Successfully Burning Anthracite Coal in a Clayton Furnace

 
VtFarmboy
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Location: White River Junction Vermont
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: outdoor US Stoves EF1600
Coal Size/Type: Nut
Other Heating: use some wood in woodstove when it gets real cold outside.

Post by VtFarmboy » Wed. Dec. 26, 2012 7:01 am

I apologize for my spelling I am using my phone. Its hard to check and edit with such a small screen.


 
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Lightning
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Stoker Coal Boiler: Modified AA 130
Coal Size/Type: Pea Size - Anthracite

Post by Lightning » Wed. Dec. 26, 2012 1:13 pm

VtFarmboy wrote:Finally got some heat.
Could we get more info about your installation? How did you run warm air and return ducts? chimney? combustion blower on the furnace? some pics? We may be able to offer more help :D

 
VtFarmboy
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Posts: 61
Joined: Sun. Dec. 16, 2012 11:43 am
Location: White River Junction Vermont
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: outdoor US Stoves EF1600
Coal Size/Type: Nut
Other Heating: use some wood in woodstove when it gets real cold outside.

Post by VtFarmboy » Wed. Dec. 26, 2012 11:49 pm

I have tried posting some pics but haven't been succesfull. I have the US Stoves EF1600 out door furnace which is a version of the Clayton. I am using flexable insulated duct with a R8 insulation. The supply side is piped under the new deck and into the crawl space under the house. The return comes from the floor of the second floor. This my coal adventure round two. I should say the set up I have heats very well with a wood fire. We have had it running since early movember. There is no induction fan just the spin drafs on the load door and ash door. I have read about the comments about barometric dampers but I have yet to find one for insulated stove pipe. The chimney stands 9 feet and the unit sits about twenty feet from the house.

I started the coal fire about three pm after cleaning the firebox. Once the first layer ws going I layer it every half hour or so. At about 1 am I gave up and went to bed. At this point I had about a hundred lbs loaded. The coal was just to the top of the brick and mounded in the middle. The fire seemed to be going well. The blower would come on for about thirty seconds every three to five minutes. Woke up in the am fire was still burning but little heat. I through a couple of small shovels full on and went to grandmas house for Christmas. I came home about five and determined that this is going to work. I thru most of another fifty lb bag in went to bed early and woke at 3 am freezing to death. I went out to give in and throw wood on and noticed the fan was running for a long time without shutting off. Decided to let it roll started the wood stove to kill the chill and went back to bed. Woke at 4 am and the house was comfortable and by 6 am we were toasting!

At 7 I wnt out and shook the grates and threw a shovel or tow on and by 10 am we were chilling again. Been fighting getting it going ever since. I think I may have over done the shaking. Last night I left both spin drafts open all the way. Currently I have the ash door open to get it going again. Right now its starting to look good again. I li,e what I read about coal and while having my wife snuggling up at night to.stay warm I don't think she is convinced.

 
VtFarmboy
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Posts: 61
Joined: Sun. Dec. 16, 2012 11:43 am
Location: White River Junction Vermont
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: outdoor US Stoves EF1600
Coal Size/Type: Nut
Other Heating: use some wood in woodstove when it gets real cold outside.

Post by VtFarmboy » Thu. Dec. 27, 2012 5:18 pm

I am begining to think I need more draft. I don't think I am getting enough air. Just enough to keep it going but not enough to keep it hot. I do get some blue flames on top but not entirely over the whole thing.

 
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Lightning
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Post by Lightning » Thu. Dec. 27, 2012 9:45 pm

VtFarmboy wrote:I am begining to think I need more draft. I don't think I am getting enough air. Just enough to keep it going but not enough to keep it hot. I do get some blue flames on top but not entirely over the whole thing.
Any idea how much coal your burning per day? 60 -> 80-> 100 pounds? more? How many Square feet is your house?
VtFarmboy wrote:There is no induction fan just the spin drafs on the load door and ash door. I have read about the comments about barometric dampers but I have yet to find one for insulated stove pipe. The chimney stands 9 feet and the unit sits about twenty feet from the house.
Yeah I agree.. 9 foot chimney isn't gonna get you the natural draft you need to run it hot. A barometric damper won't help your situation since it only limits a chimney that drafts too strong, it doesn't do anything to help a weak draft. I would try a motorized draft inducer/combustion blower. I think that you can trigger a combustion blower with that thermostat thats on the furnace? You would have to investigate...

