Coal quality variations: brand to brand, pallet to pallet.

rberq wrote:

SMITTY wrote:WAS using Kimmels bagged nut.
Now using Blashak bagged nut.

Weird. I have some of each, and I think the Kimmels burns better and hotter and longer than the Blaschak. I think both brands vary from pallet to pallet and year to year.

I figured I'd start a new thread on this so as not to hijack the other thread where this was posted.

rberg was responding to my comment about how I get 24 hour + burn times out of this load of Blashak (with less ash & same heat output), vs. the maximum of 15 hour burns tops out of Kimmels (with an overflowing ashpan in that 12-15 hrs.) -- all bagged nut coal. I believe he is right.

I was thinking .... maybe before any of us commit to a large load of coal, it might be worthwhile to take several small samples from companies closest to you ... just to check burning characteristics. After just 2 bags of this load of Blashak I picked up in October, it was clear that my burn times really had doubled, with 30%+ less ash, & same heat output as the Kimmels I burned the 4 seasons prior.

I'm definitely doing this next season to make sure I don't get stuck with 5 tons of garbage .. like last year!

I may say finally, I have a good answer:

I started noticing the difference, after invistagating " Flames " from a previous post, and since I did not notice consistency of reproducing flames of the same height based on same conditions, I realized, it was the quality of the coal that was missing from the formula !

So here what I can say with confidence, and I agree the coal may vary within the same batch: when and if you see and can produce tall beautiful geen flames, most likely you have a very low quality coal, with very high sulfur content; you will notice it's really easy to start, but won't last long and the heat output is about 30 % less than the low sulfur coal.

The high quality coal tend to be a bit harder to start, and rarely produces any green flames ( green flames = Sulfur ), the flames tend to be very short, blue and violet in color, your first indication even before burning is actually the weight, one of my container holds 300 to 320 LBS of coal of the same volume, but the only variation is the quality .

I hope this can help.

GeorgiePorgie wrote:, one of my container holds 300 to 320 LBS of coal of the same volume, but the only variation is the quality .

Keep in mind the volume of coal will also vary by the size. Larger sizes take less volume.

I have noticed a difference just within my Blashak coal of the same size.

I recently picked up a couple more of tons from a local Amish supplier, and it burns a bit better than what I got in November from another supplier - both RICE from the same Santa Claus bags.

Both are / were quite wet - which doesn't bother me. At first I though it was 'sitting out in the rain, but this last batch was shrink wrapped and literally right off the Blashak truck - and wet in the bags.

Face it, coal isn't mixed in a tank from exact ingredients. Maybe the dino from one batch was a bit fatter than the dino from the previous batch, hence the differences.

I'm using Kimmels bagged nut, that came directly from their yard two weeks ago. From all appearances, it burns the same as what I had last year. All samples I've randomly pick out of each bag are consistantly glossy and have the typical glass sound when poured from the bag into the bin for inspection. Checking the ash, there is a bit of what I assume is bone, but for the most part the ash is granular and varies from buff to red in colour.

It is a crap shoot. It will vary bag to bag, pallet to pallet, ton to ton. Brand name will be meaningless. Unless you get it
all from the same place, and it was mined in the same area, etc etc. Not saying that it can not happen, but pretty unlikely.