The Cold Weather Is Here!

Thanks for the reply, Coal Berner. We ended up ordering grates through a local shop, but I'll definitely bookmark those links.

The grates came in today, and had a Woodman's parts catalog in the box. Extensive inventory but pricy.

Currently 35°F here - my stove went 14 hours today and had plenty of coal left in it. I only had to add about 15# to bring the level back up after shaking the grates and revving the fire up. Nice!

23 degrees here now, going down to 17 tonight, 29 for a high tomorrow, and we are under a winter storm warning. I've got a cord of wood sitting outside, blocking the shed where the other cord is. But I'm not worried, because there is coal in my coal bin. Oil heat? We don't need no stinkin' oil heat!

Wood'nCoal wrote:23 degrees here now, going down to 17 tonight, 29 for a high tomorrow, and we are under a winter storm warning. I've got a cord of wood sitting outside, blocking the shed where to other cord is. But I'm not worried, because there is coal in my coal bin. Oil heat? We don't need no stinkin' oil heat!

Same weather up here (20* right now) with a storm due tomorrow night but my house has never been warmer! Since I took this forum's advise & jury-rigged a blower on my stove my house is now a balmy 71* with the Harman not even breaking a sweat! Thanks!

billw wrote:

Wood'nCoal wrote:23 degrees here now, going down to 17 tonight, 29 for a high tomorrow, and we are under a winter storm warning. I've got a cord of wood sitting outside, blocking the shed where the other cord is. But I'm not worried, because there is coal in my coal bin. Oil heat? We don't need no stinkin' oil heat!

Argghhh! I'm watching the gauge on my oil tanks going down, down, down. This'll be the last year for this nonsense. Next year there will be a coal boiler and full bin of coal in the basement.

If you are up to the work involved to heat with coal-once you do it-you'll never look back.

I decided to blow off work mid-afternoon and go on a coal run, picked up 1/2 ton of pea and 100 lbs. of rice for the future stoker, but I arrived home around 3:15 to no power, so the blower on the stove and my science project heat distributer were off. I put off dragging out the generator, usually as soon as I start it and run the power cords the power comes back on.

So I chuted the coal into the bin, and it started getting dark, so out came the generator, the cords, etc. Got the blower on the stove running. Generator down to 1/4 tank of gas---and no more Yuengling. What to do?? I went on a beer run (have to have priorities).

I just finished siphoning gas out of the truck and filled the generator when the power was restored. It was out for 4 1/2 hrs, but the 3 1/2 hours without the blower on the stove made a big difference. Temperature is slowly creeping back up in here and I am tired.

BTW my house was probably the warmest on the road during the outage.

More coal wood ncoal you need to get that truck fixed and get the good stuff
Oh you better Put some more Gas in it to

coal berner wrote:More coal wood ncoal you need to get that truck fixed and get the good stuff
Oh you better Put some more Gas in it to

I know, you are right! I've been doing my "chicken without a head" routine lately, running around and not getting a whole lot of things finished.

That's the advantage of the hand-fired gravity fed stoves, they don't need no juice! You know when your gonna need them the most their keep firing away! I had both of mine cracked up over the weekend, by late Sunday, I was upstairs in shorts, tshirt and barefeet, nice 75 degrees! Let the snow fly and wind blow!

JiminBucks wrote:That's the advantage of the hand-fired gravity fed stoves, they don't need no juice! You know when your gonna need them the most their keep firing away! I had both of mine cracked up over the weekend, by late Sunday, I was upstairs in shorts, tshirt and barefeet, nice 75 degrees! Let the snow fly and wind blow!

Both stoves cooking now, the coal and the relic Fisher wood burner, 24 degrees out. I'm on the 2nd floor, although it's not hot up here (69) it's comfortable. I'm in the only original room left in the house, lath strips and old, old plaster covered with fiber board on furring strips, no insulation, and wide board flooring with no sub floor, and in the north east corner of the house. A bit drafty! Oh there is a bit of insulation above the ceiling in the attic. But we love the place any way.

P.S. on my last post. I went downstairs through the wave of hot air flowing up the stairwell to check on the Fisher wood hog, and my wife has the porch door open a few inches, too hot for her! and the dryer is running, sucking in cold air through the cracks and crevices. Now if I can only figure out how to run the dryer on coal instead of electricity. Hmmmmm...there has to be a way.

We had 8 Degrees last night, brrr. The LL Hyfire was pumping out 68-70 into the 1st floor and the Keystoker was maintaining the upstairs at 65....the house is really comfortable, last winter the Keystoker was running full throttle and we couldn't get it above 63-64 in the first floor with 58-60 on the second.....just not enough air flow upstairs

10F here cold out there warm in here 82f downstairs 68 to 70 upstairs but burning a little more coal 48lbs to 54lbs 24 to 27hrs but then again the stove hold 100lbs of nut so not to bad keep warm everyone

Coal / wood wrote! Now if I can only figure out how to run the dryer on coal instead of electricity. Hmmmmm...there has to be a way.

Thats a good idea, use the double exhaust pipe idea with the 'Tee' and hook that up to a 'special' dryer' ,let the dryer suck the heat off the 'exhaust' and I bet you don't even have to even vent it outside, as it would be just moist warm air. Just what a dry house needs!