Keep us posted :D

 
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Lightning
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Post by Lightning » Thu. Dec. 27, 2012 9:50 pm

VtFarmboy wrote:I think I may have over done the shaking.
Shake till you see orange embers falling down thru the grates and an orange glow radiating down thru the grates. Its important to clear as much ash as you can or the coal can't get enough oxygen to burn hot and it will choke/run cool. Its almost not possible to over shake, unless of course you shake till the whole fire ends up in the ash pan lol.. Shake her good!! 8-)

 
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Post by DOUG » Thu. Dec. 27, 2012 10:04 pm

It does sound like you need more suction or draft from your chimney. I would increase the hieght from 9 feet to 12-15 feet. This is probably the limit for the hieght of the chimney not being guide wired. I belive that you will see a significantly increased change for the better of how the furnace will operate.

As said prior, a chimney draft fan would work, but I can't see how you could make it feasible to install and operate with insulated chimney pipe, especially out doors, so I would rule this out.

As for installing the combustion draft fan in place of the spinner, I don't think that this will work well either. From my experience using a draft inducer fan for combustion with anthracite, it tended to clinker up the coal quickly therefore requiring a shut down, clean out, and restart.

So my thought is to increase the hieght of your chimney.


 
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Lightning
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Post by Lightning » Thu. Dec. 27, 2012 10:12 pm

Sounds like good advise Doug.. :D But how could he control heat output with a thermostat in the house? Or wouldn't he have that option? I think there is a motorized combustion flap? lol - that could be run on these furnaces.. At least thats the impression I got from looking at the manual for it.

 
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Post by DOUG » Thu. Dec. 27, 2012 10:31 pm

I belive you are correct with the motorized combustion spinner, at least from what I also get from reading the manual. I would think that the thermostatically controlled motorized flap would work some, but especially well with a wood fire. As for keeping the anthracite fire going strong, I'm not sure if it will let too much air through the front cast iron liner holes burning the front faster and then adding too much secondary air over the fire? This is my first thought. If it does, I'm sure a couple of flat washers, nuts and bolts to close off the cast iron front liner holes would cure the problem, then forcing the incoming air, now preheated, from the motorized spinner under the grates. Something to experiment with and see whether or not you can get any use out of the wall thermostat when firing anthracite. Of course the flat washers, nuts and bolts may need to be removed in order to keep a good wood fire going using the wall thermostat.

 
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Lightning
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Post by Lightning » Fri. Dec. 28, 2012 6:45 am

VT, why did you decide on an outdoor furnace? Just curious.. No basement? What was your source of heat before the EF1600?

You might consider boxing your outside heat run and return to keep wind off them. I fear you are loosing heat outside too...

 
VtFarmboy
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Posts: 61
Joined: Sun. Dec. 16, 2012 11:43 am
Location: White River Junction Vermont
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: outdoor US Stoves EF1600
Coal Size/Type: Nut
Other Heating: use some wood in woodstove when it gets real cold outside.

Post by VtFarmboy » Fri. Dec. 28, 2012 4:34 pm

Lightning wrote:Sounds like good advise Doug.. :D But how could he control heat output with a thermostat in the house? Or wouldn't he have that option? I think there is a motorized combustion flap? lol - that could be run on these furnaces.. At least thats the impression I got from looking at the manual for it.
That is what I have. There is a motorized flap where the combustion fan is put as an option. I have found I get the best burns with the spinner there and on the ash door wide open. When I have coal going the house doesn't get warm enough to close the flap. And wow put another section or two on that pipe. I am not sure how I would do it. I had a hard enough time getting the three sections up the I did. I would need a lift or something. It is guyed so that's not an issue.

 
VtFarmboy
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Posts: 61
Joined: Sun. Dec. 16, 2012 11:43 am
Location: White River Junction Vermont
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: outdoor US Stoves EF1600
Coal Size/Type: Nut
Other Heating: use some wood in woodstove when it gets real cold outside.

Post by VtFarmboy » Fri. Dec. 28, 2012 4:48 pm

Lightning wrote:VT, why did you decide on an outdoor furnace? Just curious.. No basement? What was your source of heat before the EF1600?

