New Old Crane 404 Stove

 
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ONEDOLLAR
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Post by ONEDOLLAR » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 7:20 pm

Ashdump

CONGRATS on the coal fire!!! The "Blue Ladies" are a wonderful sight to see and the pic you posted looks good! Now shut the doors and dial down the air and get ready to enjoy steady heat unlike ANYTHING a wood stove can pump out. :D

Soon you wonder why you had ever burned wood. Congrats again!


 
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Post by ASHDUMP » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 7:33 pm

Thanks ONEDOLLAR,

My only concern at the moment is that it seems that I need more air. Both my knobs are wide open, the flue damper is wide open too. I have to keep the ashpan door cracked open to maintain an even burn at around 475/500d. If I shut the ashpan door 100% the temp goes down quick. I'm able to latch the ashpan door about 50% just enough to keep the gasket just off the face of the stove. Not ideal but it works.

I'm monitoring this thing every 5 minutes and will not go to bed with the ashpan door open. I'd rather smother the fire out than leave the door cracked open. I need to inspect my knobs a little more and make sure there is nothing blocking them. Or, maybe I need to reconfigure my piping.... :?:

Then again, this is my first night of burning and I'm a noobie with some anxiety right now.

Just checked the thermometer - she crept up to 600d so I now just shut the ashpan door 100% and kept the knobs wide open. I'll monitor ever 15 minutes and see whats going on. But she's a pumpin'!!! :!: :!: :!:

 
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Post by franco b » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 7:41 pm

If that is the temp high up on the stove pipe then it is much too high. 200 tops at that location. Move that thermometer to about a foot or 2 from the stove exit. Close that ash pan door tight and the air valves should be almost closed.

 
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Post by dcrane » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 7:56 pm

ONEDOLLAR wrote:Ashdump

CONGRATS on the coal fire!!! The "Blue Ladies" are a wonderful sight to see and the pic you posted looks good! Now shut the doors and dial down the air and get ready to enjoy steady heat unlike ANYTHING a wood stove can pump out. :D

Soon you wonder why you had ever burned wood. Congrats again!
dollar has this correct... time to dial it down, you can bank up some coal against the rear close the bottom door (twist your air controls closed all the way, then turn them maybe 2 turns open to start with). move your temp gauge to the top surface of the stove because those are the numbers you have in your head (I go about 800 on mine but most would say that's high), 600 is more normal... stack temp on wood is far higher than coal (if you seeing 600 on stack with coal she's crankin' to hot).

Those are roaring blue flames your seeing (we want to see "dancing" blue flames, yours are like the coming of Russian Army toothy...we want ballerina's)

 
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Post by ONEDOLLAR » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 8:05 pm

Ash

Dial everything back and let the coal burn. You shouldn't have to add any coal to this stove till morning. Doug can tell you more about what temps to expect but I would think your stove should have no problem with an easy 500f overnight. My Jr has no problem doing 450f overnight for 12 to 14 hours.

Coal does not burn like wood and that is something that you have to remember. Once coal is burning it doesn't like to be disturbed too much. Let it burn and you will like the results!! :D

ps if you have a MPD close it as well. Other wise that heat is just going out and up the ole chimney.

 
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Post by ASHDUMP » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 8:24 pm

Great information guys and thanks for the guidance. So I moved the temp gauge off the pipe and onto the stove. The old location was about 6" away from the outlet. New location is smack dab in the middle of the top. I closed both knobs all the way and opened up one full rotation. The top stove temp is about 625d. She is pumping out some serious heat... I might have been a little over temp cause I smoke out the basement again! We'll at least I think this is the end of the smoke detectors going off! ha...

Old location:
Image

New location:
Image

 
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Post by ONEDOLLAR » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 8:30 pm

No MPD? I think you may need one BUT take Doug's advice on it. He knows Crane stoves better than any of us! :o

I suspect your new stove can hold that 600 mark all night without any help from you. Show me a wood stove that can that! Just think... No more needing to feed the beast to stay warm at 3 am. :P


 
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Post by DePippo79 » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 8:52 pm

Now you can sit back with a beverage of your choice and enjoy the ladies. You'll never think about wood again. Your wife will love waking up to a toasty warm house. Nice job. Just remember like the others said, coal is not wood, nice and easy, small adjustments and it's happy. Matt

 
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Post by ASHDUMP » Sat. Oct. 12, 2013 10:33 pm

Well its only the first night but I've now been able to keep it at around 625 on the thermometer (now mounted on the top of the stove). Been tweaking the pipe damper and the knobs on the front. Seems to be putting out a nice even heat.

I can already tell this is going to be way better than wood. Every time I go look at the stove the coals haven't moved and the heat output and burn looks the same. :D

 
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Post by dcrane » Sun. Oct. 13, 2013 7:52 am

ONEDOLLAR wrote:No MPD? I think you may need one BUT take Doug's advice on it. He knows Crane stoves better than any of us! :o

I suspect your new stove can hold that 600 mark all night without any help from you. Show me a wood stove that can that! Just think... No more needing to feed the beast to stay warm at 3 am. :P
he does have a MPD (which is great to have!), I cant know his draft and how it acts so he will have to play around to use the MPD and air controls to find what works best to maintain that 600-700 on the top of stove and keep a nice even slow burn. (he has a HUGE horizontal run and in time he will change a few things like location of MPD and configuration of his stove pipe (this is the worst it will ever be for him because we all know with a few simple changes he can improve his draft easy and he can locate his MPD more properly)... but this is his first year so its better to start learning the wonders of coal heat, he will know a few things more to update for the better after his first season and make a bunch of changes next spring all at one time (he did great this year for his first coal fire and very little start up expense and this is the worst performance season he will ever see!)... it gets far better very fast with a few simple changes next season ;)

 
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Post by ONEDOLLAR » Sun. Oct. 13, 2013 5:03 pm

Ashdump

How did things go with your first overnight coal burn?

 
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Post by ASHDUMP » Mon. Oct. 14, 2013 10:05 am

ONEDOLLAR wrote:Ashdump

How did things go with your first overnight coal burn?
Actually things went well but I did run into a snag... I don't think I shook the grates enough and accumulated a lot of ash in the burn pot which was restricting air flow. I finally figured this out this morning. I basically shook out two bins of ash and was only left with a small pile of glowing coals. So now I'm trying to get another good burn going this morning with only a small pile of coals that was left over... tending the stove every 30 minutes with a new small pile of coal until it gets going.

Thanks for asking!

 
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Post by ONEDOLLAR » Mon. Oct. 14, 2013 10:37 am

FILL HER WITH COAL. No need to add bits and bobs. FILL HER UP and let the coal do its thing!!!

 
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Post by dcrane » Mon. Oct. 14, 2013 1:49 pm

ONEDOLLAR wrote:FILL HER WITH COAL. No need to add bits and bobs. FILL HER UP and let the coal do its thing!!!
dollar is right... it does not take much to get her back up. overnight burns= good shake down before bed... fill her with coal and even bank it against the rear baffle a bit... get up in morning... open bottom door for a few... shake her down good...fill her up and bank coal again... come home from work and start again. :up:

 
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Post by michaelanthony » Mon. Oct. 14, 2013 2:51 pm

ONEDOLLAR wrote:FILL HER WITH COAL. No need to add bits and bobs. FILL HER UP and let the coal do its thing!!!
...
...I feel his pain or I should say angst. Three years ago I bought a pot belly stove and could not get it to burn for more than a couple hours :mad: the damn coal kept going out...well well well, finally I tuned in and turned on to the advise here and realized I was trying to burn coal with a wood burners brain :bang: K.I.S.S. not the rock band!


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