Utility Glenwood Kitchen Stove Any Hints, Tips Etc..

Hello all. Longtime lurker here and have enjoyed all the good info. Stuck inside today as it's snowed about 18 inches so far with more to come here in Massachusetts.
I have two coal stoves in my home. One is a Vermont Castings Vigilant that I am very happy with and pretty much have down to a science.
I also have a Utility Glenwood combination stove in the kitchen. It has propane for the burners and oven, and coal or wood for the oven and heating.
I only run the Glenwood stove during very cold periods as the Vigilant does a pretty good job on it's own, but the Glenwood is much harder to operate.
It has two sliding air vents on the front and two different "dampers" in the back. I also have a manual pipe damper.
Of the two dampers in back, one (which has a broken lever which is supposed to stick up out of the top) is labelled coal or gas.
I am assuming this is to direct heat to the oven to cook with coal heat, but no matter what position that damper is in (I can get my fingers in to change its position), and how hot the coal bed is, I cannot get the oven anywhere near baking temperatures.
The other damper in the back I am assuming is to recirculate the heated gasses when the stove is up to temp, similar to the damper in my Vigilant?
Of the sliding air vents in the front, I am assuming the lower is for intake air to the bottom of the coal bed, but it's position really does not seem to make much difference, and the top is for burning wood and getting the coal started.
Everything I have posted is all assumptions on my part from experimenting. The problem I am having is I can either get the stove burning really hot, and using lots of coal, short refill time, or just lingering along, with hardly any heat, but long refill time. Cannot seem to moderate it's output.
Is it just finding the magic combinations of rear lever, pipe damper and intake vent position? At what temp should I be operating that rear lever? Should I be able to get the oven up to baking temps? Is that also a combination of lever positions?
I am burning nut coal.
If anyone has any ideas or info. I would greatly appreciate it. And if you have an owners manual kicking around I would love a copy
Thanks in advance.

Welcome Fred,

Part of the problem is it's a combo stove meant for cooking, not so much for heating. Unlike the earlier stoves that had no gas section, they had more surface area to radiate heat when using coal or wood.

The coal/gas lever should divert flue gases from the firebox to a jacket over the top, down a side, under the oven, and then up the back flue leading to the chimney pipe collar.

Yes, the lower damper on the front door is the primary air (through the ash pan area under the grates ). That's the main air control when burning coal. The upper damper on the front is the over fire air. The main control for wood.

When burning anthracite coal, only use the primary damper, and the MPD (Manual Pipe Damper) in the chimney pipe. Keep the secondary damper closed, or you'll have too much cool air over the fire thus weakening the draft too much and stalling the fire.

Wood vs coal, a firebox full of coal will burn much longer that a firebox full of wood. About twice as long is the usual.

Of the two dampers on the back, there should be one that controls the pathway from the firebox, directly to the chimney pipe collar. That damper is what many call the direct/indirect mode damper. When starting a fire, and during reloading, that damper should always be in "direct mode" - meaning it should be open directly from the firebox to the chimney pipe, to get a strong draft going. Once you have a fire established, closes that damper so that the flue gases must travel around the oven. That will heat more of the stove to extract as much heat as possible, and it will help control and slow the fire as it is extracting heat from the flue gases and thus lowering the draft strength somewhat.

To help keep heat in the stove try closing the MPD more and more and see if you get more heat into the room. If the MPD is open too much a lot of the heat will just go up the chimney.

The usual reasons an oven doesn't get hot is air leaks sucking cooler air into the flues and jacket surrounding the oven, and/or having the MPD too far open.

Paul

Have you cleaned out the area under the oven usually accessed by a small door on the front below the oven door? If you never have maybe it is full of soot, ashes or maybe a mouse nest. In any case, that would keep your oven from heating.

Good catch CT. Yeah, if they haven't been, cleaning the flues will help.

Paul

Here is the problem. The utility is a transitional piece. Gas ranges were coming in and rural folks that switched to gas had cold kitchens. Glenwood answered the need by combining the coal/wood kitchen heater with a complete gas range. The firebox is designed to heat the kitchen only. The gas side does all the cooking. The gas side is probably insulated( they came both ways) and is independent of the coal/wood side. You will never get the oven hot by using the coal/wood firebox.

Thanks Paul. You've confirmed what I thought about this stove.
I think I'll just leave the coal/gas flapper "shut" and not bother with tying to cook with coal.
Coalturkey-thanks for your reply. The entire bottom of the stove above the burners come out for cleaning which I do frequently, but perhaps there are obstructions elsewhere. I think in the spring I will take the entire back off and clean out any junk.
Stovehospital-That's what we use it for. Our Vigilant heats our home pretty well, but the kitchen is on the opposite side of the house, and stays chilly. The Glenwood heats it up nicely.

Fred, All is not lost.
My in-laws -to-be, have for decades, used a combo wood/coal/gas Stewart range for heating their kitchen and all their cooking/baking. While the range doesn't have quite as much heating surface areas as a full sized coal range, it does heat their kitchen very well. And the wood/coal oven works very well for all their baking.

When you get to taking it apart to inspect the flues, check to see that the coal/gas damper is fully closing in both positions. Maybe you can also repair the lever at that time and make it easier to use ?

You may be able to move the damper now, but without it's lever you might not be able to "clunk it".

Fly ash can build up around the damper edges and not let it close completely. Every now and then closing it by getting it to make a metallic clunk helps blow the ash out of the joint.

Plus, that metal to metal clunk lets you know it's closing as it should. If the ash builds up you can feel it closing softly as the ash cushions it and no "clunk" will be heard.

Next would be to check the flue pathways leading from the firebox, through that coal/gas damper, all around the oven, and up to the pipe collar. Look for any joints that are not completely sealed. If they can suck in the slightest amount of cool air it lowers the temp of the flue gases going to heat the oven.

My range was missing a lot of the sealer in the joints around the oven. No gaps greater than about 1/32 inch, but all those small leaks collectively where allowing a lot of cooler air into the oven flues.

I resealed the joints and the oven now gets over 100 F hotter with the firebox and MPD dampers at the same settings. And the range became more controllable because the draft was stronger without all those air leaks.

Paul

There are no flues around the oven. The gas side is completely separated from the coal side. The exhaust gases go out the back then down and back up again, then out. It is similar to the path of the gases in the back pipe of an oak stove. There is a clean out at the bottom back of the heat exchanger. Be careful as most of the interior baffles in these heat exchangers are toasted. People try to heat the whole house and badly overheat the unit. It is designed as a kitchen heater only.

Well, that would explain why the oven doesn't get hot with just coal on this model.

So the coal/gas damper is just for choosing to connect either the firebox, or the gas oven to the chimney ?

Paul

Stovehospital-confused as to what that lever and vertical baffle would be for then?
Thanks for all your info.

The lever is for direct or indirect draft. Use direct when you add fuel. The vertical baffle is the direct the gases down to the bottom and then back up to the exit flue.

Stovehospital -I understand that is what the lever in the back is for.
My confusion is with the lever marked gas or coal. If it is not to divert heat to the oven side, what is it actually for?
Thanks again.

The lever on the top that is.

This one with the broken lever.

As soon as some snow melts I will check one of my Utilities for that lever. I think it was used if you were burning coal gas. Coal gas is poisonous and must be vented. Some gas stoves have sealed tops and vent all the gases up a flue because they were used for coal gas. Today with natural or propane we don't need to vent them. On the other hand you may wish to vent oven cooking gases up the flue.