Nothing 'Inbetween' About This Morning!!

The weather guessers missed the mark last night. The original forecast was for 49* during the day and 33 at night. It did get up to 49*, but by 7pm it was only 33*.

The forcast was revised for a low of 29*, well it was that cold at 11pm. This morning at 7AM it was 22*, hard crunchy frost, skim ice on the pond, and the hose I left out last night is frozen....

Supposed to get up to 56* today. A clear, crisp, cold morning.

Stoker Boiler is running great, 150* water, warm house at 68*. Burnt maybe a five gallon bucket or two overnight.

Greg L

We were a balmy 27*F in Carbondale this morning. The smashed pumpkins in the road from the festivities a couple nights ago were frozen enough to make rather annoying speed bumps.

The old Alaska was just barely above an idle, sipping coal and has only required ash removal every couple days. The house is a toasty 71*F and the kitchen has the nice warm spot.

It's nice to have some cooler weather again.

Test Fired my old EFEL a couple of times this week. Temps in SE PA has been in the low 30's at night. Just cut a new vent hole between the laundry room (where the stove is) and the master bedroom on the north side of the house. Stayed nice and about 70 thru the night! I wrapped the first foot or so with that KAOWOOl stuff. A bit pricey, but now I can sleep better at night. So far no need to turn the oil burner, which is good cause I'm out of %$&#&^ Oil and not buying any!

I was planning on running the heat pumps throughout the w/e but two nights ago when it got just a bit cooler out, I was walking around the house shivering. So I gave in and lit a coal fire.

I didn't want to dip into my fresh stock of the red ash material just yet but now we are a warm 72F in the living room and I feel much more comfortable. The 80 gal. domestic water tank is up to 105F, still a tad low but it hard to build up the temps with half a firebox burning.

Expect lows in twenties here overnite, looking forward to it as we have to keep a couple windows open with stove going now. Haven't wanted to let it go out cause then furnace would kick in, and it is nuisance to get coal going good again. Got a great bed of coals and want to keep it that way. Be interesting to see how much we do burn in a day when real cold. Right now going thru less than twenty Lb. a day.

Low tonight here forecast to be 33. The coal fire has been loosing steam since last night. Arrived home a little late tonight, there's only fire in 1 corner. I'm nursing it back, once I get the fire up I'll give it a good shake.

Had ours going now for about 24 hrs. Mid 30's at night was our decision to get our stove going and keeping furnace off!!

Getting a good feel for the stove. Probably have loaded a bit too much coal in the 50-93, but I am keeping the air damper set to mid level keeping burn level low. Its a bit warm in the house in upper 70's but with the big house it helps push the heat upstairs.

So far things going well with our first burning coal season.

I ended up emptying the stove, it never made it back. It burned down too low during the day.

Almost 2 pans of ash. I was happy to see that there was very little unburned coal. I'm so frugal that I pick out any unburned coal to re-use, (the thought of dumping perfectly good coal!) within reason, that is.

Hey wood ncoal nothing wrong with that I do the same if there is any left
in the ash most of the time it is all powder but once in a while if I get to
crazy in the shake in will have some coal in with the ash so back in it
goes for another burn

Wood'nCoal wrote:I ended up emptying the stove, it never made it back. It burned down too low during the day.

Almost 2 pans of ash. I was happy to see that there was very little unburned coal. I'm so frugal that I pick out any unburned coal to re-use, (the thought of dumping perfectly good coal!) within reason, that is.

I went to Lowes to purchase a 30 gallan metal trash can with lid. I purchased some metal screen and some small wood strips to make a "coal filter" that a place over the trash can.

The ash falls inside the trash can while the "nickel" size coal, or sometimes larger, pieces stay on top of screen where I reuse.

Thanks guys, thought I was the only on who did that. Hey Rex, that's a good idea, I would have thought of it eventually.

Wood'nCoal wrote:Thanks guys, thought I was the only on who did that. Hey Rex, that's a good idea, I would have thought of it eventually.

The screen was like 4 bucks. Same stuff you see used in rabbit cages flooring. Small square like holes.

I know I have some of that around here somewhere.....unless I used it for something.