You might consider boxing your outside heat run and return to keep wind off them. I fear you are loosing heat outside too...
The ducts are well insulated We were looking at out door boilers. The problem is the state of Vermont has made it nearly impossible to install them. I have a good friend who is a lawyer. We looked at the regs. All of the state regs were aimed specificly at boilers. So this unit is unregulated and I did not need permits. We have only a 16x18 basement where all of the water is along with our old oil boiler. We do have a wood stove which is what we actually heat with primarily. The issue always was that the stove is at one end and the other end gets cold. Eventually I will get the old boiler hooked back up. We are constantly in the state of construction. I am a bit of a do it your selfer. I own this place and owe nobody for it. Plenty of fire wood when we need it. The coal trial is because there was a recent article in the local paper about people gong back to coal as a primary heat source. The ducts run between the joists under the deck we will be replacing the flexable duct with galvinized and will insulate that real well next year. I just didn't want to do anything perminant until I was sure my set up would work. With wood this system heats well. I do think on the really cold days it will require the wood stove to help.

 
VtFarmboy
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Posts: 61
Joined: Sun. Dec. 16, 2012 11:43 am
Location: White River Junction Vermont
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: outdoor US Stoves EF1600
Coal Size/Type: Nut
Other Heating: use some wood in woodstove when it gets real cold outside.

Post by VtFarmboy » Fri. Dec. 28, 2012 4:59 pm

Lightning wrote:
VtFarmboy wrote:I am begining to think I need more draft. I don't think I am getting enough air. Just enough to keep it going but not enough to keep it hot. I do get some blue flames on top but not entirely over the whole thing.
Any idea how much coal your burning per day? 60 -> 80-> 100 pounds? more? How many Square feet is your house?
VtFarmboy wrote:There is no induction fan just the spin drafs on the load door and ash door. I have read about the comments about barometric dampers but I have yet to find one for insulated stove pipe. The chimney stands 9 feet and the unit sits about twenty feet from the house.
Yeah I agree.. 9 foot chimney isn't gonna get you the natural draft you need to run it hot. A barometric damper won't help your situation since it only limits a chimney that drafts too strong, it doesn't do anything to help a weak draft. I would try a motorized draft inducer/combustion blower. I think that you can trigger a combustion blower with that thermostat thats on the furnace? You would have to investigate...
I went through 300lbs of nut in 5 days. We have about 1600 square feet. We are built on a slab with a 2.5 foot crawl space and one end with a 16x18 foundation.

Keep us posted :D

 
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Lightning
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Post by Lightning » Fri. Dec. 28, 2012 6:27 pm

VtFarmboy wrote:I went through 300lbs of nut in 5 days. We have about 1600 square feet.
ooooohhh man.... 60 pounds a day. I'm heating 2500 square feet (which includes 400 in the basement) with 40 pounds a day and my house is loose. So yeah, yer loosing alot of heat either up the chimney or because your appliance is outside OR its not tuned up to burn coal very efficiently which was the problem I started with.. Thats a whole other ball of wax though :(

 
VtFarmboy
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Posts: 61
Joined: Sun. Dec. 16, 2012 11:43 am
Location: White River Junction Vermont
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: outdoor US Stoves EF1600
Coal Size/Type: Nut
Other Heating: use some wood in woodstove when it gets real cold outside.

Post by VtFarmboy » Fri. Dec. 28, 2012 6:39 pm

Lightning wrote:
VtFarmboy wrote:I went through 300lbs of nut in 5 days. We have about 1600 square feet.
ooooohhh man.... 60 pounds a day. I'm heating 2500 square feet (which includes 400 in the basement) with 40 pounds a day and my house is loose. So yeah, yer loosing alot of heat either up the chimney or because your appliance is outside OR its not tuned up to burn coal very efficiently which was the problem I started with.. Thats a whole other ball of wax though :(
Well I tell you I still have probably 80 to 100 lbs still in there. Here is a new development. As I have used up this round of coal about 3 pm or so I threw some wood on top. Well now that coal is going and I have plenty of heat. The house I plenty warm. The two pieces of wood I put in are well Burt up and now we are just on coal. Things are toastu and going good.


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