Blue Flame in My Stove Pipe?

I am still kind of new to the coal burning art. I have yet to completely jump from the wood burning I've done for the last 20+ years. I have noticed on occasion the blue flame up in the stove pipe headed to the block chimny. I do have a BD installed and set to -0.04 with a Dwyer 25 (perm. install). I notice it during mid burn or so this happens. Is it something I'm doing wrong? Or does this happen and it is not anything to worry about?

Welcome aboard partner. How long after you load fresh coal do you see the blue flames?

Thanks for the welcome...I would say within an hour or so. I load my coal in the center in a pile and leave hot all around the pile to get the new going.....

Welcome to the forum....

I'd say you just have some tweaking to do regarding the over fire air supply. The volatiles are building up and not igniting until there are enough to shoot the resulting flame up the pipe. If you can get a more controlled gradual burn of the gas then you will have the smaller blue flames contained in the firebox. Over fire air will help with this. It sounds like you are leaving enough burning coal exposed when re-loading which is the second ingredient to lighting off the gas.

I keep the over-fire air open for aprox. 10 mins or so after re-load. This is totaly based on what I see in the firebox...I do tend to shut that when there is still a little smoke present...maybe I'll let that smoke evacuate totaly and see how that goes...This doesn't happen all the time it's just that it happens once in a while and gets me nurved up..cuz the fire aint supposed to be there....

dont get to worked up, your draft is OK so a "blow out" is unlikely , you have a block chimney, your burning coal only, make sure your stove pipe is secured at each joint with 3 or 4 screws (you should do that anyways!).

Curious... what model coal stove do you have? this will better enable everyone to help you tune her correctly for that glorious gas burn we all strive for (we just need to get yours back in the stove LOL).

You are burning anthracite right? Hard Coal?

What you are seeing is volatile gases being baked out of the fresh coal.. This is normal although the flame shouldn't extend up the pipe very far.. Once its burning good like that, close your primary air down some, leave the secondary alone till the flames simmer down and you have an orange glow showing thru the fresh coal. Then you can cut back the secondary air to a sliver and set your primary for the burn duration.

I'm burning anthracite in a New Yorker WC-90 so there is a combustion blower for under the fire through the ash chamber (which has a door on it) and a door shutter for over the fire..right now I'm still alternating from wood to coal as I educate myself...when the coal thing gets me wondering we revert back to old school (wood)...I just need to get the bugs worked out and these questions answered and the comfort factor will grow x2 both heatwise and mindwise...I have been able to keep the small "splosions" to a minimum learned that one fast...had to put stove pipe clean out back on a couple times. Thats the only joint without three screws in it. Sometimes having more balls than brains doesn't work out, so I'm trying to balance the mix you know....I really like the coal when I get the recipe right, it works pretty good!

Is that a boiler or forced air furnace?

You mentioned barometric damper? Its not recommended to use a barometric in case of chimney fire. The barometric will feed it.

As for mixing wood and coal, just use one or the other so you can learn coal. They have different burn characteristics and require different settings.

...WC-90 is a boiler, New Yorker recommends the BD in the install paperwork for use either wood or coal. I ran for a little while with out it and won't go back to that..chimney drafts too well and all the heat was going right up..and the coal and wood piles were going down just as fast. Learning curve is 90 degrees...house was not! I'll try cutting the shutter on the blower a little too.

franco b wrote:It seems that combustion blower might be blowing too hard. I would try limiting that to let the fire build more slowly.

I totally agree. I would even suggest not using the combustion blower and instead control the primary air manually...

Good idea,I'll have to experiment with the blower shutter and the motor off and see how that would flow air to the load....