My Adventure With Bit Coal in My Parlor Stove

 
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oros35
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Post by oros35 » Fri. Jan. 14, 2011 1:12 pm

I tried and failed...

Well I thought I would try something different and see if I could burn Kentucky Bit coal in my Hub Heater 215 (1912 vintage cylinder stove). It's like a Glenwood base heater but just has a recirculation damper and a bypass damper with a section of 6" oval pipe going onto the 6" round chimney pipe. I picked up some Kentucky Lump Bituminous coal to give a try, its much cheaper in this area than Anthricite coal and I would love to be able to burn that instead.

Day 1: I have a dying Anthracite fire. I shake it down and get a good draft going. The fire is low enough that I would have to baby it back to life with Anthracite. I toss a few lumps on top and fill up the fire pot. In a few minutes I have a very nice burning pile of coal. Much different than the Ant coal, I now have smoke and alot of yellow flames but great heat and seems real easy to burn. I also like the smell of the Bit burning much better than Ant. I adjust the draft keeping alot of over fire air and keeping my stove temp around 500 degrees. I keep it on direct draft mode. Life is great, I really like this coal so far. I let it burn through the night tossing on a fresh pile before bed.

Day 2: Check on the fire first thing in the morning, just about dead... but there is still black coal in the pot, I stirr it around and it comes back to life. Let it catch real good and toss some more on. I find I have to open the draft more to keep the temps up to 500, but I figure it's normal since I just shook the last of the Ant ash out. Burn the rest of the day. In the evening, I toss some more on and it's really acting like It's not getting enough draft or I'm not giving it enough air or something. Still working on the learning curve so I let it run for the night.

Day 3: Pot is full of half burnt coal, low red glow from the center, fire is going out. I have come to the conclusion that something is wrong and let the fire die, this takes quite a while.

Boy did I find a mess.... So I knew Bit makes more flyash, but didn't expect it to clog my pipes in 2 days!!! The 6" round chimney pipe was coated with about a 1/2" of soot. The 6" oval was even worse. The bypass damper was almost sooted completely shut. In a 6' section of exhaust I got over 1 gallon of soot built up in under 3 days! In that short time, it completely choked out the pipes and I had no draft.

So the moral of the story, a 1912 Hub Heater does not Burn Bit coal. Unless I did something wrong. All cleaned up now and switching back to Ant. Problem is I'm down to a couple 5 gallon buckets and it's way too expensive on this side of PA. I usually bring back a few ton when I'm visiting family out near Harisburg, but didn't get any this year and not sure when I'm gonna make is back out there.

I really wish I could burn this coal in my heater as it's much easier to get going and smells much better.

Anyone want to buy a trailer load of Kentucky Bit coal off of me? Can deliver!!


 
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wsherrick
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Post by wsherrick » Fri. Jan. 14, 2011 2:09 pm

Hi There,
We haven't heard from you in a while. Your stove is strictly an Anthracite Animal. They were not designed for Bituminous. If you want to burn Bituminous coal you can burn it in a Glenwood Base heater. They are designed for multi fuel use.
Your stove is so efficient that it sucks out all of the heat from the exhaust gasses. This cools them way below their ignition point and the end result is quick soot build up. You can burn the Bituminous in your stove, because I have done so in a similar stove for years. You can't use the Base Burning mode, You have to run it in direct draft and you have to run it in a two stage manner. When you load the coal and it starts to flame, you must let it run a little hotter than you are used to with the secondary air damper about 1/2 of the way open and the primary dampers open just a little, tiny bit. After about 20 minutes or a half hour, you then cut back on the secondary air some and open the primary dampers more. How much or how little depends on your draft.
The point is you have to have a hotter exhaust temperature to burn the soot off the inside of the pipes as it builds up. It will clean itself to a large degree if you follow the above procedure.

 
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oros35
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Post by oros35 » Fri. Jan. 14, 2011 3:04 pm

Makes sense.

