"Oak" Stoves Vs Modern "Box" Stoves

 
User avatar
Photog200
Member
Posts: 2063
Joined: Tue. Feb. 05, 2013 7:11 pm
Location: Fulton, NY
Baseburners & Antiques: Colonial Clarion cook stove, Kineo #15 base burner & 2 Geneva Oak Andes #517's
Coal Size/Type: Blaschak Chestnut
Other Heating: Electric Baseboard

Post by Photog200 » Sun. Nov. 17, 2013 1:17 pm

I too use an antique cook stove. I recently installed coal grates in it but for right now I am using wood. When it gets colder, I will burn coal in it so as to keep the fire going longer. I have the stove out in my detached garage until I can build my addition on the house for it. It does keep nice heat in the garage. Unfortunately, I have not taken any draw measurements to help you out. I know when I throw the oven switch it takes a lot more draw...it is kind of like putting it into baseburner mode.
Randy


 
User avatar
Sunny Boy
Member
Posts: 25560
Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 1:40 pm
Location: Central NY
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: Anthracite Industrial, domestic hot water heater
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood range 208, # 6 base heater, 2 Modern Oak 118.
Coal Size/Type: Nuts !
Other Heating: Oil &electric plenum furnace

Post by Sunny Boy » Sun. Nov. 17, 2013 2:47 pm

Photog200 wrote:I too use an antique cook stove. I recently installed coal grates in it but for right now I am using wood. When it gets colder, I will burn coal in it so as to keep the fire going longer. I have the stove out in my detached garage until I can build my addition on the house for it. It does keep nice heat in the garage. Unfortunately, I have not taken any draw measurements to help you out. I know when I throw the oven switch it takes a lot more draw...it is kind of like putting it into baseburner mode.
Randy
Thanks for the reply. I thought mine would take a lot of draft to keep it going in oven mode too. But now with the manometer plumbed into the pipe about 30 inches above the stove top, I'm surprised to see how low I can get the readings and the stove is still drawing fine for many hours.

When I first got the stove, the top "T's" and "I's" (the castings that support the round plates) were warped and leaked. That made the stove was not easy to control the heat levels. Plus, if I didn't keep the draft up, I could smell coal exhaust in the kitchen. I got new plates from Once Upon A Time stove shop and now, it's amazing how well the stove can be controlled.

Yes, same idea as a base burner - increasing the length that the flue gas must travel within the stove to extract as much heat as possible. Mine is at the small end of kitchen range sizes, but even so, with the "oven damper" closed, the flue gasses travel about 8 feet farther through pathways that wrap around the oven inside the stove. Plus, the water tank on mine adds even more radiating surface area- approximately 4 times as much as the same model without the tank. All that surface area adds up and really sucks the heat out.

Still experimenting with the manometer hooked up, this morning I took some readings with my IR gun before opening all the dampers and shaking ashes/loading coal. While still throttled down in "night mode", the two left hand top plates, which are right above the fire box were, 689 and 612 degrees. The stack temp was 104 degrees at 36 inches in the vertical section above the stove top, just below the pipe damper. The manometer was reading about .006. Outside temp was 40 and kitchen temp was 68 degrees.

Can't wait to get my oak stove hooked up to see what kind of numbers it gets.

Paul

 
User avatar
Photog200
Member
Posts: 2063
Joined: Tue. Feb. 05, 2013 7:11 pm
Location: Fulton, NY
Baseburners & Antiques: Colonial Clarion cook stove, Kineo #15 base burner & 2 Geneva Oak Andes #517's
Coal Size/Type: Blaschak Chestnut
Other Heating: Electric Baseboard

Post by Photog200 » Sun. Nov. 17, 2013 3:15 pm

I found some 1/8" rope gasket that I am going to try to put around the round plates (eyes) and see if I can make it more airtight.

I was told by Bryant Stove in Maine, they did not make a water reservoir for this stove so I am keeping my eye out for an oval copper water pan like they use to keep on top of these stoves.


