First Season Burning Coal...Success!!!

I bought my house last March and I decided to replace the 20+ year old oil furnace with a Harman SF-160 dual fuel boiler. My father has a SF-360 that he installed about 3 years ago and has loved it ever since, and we have about 300 acres of hardwood so I figured I could burn both wood and coal in my boiler thats why I chose the Harman. after delivery in May I spent the summer doing all the plumming to hook it into my hot water baseboard which was fairly easy. I decided to start burning coal in December and after some trial and error and finding this site I have been very happy with my stove! I have burned about 3 tons since December and it is still burning, even though we are getting the 65* days. Anyway just wanted to say thank you to all of the members here as I found answers to all of my questions just by reading the posts of other members. Now I am preparing to shut my stove down for the summer and do a couple tweeks to my system and also am planning to build a coal bin to hold about 4 tons for next year. Thanks again to every one on this site and I look forward to contributing myself as the years go by!

Welcome to the forum. There are many helpful people willing to help. Just ask and you shall receive. Next year I may ask you some questions about the Harman dual fuel.

I'll be the first to admit that I've still got alot to learn but I'll answer them if I can.

This was my first season with the Hitzer 30-95 and I am very pleased. With April fast approaching, it appears that I will have burned about 1 and 3/4 skids of coal. Very economical to say the least. It will equal out to about $500.00 for the entire heating season, nearly 7 months. Wife loved the toasty warm house.

pyroguy wrote:I bought my house last March and I decided to replace the 20+ year old oil furnace with a Harman SF-160 dual fuel boiler. My father has a SF-360 that he installed about 3 years ago and has loved it ever since, and we have about 300 acres of hardwood so I figured I could burn both wood and coal in my boiler thats why I chose the Harman. after delivery in May I spent the summer doing all the plumming to hook it into my hot water baseboard which was fairly easy. I decided to start burning coal in December and after some trial and error and finding this site I have been very happy with my stove! I have burned about 3 tons since December and it is still burning, even though we are getting the 65* days. Anyway just wanted to say thank you to all of the members here as I found answers to all of my questions just by reading the posts of other members. Now I am preparing to shut my stove down for the summer and do a couple tweeks to my system and also am planning to build a coal bin to hold about 4 tons for next year. Thanks again to every one on this site and I look forward to contributing myself as the years go by!

Great to hear. I'm about to go get an SF-150 and this will be my first coal stove after burning wood for many years. Any tips you can give I'd love to hear it. My wife is mostly concerned with the dust factor as this will be in a living space.

For the most part, while there is fly ash, it is very minimal. Not near as much as when I burnt wood in my earth stove. You shake the stove down and let it cool, then remove the tray, rather than shoveling scoops of wood ashes which was very dusty. You are going to love coal.

Thought I was shutting down till we woke up to snow yesterday--the Hitzer 50-93's been idleing,thanx fastcat,for about a week--temps are supposed to get to the low teens for a few days--this A.M. I shook the tears out of her & poked my little heart out to get her back to winter mode--she's awake & back at it--I wish that would work w/ Momma uh-oh

HanSoSlow wrote:

pyroguy wrote:I bought my house last March and I decided to replace the 20+ year old oil furnace with a Harman SF-160 dual fuel boiler. My father has a SF-360 that he installed about 3 years ago and has loved it ever since, and we have about 300 acres of hardwood so I figured I could burn both wood and coal in my boiler thats why I chose the Harman. after delivery in May I spent the summer doing all the plumming to hook it into my hot water baseboard which was fairly easy. I decided to start burning coal in December and after some trial and error and finding this site I have been very happy with my stove! I have burned about 3 tons since December and it is still burning, even though we are getting the 65* days. Anyway just wanted to say thank you to all of the members here as I found answers to all of my questions just by reading the posts of other members. Now I am preparing to shut my stove down for the summer and do a couple tweeks to my system and also am planning to build a coal bin to hold about 4 tons for next year. Thanks again to every one on this site and I look forward to contributing myself as the years go by!

Great to hear. I'm about to go get an SF-150 and this will be my first coal stove after burning wood for many years. Any tips you can give I'd love to hear it. My wife is mostly concerned with the dust factor as this will be in a living space.

Hi, when you will become friend with your stove you will love it... For the dust it is very clean if the ash pan can have a lid to slide on it. Any way I had a wood stove with the same kind of ash pan and lid and it is a lot cleaner with anthracite. If you want, you can see a small video I made with my daughter at : Hand Fired Coal Stoves= A Different Vigilan11 coal stove

1st season your considered a newbie and after 31 years of burning coal I'm still learning. The members on this site are great and very coal knowledgeable. They are there when you need them. I wish something like this was around when I first started out. Any questions in the future just shout and I am sure you will get the answers you need here. Congrat's on your first season and many more to come.