I think I would have to remove the internal bypass damper completely to get it to keep enough draft. Not a big deal as it bolts into the back pipe. I may try that to get me through a while untill I can make it back east and get some cheaper Ant. I'd have to regulate it with the mpd and get up earlier in the morning!

Once I cleaned it out and lit the wood fire to start it back up, I could tell the remaining soot ignited and burnt off. My stovepipe temperatures were higher than my stove barrel temps (500 vs 350) for a little while until it burnt off.

 
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wsherrick
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Post by wsherrick » Fri. Jan. 14, 2011 3:29 pm

If you want to burn Bituminous on a regular basis you need to get an Oak Stove. A Glenwood Oak, Glenwood Modern Oak, Or a Hickory Glenwood would all be supurb burning Bituminous.
The Hickory Glenwood is a beautiful stove and the door doesn't have any windows so it's good with Bituminous. It also has an ample secondary draft damper in the loading door as well.

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oros35
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Post by oros35 » Mon. Jan. 17, 2011 12:13 pm

Ok bit of an update.

To get through the weekend I was mixing the last of my Anthracite coal with the KY Bit. That worked very well. I would toss several lumps of Bit on the bottom then cover with a layer of Ant. I'd give it plenty of over fire air and about 1/4 under fire air. It cooked nice and hot and the layer of Ant seemed to filter out the soot from the Bit and burn it up before it made it into the exhaust pipes. It still smoked and smelled like the Bit fire, but burnt more like an Ant fire, just with yellow flames.

I'm now completely out of Ant coal. Loaded it up with Bit coal last night and this morning. I can see more soot build up, but not horrible yet. I wish I had more time to tend to it this morning, but had to run to work. It was not fully lit yet and was still making alot of heavy smoke (after about 1/2 hour). I left it with alot of over fire air and just a little under fire. Hopefully I got the settings right so it would burn ok for the rest of the day.

I'm experimenting with changing the size of what I put in. It makes a big difference on how it burns based on the size.

 
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Berlin
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Post by Berlin » Mon. Jan. 17, 2011 5:12 pm

interesting experiment. This is why I always suggest using an 8" pipe and no manual damper on any bit appliance - a 6" will clog with soot where an 8" will stay mostly clean/ the soot will fall apart before it builds to the point that it restricts draft. Glad that you like it otherwise.

 
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Post by rockwood » Mon. Jan. 17, 2011 5:54 pm

wsherrick wrote:The point is you have to have a hotter exhaust temperature to burn the soot off the inside of the pipes as it builds up. It will clean itself to a large degree if you follow the above procedure.
William is right on the money here.
Only difference is that I can't wait 20-30 minutes to cut back the draft because the stove will overheat. I have to cut it back after about 10 minutes with my particular stove and coal.
If I go to refill the stove and find the entire inside of the stove is black then I know the stove was fired too cool. If the inside of the stove is gray/white then I know the firing was hot enough to limit soot buildup. I have a thermometer to monitor stove temperature so I don't over fire.

I agree with Berlin regarding flue size and manual dampers....soot can rapidly accumulate on a manual 'smoke pipe' damper even if you fire the stove correctly. On my particular installation a baro damper works very well.
At the end of each heating season I have about 1/4 inch of soot buildup in the flue beyond the baro damper. Between the stove and the baro there is virtually no soot.


 
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oros35
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Post by oros35 » Tue. Jan. 18, 2011 10:27 am

Well I've gotten a few extra days out of it by adjusting my burn style, but I can't get the heat up now. I suspect the pipes are getting cloged again. The first few days I was able to get the heat up and it burnt off the soot very nicely. Like was said, at first I got a coating of black soot on the inside, as the temperature came up to around 600 stove temp with about 400 pipe temp the soot burnt off nicely and left a grey coating where the soot was. It took a good 1/8-1/4" of soot coating and burnt it to nothing.