Thanks for the reply. I thought mine would take a lot of draft to keep it going in oven mode too. But now with the manometer plumbed into the pipe about 30 inches above the stove top, I'm surprised to see how low I can get the readings and the stove is still drawing fine for many hours.

When I first got the stove, the top "T's" and "I's" (the castings that support the round plates) were warped and leaked. That made the stove was not easy to control the heat levels. Plus, if I didn't keep the draft up, I could smell coal exhaust in the kitchen. I got new plates from Once Upon A Time stove shop and now, it's amazing how well the stove can be controlled.

Yes, same idea as a base burner - increasing the length that the flue gas must travel within the stove to extract as much heat as possible. Mine is at the small end of kitchen range sizes, but even so, with the "oven damper" closed, the flue gasses travel about 8 feet farther through pathways that wrap around the oven inside the stove. Plus, the water tank on mine adds even more radiating surface area- approximately 4 times as much as the same model without the tank. All that surface area adds up and really sucks the heat out.

Still experimenting with the manometer hooked up, this morning I took some readings with my IR gun before opening all the dampers and shaking ashes/loading coal. While still throttled down in "night mode", the two left hand top plates, which are right above the fire box were, 689 and 612 degrees. The stack temp was 104 degrees at 36 inches in the vertical section above the stove top, just below the pipe damper. The manometer was reading about .006. Outside temp was 40 and kitchen temp was 68 degrees.

Can't wait to get my oak stove hooked up to see what kind of numbers it gets.

Paul[/quote]

Attachments

IMG_0154.jpg
.JPG | 143KB | IMG_0154.jpg

 
User avatar
Sunny Boy
Member
Posts: 25560
Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 1:40 pm
Location: Central NY
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: Anthracite Industrial, domestic hot water heater
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood range 208, # 6 base heater, 2 Modern Oak 118.
Coal Size/Type: Nuts !
Other Heating: Oil &electric plenum furnace

Post by Sunny Boy » Sun. Nov. 17, 2013 5:34 pm

That roll top is a beauty, Randy !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'll bet you can't wait to get the addition done.

Not surprised there's no tank available. Ranges with a water tank seem to be even rarer than ones set up for coal.

Just lucked out finding mine when I was buying a new wood stove. The girlfriend just happened to ask the dealer if we could cook on the stove top. She told him that she had grown up learning to cook with a coal range in her parents house. The dealer said they'd just taken a coal range in trade and asked would she like to see it. He showed us the Sunny and next thing I know, she insists she's buying it for me, . . so she gets to use it ! :D

Now, 8 years later, the wood stove is still in the shipping box ! :roll:

Paul

 
User avatar
Photog200
Member
Posts: 2063
Joined: Tue. Feb. 05, 2013 7:11 pm
Location: Fulton, NY
Baseburners & Antiques: Colonial Clarion cook stove, Kineo #15 base burner & 2 Geneva Oak Andes #517's
Coal Size/Type: Blaschak Chestnut
Other Heating: Electric Baseboard

Post by Photog200 » Sun. Nov. 17, 2013 6:12 pm

Sunny Boy wrote:That roll top is a beauty, Randy !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'll bet you can't wait to get the addition done.

Not surprised there's no tank available. Ranges with a water tank seem to be even rarer than ones set up for coal.

Just lucked out finding mine when I was buying a new wood stove. The girlfriend just happened to ask the dealer if we could cook on the stove top. She told him that she had grown up learning to cook with a coal range in her parents house. The dealer said they'd just taken a coal range in trade and asked would she like to see it. He showed us the Sunny and next thing I know, she insists she's buying it for me, . . so she gets to use it ! :D

Now, 8 years later, the wood stove is still in the shipping box ! :roll:

Paul
Yes, the cast iron roll top warming oven is a very rare find. I was talking with Mrs. Bryant of Bryant Stoves in Maine when I bought the Kineo from them and she told me just how rare it was. The stove was made in Bangor Maine and she knows her stuff about those local stoves.

