Just Saying Hi... for Now.

Kalindi wrote: I assumed we were missing parts. I thought there would be a door or something stopping the coal from dropping down. It seems odd that coal would just be piled up and burning like that. It seems a lot of coal.

It doesn't really matter how much coal is piled up, coal burns from the bottom up.

Welcome to coal school!

That's a beautiful stove!

Take a look at Nortcan's thread on his radiant heater.

I Have My Base Burner (BB)

He did a complete rebuild of a radiant heater like yours. Mind you, it's one of the monumental threads in this forum, I believe it's up to about 60 pages long at this point. But he did an excellent job of restoring one of these and has lots of pictures along the way. He also had to re-do his mica and came up with a good method. It will take you some time to read all that is in there, but I think it's probably the most appropriate thread for your stove that I know of on here. You may actually wish to take the magazine out and not use it until you get more familiar with running your stove. I believe Nortcan decided he preferred running without... Nortcan - you listening?

How big is the place you will be heating? How well insulated? That's sure a nice looking stove... Have fun rebuilding it. Where are you located?

dj

Kalindi wrote: Thanks Franco. I assumed we were missing parts. I thought there would be a door or something stopping the coal from dropping down. It seems odd that coal would just be piled up and burning like that. It seems a lot of coal.

If you are familiar with burning wood forget everything you know about burning wood. The burn rate for coal is controlled by the air flow and not the amount of fuel on the fire. Because of this you can fill the stove up and get on a schedule of filling and shaking it once in the morning and once in the evening, if you have the air turned down low you'll still have large quantity of coal left. That is one of the big benefits of coal compared to a wood. Matter of fact if you don't fill it up you're only asking for headaches and is probably the biggest mistake people new to this make.

Kalindi wrote:Hi Nortcan,

It must be 16" then. My 2 yr old was "helping" me measure. We will make it air tight. I almost can't wait for cold weather again... almost...

All the family will be happy with the stove, these stoves are like a part of the family all year round.
For the WAITING question, I know what you mean

DLJ, thanks for all the good words. As you said, it looks like I'm a little sick about these antique but many sickness can be cured and I will be very soon
I think that some stoves have fixed magazine in them. I saw some having a mag. (like a box) at the top and having a chute connected to that mag. Others have only a mag. made from a cast iron tube like the one I made for my Bride. These are removable. I will be back on that point in a few "cured"days

dlj wrote:Take a look at Nortcan's thread on his radiant heater.

I Have My Base Burner (BB)

He did a complete rebuild of a radiant heater like yours. Mind you, it's one of the monumental threads in this forum, I believe it's up to about 60 pages long at this point. But he did an excellent job of restoring one of these and has lots of pictures along the way. He also had to re-do his mica and came up with a good method. It will take you some time to read all that is in there, but I think it's probably the most appropriate thread for your stove that I know of on here. You may actually wish to take the magazine out and not use it until you get more familiar with running your stove. I believe Nortcan decided he preferred running without... Nortcan - you listening?

How big is the place you will be heating? How well insulated? That's sure a nice looking stove... Have fun rebuilding it. Where are you located?
dj

My husband and I have found the thread on Nortcan's rebuild independently of one another and have been discussing different parts of it. I need to find time to read through the entire thread.

The type of house we are trying to heat will be the more complex part of this. It is probably around 2500 sq. ft. It is a partially very very old house. The main room of the house where the heater is located is an old log cabin. The house was date decades ago when my in-laws owned it and it was estimated at around 275 years old then. It was added on to on on one side and then again on the back. We ripped off the back and re-did the kitchen, bath, and added a master bedroom upstairs. The addition is now very very well insulated. The original first addition very very drafty (will be our family room and upstairs will my my daughters bedroom). We will be renovating and adding some insulation, but not as much as on the new addition because we added some pretty thick walls there. The other issue is that the heat has to get through the actual thick log wall and only has the open door way to travel through. The upstairs rooms in the log part and old addition of the home which are right now completely gutted and have not undergone any renovation yet and have absolutely no insulation have already retained enough heat from the freestanding oil heater that I am sure the upstairs will be fine. The master bedroom is in the new addition which is upstairs on the outside of the log wall though. I hold no hope that the heat will get there. Unless there is a way it will get through the kitchen ceiling through the bedroom floor, but we insulated pretty heavily. There will be a staircase (not there yet) right near where the stove is that will go to the second floor and to a hallway. I am hoping that we will be able to direct airflow and leave doors open to circulate air down the hallway to our bedroom. I guess we won't really know this until he house is finished.

We are in Kingsville MD.

I'm sure the stove will do a marvelus job of heating the area it is located it, but moving any significant amount of heat through a single doorway is going to be a challange. I would plan on having some supplemental heat (electric baseboard perhaps) in the bedroom to help out in cold weather.

A stove with a 16 inch firepot will be more than adequate to heat your house. I didn't see any pictures of the back. I wonder if your stove is a double heater. Many base burners were made as, "double heaters." What that means is there is a heating duct on the back of the stove that brings cold air up from the floor, heats it and then it exits out of an opening in the top rear of the stove. These double heaters produce lots and lots of convective heat as well as radiant heat. Often times the heat from the double heater was ducted to the upstairs.
If you put a register in your kitchen ceiling then it and the stair case will make a circulation pattern which will allow cold air to come down to the stove and the warm air to rise upstairs. Again that stove is capable of heating your house, drafts and all in sub zero weather. All you have to do is apply some creativity to moving the air upstairs. Since you have work to do you can plan that into the renovation as you go along.