The soot is long stringy black oil like soot. Nasty stuff.

I plan to make a few modifications to open up my pipes some. It will be easy to do with the Hub Heater. The recirculation pipe is just stove pipe with a divider and damper bolted inside so the actuall diameter of the pipes is half of a 6" pipe! Unbolting the internals will open it up to a full 6" pipe esentially doubling my stove pipe diameter.

The smallest area will be the outlet of the barrel which is about 5". That will go to an oval 6" pipe and then into a round 6". I have an elbow about 18" above that that I should change to a Tee. There is another 18" section to get to the wall, a small angle 20 degrees or so that goes into the wall. It's about 18" through the wall and into the double wall chimney.

Berlin - you would reccomend an 8", you find 6" can clog up, no wonder I'm having problems as i'm restricted down to a 3"!!!! I'm surprised it's burning as well as it is.

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Tim
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Post by Tim » Wed. Jan. 19, 2011 8:55 am

oros,
Why not just remove the indirect back pipe completly and replace it with straight pipe, clean up the indirect pipe and spray it down with WD-40 and stash it away in a dry place for the future or possibly sell it to a Anthracite burner in NEED of one?
I would install 6"straight pipe with a "T" and cap right out the back of the stove so ya have a cleanout at the bottom and see what happens from there with your ash build up ...you can always re-install the indirect pipe?...but burnin Bit with the tube I think will just give ya problems.
Tim

 
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oros35
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Post by oros35 » Wed. Jan. 19, 2011 9:42 am

I did remove the divider and bypass damper. Amazing how much more draft I have now. Gonna run it like that for a little while.

Mainly just experimenting here.

Once I burn up some of this Bit or get another load of Antracite, I will be switching back. Bit coal seems to take alot more effort to burn nice. Anthracite is more predictable. But it is nice to know that I can make it work if I need to.

 
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Tim
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Post by Tim » Thu. Jan. 20, 2011 8:04 am

Sounds like ya have a solid plan ...
Yrs. ago when still at my mom's place she had a bit coal burner ...it was a messy,stinky affair to keep the unit going but it made SUPER HEAT!.. that is why I love Anthracite for its ease of use,controllability and its much cleaner.
Currently my #2 son works for a coal company and he gets 7 tons of Bit "FREE" per yr. he just has to haul it ...he brought me a 5 gallon bucket of screened BIT NUT from the tiple where he works...I tried it one Saturday eve..in the Glenwood ...heat was excellent for a few hrs...then it all bridged up and was hard as a rock and needed poked down an ALL THEM MEMORIES FROM STOAKIN THE FIRE AT MOM'S CAME BACK! ...after the test burn he asked me how many tons I wanted for FREE I said ...NONE!...sorry ..I will just buy my Anthracite!
I am not goin back to Bit coal FREE OR NOT!!!
Tim

 
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Post by grizzly2 » Thu. Jan. 20, 2011 8:21 am

oros35,

I think I have discovered you main problem. After closely looking at the pictures you posted, I noticed that you have mounted your stove on the wall and are exhausting through the floor. toothy

 
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Tim
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Post by Tim » Thu. Jan. 20, 2011 8:36 am

:o ...OMG ...THAT IS IT!

 
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Post by 009to090 » Thu. Jan. 20, 2011 9:43 am

grizzly2 wrote:oros35,

I think I have discovered you main problem. After closely looking at the pictures you posted, I noticed that you have mounted your stove on the wall and are exhausting through the floor. toothy
HA! LOL I thought the same thing. :D
I bet its easy to load like that :eek2:

Had to turn my PC on its side to see it correctly.

 
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Post by franco b » Thu. Jan. 20, 2011 11:05 am

grizzly2 wrote:oros35,

I think I have discovered you main problem. After closely looking at the pictures you posted, I noticed that you have mounted your stove on the wall and are exhausting through the floor. toothy
Keen observation.


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