I just bought a new glass top stove for my kitchen and I HATE it! (wasted $2,000.00 on it) I would much rather cook on the old stove...so yes, you are right, I cannot wait to be able to put that addition on. I still cook on it but it would be much more convenient if it was in the house!

That is so cool that you have a girlfriend that wants something like this...she is a keeper.

Randy

 
User avatar
BPatrick
Member
Posts: 349
Joined: Wed. Jan. 25, 2012 5:29 pm
Location: Cassopolis, MI
Baseburners & Antiques: 2 Crawford 40 Baseheaters
Coal Size/Type: Stove Coal
Other Heating: Herald Oak No. 18

Post by BPatrick » Sun. Nov. 17, 2013 10:51 pm

Not up for a battle but there is a misconception that model oak direct drafts arent effecient. I have one and it gets 14 hour burn times easy sometimes 16 hours. And it will put out serious heat. Its not like its a wood burner. I don't ev3n burn wood through it . Jjust anthracite. As far as radiating heat. They are hard to beat easily running at 550 for 14 to 16 hours. Oh yeah. And that 550 heat happens in just minutes when your getting the stove going for the day. The cast plus barrel design is amazing as it gets heat out into the room. Mpds and your use of them will keep heat in the room. Not knocking modern technology, but don't count out the direct draft s as they are efficient also.

 
User avatar
Sunny Boy
Member
Posts: 25560
Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 1:40 pm
Location: Central NY
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: Anthracite Industrial, domestic hot water heater
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood range 208, # 6 base heater, 2 Modern Oak 118.
Coal Size/Type: Nuts !
Other Heating: Oil &electric plenum furnace

Post by Sunny Boy » Mon. Nov. 18, 2013 6:49 am

With the technology we have today, I have no doubt that a modern stove can be built to extract the max heat out of a pound of coal.

What I find most interesting is how efficient some of these antique stoves are, that were built over 100 years ago. :shock:

I would add, don't count the kitchen ranges out when it comes to heating efficiency. I was reading another thread about how various base burners are designed to pass flue gases around to get that heat out. As I read, I found myself more than once saying, "Yup, my range has that too". After all, it was designed and built by the same people who built those base burners.

And, . . it will cook a Thanks Giving dinner while doing all that house heating, and heating water to wash the dishes afterwards too !!! ;)

Paul


 
User avatar
wsherrick
Member
Posts: 3744
Joined: Wed. Jun. 18, 2008 6:04 am
Location: High In The Poconos
Hand Fed Coal Stove: Glenwood Base Heater, Crawford Base Heater
Baseburners & Antiques: Crawford Base Heater, Glenwood, Stanley Argand
Coal Size/Type: Chestnut, Stove Size

Post by wsherrick » Mon. Nov. 18, 2013 3:12 pm

BPatrick wrote:Not up for a battle but there is a misconception that model oak direct drafts arent effecient. I have one and it gets 14 hour burn times easy sometimes 16 hours. And it will put out serious heat. Its not like its a wood burner. I don't ev3n burn wood through it . Jjust anthracite. As far as radiating heat. They are hard to beat easily running at 550 for 14 to 16 hours. Oh yeah. And that 550 heat happens in just minutes when your getting the stove going for the day. The cast plus barrel design is amazing as it gets heat out into the room. Mpds and your use of them will keep heat in the room. Not knocking modern technology, but don't count out the direct draft s as they are efficient also.
There is nothing wrong with a good quality Oak Stove. The high end ones are very desirable indeed. Those that have the double heating options, heated secondary air, indirect back pipes, etc. are highly efficient and versitile.
Base Burners are designed for Anthracite. If I was in an area where Bituminous was cheap and plentiful, I would have a Radiant Home Oak or a Florence Hot Blast. There are several others that I would also commend for that purpose.
The thing that must be remembered is that all Oaks are not equal. There were a lot of inexpensive models made that are not as well designed as the high end ones. Again one must know what he is looking at before making that judgement call.

