through the house

Not really sure but a call to Jeff at AHS and I'm sure he would give you the lowdown on it. He is a very nice guy and never too busy to answer questions..

I'm still waiting on the cold air return to come in from Vogelzang. Not sure how long it takes to ship, but hopefully it will be here by the end of this week.
Hey Greg... they are located out near you... Feel like picking it up and flying it over to me on one of your trips? Vogelzang is located at: 400 West 17th Street, Holland, MI 49423. Familiar where that is?
Greg.... I don't think that I want to spend the time or money switching the chimney over to 8" id. The 6" chimney I have now is double wall insulated and 24' high. It cost me $78.00 per 3' section and if I go to 8" it's around $100.00 per 3' section. That's money that I don't have or want to spend right now.

With all of the problems with bituminous I think that I'm going strictly anthracite next year!! It's a little more than double the price, but sounds worth the extra price. I can get bituminous for $68.00 a ton and they want $200.00 for anthracite. Anybody in the Beaver County (15001) or surrounding area know where to get it cheaper? Not sure if they have price breaks in the summer or not, but doesn't seem like they do.

KTM...That smoke hood seems like a neat idea but a lot of work to hook up if it needs to be exhausted outside the house?

Berlin...I'll have some pics tomorrow of the outside of the chimney. I got home today and it was too dark to take the pics. As far as the cold air return I don't think that I can hook it into my cold air return throughout the house because I have the furnace fan already pulling air from that. Might have to try to pull air from somewhere else inside of the room.

I'm really glad that all of you guys are on here!!! You all have a wealth of knowledge and not sure what I would do if this site was not here!!! Your help and comments are much appreciated

Thanks,


....Rich

Hello all, have a US Stove 1600 that requires a 6 inch min chimney, would you guys suggest an 8 if I plan on burning wood and antrhacite???

Tom in PA

i'd go with 8 in just about any situation, except mabey an ice shanty stove. 8 in my opinion is the minimum for burning bituminous.

I recall when we had our Woodchuck furnace (very similar to yours) we burned some Indiana bituminous back in the 80's. It had a 6" outlet and that was run into an interior masonry chimney that ran from the basement up through 2 floors and the roof. It was at least 35' high. I believe it was standard 8" square flue tile.

We had ZERO issues with smoke or soot IN the house, but produced great quantities of smoke and soot OUTSIDE the house. It was a real mess. The chimney also clogged almost solid in a matter of weeks. When it was clean, it would just about take your socks off, but as it loaded up the draft went to about nothing.

Needless to say, we didn't burn any more coal. That stove was a very poor coal burner, but did very well on wood.

Chris

I totally agree with Greg on the 8" chimey thing. I had a 6" on my boiler and it didn't draft well and soot/smoke would just roll out the out the door alot. I then switched to a 8" single wall up to the ceiling of my garage. It worked alot better after the switch.
There really is no need to go with double stove pipe until you get outside. Single wall will radiate heat also. Not to mention double/triple wall is way overpriced!!!!!!!

It was Ktm's experience with converting from 6" to 8" that prompted me to do the same. When I have my firebox full for a long cold night I have about 120# of coal in it, so I really need the bigger chimney.

Rich, I think if you follow this checklist you will greatly reduce your smoke.

Make sure you open a window in the basement to provide outside air.
Turn off the heat distribution blower fans
Open the ash pan door and 'rev-up' the fire or turn on the combustion fan to do the same
Turn off the combustion fan, and slowly open the loading door, letting the air gain velocity going up the chimney

When you load fresh coal plan on loading quickly and closing the door in a hurry, leave the ash pan door open or the combustion fan on to burn off the volitiles in the fresh coal. Only after about 30 minutes or so, follow the above 'checklist' again to access the firebox and break up the glued-together mass of Bitumonous coal.

Let us know if this works or helps.

Greg L

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Tigermanrich

I would pick up a dozen or so bag of athracite and see how it burns in your furnace. I was unable to burn it in my US Stove 1557 Hot Blast. Its the same as your stove. I ended up pulling my stove out and installing a Hitzer 82FA. Give it a try I'd be interested to hear how it burns.

Don

Don how about an update on your thread about the install of your new Hitzer 82FA?? I'm sure we'd all like to hear how you like it , plusses and minuses etc.

Greg L

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LsFarm wrote:Don how about an update on your thread about the install of your new Hitzer 82FA?? I'm sure we'd all like to hear how you like it , plusses and minuses etc.

Greg L

.

Its working great. I shake it, put coal in it and walk away. Maybe not that simple but pretty close. Puts out plenty of heat. I built a fire on Saturday Jan. 16th and have not come close to loosing the fire. I lot different than the Hot Blast. It was an everyother day thing with that stove. I'm burning stove coal at this point Its what I had. If I need to order more I may try nut. Just to see how it burns. So far so good.

Don

Pics of the chimney

more pics

more pics

Rich with that tall of a chimney, you should have lots of draft. So I think your chimney is competing with the distribution fans pulling air from the furnace room. a tight house.with good windows, and bituminous coal that is gassing off huge quantities of volitiles.

Did you try my 'checklist' yet?? I'm leaning strongly towards opening a window in the furnace room. If none of your basement windows open, remove a pane of glass, cut a piece of galvanized duct steel with a 6" hole in it to fit the window opening. Install where the window was, with a 6" duct running over to the furnace door. this will give a direct path for outside air to go up the hot chimney taking the smoke and soot with it. You can use clothes dryer duct tubing, it is not carrying anything but air.

You can put a damper in the fresh air duct to shut of the cold outside air or put a cap on the end till you need to tend the fire again.

Let us know what's happening.

Greg L

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The cold air return just came in today and I hooked it up first thing when I got home!!!!! Greg..Thanks for flying it over!! \:D/ I still need to go to the hardware store to get a filter for it though. I Plan on getting that either tonight or tomorrow after work. I'm planing on going through about 1 filter weekly if I'm guessing correctly about the amount of soot and smoke coming out of the loading door and being pulled into the fans. Will let you know how everything works out. Crossing my fingers. :dontknow: Will keep you all posted on how everything works out.