 
User avatar
dlj
Member
Posts: 1273
Joined: Thu. Nov. 27, 2008 6:38 pm
Location: Monroe, NY
Hand Fed Coal Stove: Vermont Castings Resolute
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood Baseheater #6
Coal Size/Type: Stove coal
Other Heating: Oil Furnace, electric space heaters

Post by dlj » Mon. Nov. 18, 2013 8:53 pm

Sunny Boy wrote:With the technology we have today, I have no doubt that a modern stove can be built to extract the max heat out of a pound of coal.

What I find most interesting is how efficient some of these antique stoves are, that were built over 100 years ago. :shock:

I would add, don't count the kitchen ranges out when it comes to heating efficiency. I was reading another thread about how various base burners are designed to pass flue gases around to get that heat out. As I read, I found myself more than once saying, "Yup, my range has that too". After all, it was designed and built by the same people who built those base burners.

And, . . it will cook a Thanks Giving dinner while doing all that house heating, and heating water to wash the dishes afterwards too !!! ;)

Paul
Paul,

I quite agree cook stoves heat well, however, how many pounds of coal can you put in your cook stove and then walk away? I imagine my Glenwood has 60 to 80 pounds of coal in it when full. I get an easy 16 hour burn in normal cold weather. Way longer in the shoulder months and when it's flat out in really cold weather I'm down to maybe 14 solid hours of burn time with even output. I can go longer, but the house temps start to drop. These stoves are made for heating. Not that the cook stoves don't heat, that they do and very well. But I could never keep a fire in a cook stove for as long at as high an output as I can in my current stove. I also don't think the cook stoves circulate the heat as well. I heat my whole house with the one stove located at the far end of the house, yet it still keeps the bedrooms nicely heated. I don't recall my cook stoves having that kind of natural convection.

FWIW,

dj

 
User avatar
Sunny Boy
Member
Posts: 25560
Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 1:40 pm
Location: Central NY
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: Anthracite Industrial, domestic hot water heater
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood range 208, # 6 base heater, 2 Modern Oak 118.
Coal Size/Type: Nuts !
Other Heating: Oil &electric plenum furnace

Post by Sunny Boy » Tue. Nov. 19, 2013 6:34 am

dj,

Yes, I could put a lot of coal in my 118 when it's finished, but that roasting pan with a 20 pound turkey in it just won't fit through the loading door ! :D

And yes, the kitchen ranges are not meant to run as long as the Oaks and box stoves, but for sake of discussion of stove designs as heaters and their efficiency, I snuck it in.

My kitchen range won't hold near as much coal as an Oak - only about 25 pounds of nut (one #16 coal scuttle full) fills the fire box. At usual settings for our cooking temps, it will go about 4-5 hours before needing a good shake-down and reload. But, damped down like I do for "night mode" when it's just being used as a heater, it doesn't run much cooler, and it will consistently go 11 - 12 hours - unattended- on that 25 pounds.

When I come downstairs in the morning, my un-insulated, large kitchen, which has 9 foot ceilings and tall windows (oh, those crazy Victorians), stays at 65 degrees, . . even when outside temps are down below zero. The left end area of the stove top stays at least into the upper 500 degree range, more often into the low 600 degrees. At 30 inches above the stove top (just below the stack damper) the pipe is down in the low 100 degree range. Most mornings you can keep your hand on the pipe. And it may run a bit longer than that once the old girl is rebuilt and properly sealed.

So, for the sake of discussing efficiency (heat output per Lb of coal), if we can extrapolate a bit, . . if I could fit 50-60 pounds of coal in that same kitchen range, I think it'd very likely run as long - maybe even longer then a base heater.

I know that my Oak, even with the indirect back pipe added, has a lot less surface area to extract and radiate heat than my kitchen range. And, with an 18 inch fire pot, my Oak is one of the bigger ones of it's type, while my kitchen range is one of the smaller. However, small as it is, it has 8 feet of flues inside it when it's in indirect mode (oven on), with a lot more outside surface area to shed that heat before it gets out of the stove. That's more internal passageway than the 118 and possibly as much as many base heaters.

Speaking of which. This old range did go 23 hours once, when I was away for an over-night in January a few years ago. I set it up my usual way for night heating mode and left at 1 pm. Got home at 12 noon the next day and it was still going. Just opened the dampers, gave it a good shake-down, added more coal and the old girl was rolling along within about the usual 10 minutes. Wish I knew why, . . and how to get it to run that long again. :oops:

Now tell me, . . how'd that big dinner you cooked on your base heater turn out ? :D

Just funnin'. I find this to be an interesting topic and I hope no one takes offence at my ribbing. :)

Paul

 
User avatar
nortcan
Member
Posts: 3146
Joined: Sat. Feb. 20, 2010 3:32 pm
Location: Qc Canada

Post by nortcan » Tue. Nov. 19, 2013 10:15 am

Paul, very interesting infos on your range.
I'm not very good at range stoves, except that I saw a few photos of some ranges, so is it possible for you to explain in simple words ( easier for my :oops: ?????English) the way for having a so long gasses path, you said about 8 Ft., I didn't even know that there was a damper in them to get the stove on a long path mode.
Thanks.

 
User avatar
Sunny Boy
Member
Posts: 25560
Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 1:40 pm
Location: Central NY
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: Anthracite Industrial, domestic hot water heater
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood range 208, # 6 base heater, 2 Modern Oak 118.
Coal Size/Type: Nuts !
Other Heating: Oil &electric plenum furnace

Post by Sunny Boy » Tue. Nov. 19, 2013 12:20 pm

nortcan,

Sure, glad to.

My range (like most) has a rectangular fire box along the left side of the stove. The top of that firebox is only a few inches under the two left-most round plates (see pictures below, in sequence as the flue gases travel.). The firebox runs from just about the front of the stove to the rear.

At the back of the stove just under where the stove pipe attaches, there is a door (damper). Next to that - usually to the right - there is a lever sticking up through the stove top that controls that damper. Some call it the back damper, and some the oven damper. When opened during re-fueling, the flue gases go directly from the firebox to the stove pipe - a distance of only about a foot from the middle of the firebox.

When the oven damper is closed the flue gases have to travel around the oven to reach the pipe. The path is from the firebox, across the top of the oven to the right front corner, down between the oven and water tank, across under the oven to the left end around the back of a baffle, then back over to the right and up the right rear side of the oven to just under the round plate at the right back corner and then back to a chamber on the back of the stove directly under the stove pipe and out.

That area under the right rear round plate is baffled off from the rest of the area between the stove top plates and the top of the oven. That baffle continues down the middle of the right side and most of the way under the oven to within several inches of the left end of the space between the bottom of the oven and the base plate of the stove.

To add to the flue gas path I have a water tank. There are two dampers on a common shaft. One water tank damper is in the front vertical flue space between the oven and water tank (the down flue), the other damper is in the flue space to the rear of it (the up flue). When the lever on the front of the stove is down, both doors are opened, blocking off part of those vertical flues and sending some of the flue gases into the area surround the water tank. The tank is just sitting down into that right end section of the stove. The water tank casing increases the surface area of the right end of the stove by a factor of four over not having a tank.

With the oven damper and water tank dampers closed, the flue path adds up to 8 feet worth of length the gases have to travel. Having the water tank dampers open diverts some flue gas adding about another two feet of pathway.

Hope this explains it.

Paul

Attachments

Bread warming.JPG
.JPG | 183.2KB | Bread warming.JPG
Coal shaker grates.JPG
.JPG | 185.1KB | Coal shaker grates.JPG
Oven damper open..JPG
.JPG | 216.6KB | Oven damper open..JPG
Oven damper lever.JPG
.JPG | 213.4KB | Oven damper lever.JPG
Vertical oven flues.JPG
.JPG | 214.4KB | Vertical oven flues.JPG
Flue divider..JPG
.JPG | 226.4KB | Flue divider..JPG
Oven base flues..JPG
.JPG | 224.6KB | Oven base flues..JPG
Water tank damper open. .JPG
.JPG | 218.1KB | Water tank damper open. .JPG
Inside water tank area..JPG
.JPG | 219.3KB | Inside water tank area..JPG

 
User avatar
nortcan
Member
Posts: 3146
Joined: Sat. Feb. 20, 2010 3:32 pm
Location: Qc Canada

Post by nortcan » Tue. Nov. 19, 2013 5:55 pm

WOW, thanks for the nice infos and photos. The stove's inside looks very clean, is it a functional stove?
That kind of stove could certainly send a lot of heat in the house like the base burners or maybe more due to that super sophisticated gasses path and the size of the cast iron mass.
Do you know if many antique ranges were built like yours?
Anyway, the best thing I should do is to go down and have a copious lunch cooked on it :D

 
User avatar
Sunny Boy
Member
Posts: 25560
Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 1:40 pm
Location: Central NY
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: Anthracite Industrial, domestic hot water heater
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood range 208, # 6 base heater, 2 Modern Oak 118.
Coal Size/Type: Nuts !
Other Heating: Oil &electric plenum furnace

Post by Sunny Boy » Tue. Nov. 19, 2013 6:49 pm

Yes, it's functional. Those flues only look clean because they were vacuumed just this past weekend. I clean them twice a year.

As you can see in the pictures it gets used. For 9 months of the year we do all the cooking/baking with it. Tonight was spaghetti night ! At least I think that's what I cooked. :D

From what I've seen on the internet, there are a lot of early kitchen ranges for sale. Most are newer than mine (1903). And most seem to be set up for wood, or wood and gas. Very few have the optional water tank.

It's possible that these old kitchen ranges, with their long flues, may have contributed to the development of the oaks and base burners. I don't know which of those was the chicken, and which was the egg. :D

Paul

Attachments

DSCN2523.JPG
.JPG | 211.9KB | DSCN2523.JPG
DSCN2521.JPG
.JPG | 221.6KB | DSCN2521.JPG

 
User avatar
dlj
Member
Posts: 1273
Joined: Thu. Nov. 27, 2008 6:38 pm
Location: Monroe, NY
Hand Fed Coal Stove: Vermont Castings Resolute
Baseburners & Antiques: Glenwood Baseheater #6
Coal Size/Type: Stove coal
Other Heating: Oil Furnace, electric space heaters

Post by dlj » Tue. Nov. 19, 2013 10:10 pm

Sunny Boy wrote:Yes, it's functional. Those flues only look clean because they were vacuumed just this past weekend. I clean them twice a year.

As you can see in the pictures it gets used. For 9 months of the year we do all the cooking/baking with it. Tonight was spaghetti night ! At least I think that's what I cooked. :D

From what I've seen on the internet, there are a lot of early kitchen ranges for sale. Most are newer than mine (1903). And most seem to be set up for wood, or wood and gas. Very few have the optional water tank.

It's possible that these old kitchen ranges, with their long flues, may have contributed to the development of the oaks and base burners. I don't know which of those was the chicken, and which was the egg. :D

Paul
Paul,

While I haven't looked at cook stoves in a number of years, when I was looking, it was very difficult to find a cook stove designed for wood. I did have one at one time, and the firebox was probably twice as deep as yours, possible a bit more. Most of the cook stoves were made for coal. Some with not very well made grates, I'm thinking likely the ones you are currently thinking are more for wood. Indeed the optional water tank is not so easy to find. I can't address the chicken or egg, but my take would be they were unrelated, the cook stove was developed for cooking, the base heater developed for heating.

If I had my preferences, I'd have one of each. I enjoy cooking on the old cook stoves. My Glenwood can't cook like your cook stove, your cook stove can't heat like my Glenwood... :box: HaHaHa....

Nortcan - as far as I've ever seen, all the cook stoves have the same, or similar, heating path options. You need it to start the fire and to run the ovens. I've never seen a cook stove without the valve to go from direct draft to oven circulation.

dj


Post Reply

Return to “Antiques, Baseburners, Kitchen Stoves, Restorations & Modern Reproductions”