Glenwood NO.8 Running on Bitumious Coal/Wood

Hello All,

After getting most of the parts I needed from Wilson (again props to the man) I found easy access to Bitumious coal near my home, (montana) its very low in Sulfides 0.8% I believe and around 8-9k btu's. I know Anthrocite is much better to burn but at only $55 per ton I cant beat that. Will this stove burn Bitumious good? If so how do I go about burning it? I read online that the secondary damper might assist with that but with the gas rings in place now from the part I got from you I shouldnt need to use secondary air.

I believe William stated in an earlier posts that it will burn with the fire rings in place and I might need the damper controlled elbow? I don't have one and im not sure how that thing even works still. To me it looks like it would just break the draft is all.

I flipped the pictures the right direction so you don't have to turn your heads sideways this time. I would have loved to floor mount this stove but I already had the hearth in place from years earlier with river rock.

I cant answer your bit question completely, but Tractor Supply has anthracite coal available, in stock, at a place or two in Montana and Wyoming. Its 300/ton.

You will need at least an 8" pipe and chimney to burn bit long term as the soot will plug up a 6" fairly quickly. I burn it sometimes with a 6" but I cleaned it a lot, enough to make it not fun. It needs quite a bit of over fire air, but more so when it is loaded and around the first 30 minutes. It is kind of like burning oiled down logs.

$55 sounds nice and cheap if you can do it.

The 6" only goes through the wall then connects up to the 8" double insulated pipe (all new) to the roof 20ft up. It creates one heck of a draft!!! I will look into getting that stuff from them

Hi,

William doesn't seem to be on line everyday. I'd try to PM him directly. I can't remember his user name off hand but I'm sure someone knows it. Once you have that, go to the User control panel and send him a PM. That will probably send him an email to his primary email so he'll know someone is looking for him. Good luck, Lisa

The cast iron elboy you have looks exactly like the elbow that has a built-in check damper, that came with the Glenwoods originally. I see it has the cast leaf design that Glenwood pipe elbows have.

If it is the elbow I think it is, there should be a rotary damper on the left side (non-showing side in your pictures). It looks, and works very much like the rotary dampers on the ash drawer and loading doors.

And yes, it 's only purpose is to let cooler room air into the stove pipe to help keep a strong draft "in check". That's why it's called a "check damper". Using it too far open can overly slow, or even kill the fire. Start out testing by only using small openings until you learn how much is enough, or too much.

There is another member on here that is using bit coal in his #6. He reports that it does very well because of the gas ring adding secondary air around the firepot to burn off the volatiles. In that same thread, William agreed that it should work very well because of the gas ring. You may find that you also need to use some amount of opening the secondary air damper in the loading door.

Trying a load, or two, of bit coal is the only real way to will tell you how much of what damper setting combinations works best for your system set up.

Paul

So I got ahold of Tractor Supply in my area and YES!!!!! they do carry Anthrocite coal. Props for pointing me in the right direction. They have nut or rice coal, this stove used stove coal? or can I burn nut coal also? Any help would be appreciated.

BM

Either nut or stove.

The main differences are.

If you have a strong drafting system, nut can help tame it. If the draft is on the weak side, the easier breathing stove coal can help strengthen it.

Other than that, the stove will hold about 10% more pounds of nut coal, so you might get a few hours longer burn times with it compared to using stove coal.

Again, all hook ups are unique, so testing with each size is the only sure way to know what your system does best with.

Paul

Hi there. Personally I've tried both stove and nut size. I prefer the nut size better. Try a Couple bags of both. Then you'll know. Stove looks great !!

[quote="BlueMountains"]So I got ahold of Tractor Supply in my area and YES!!!!! they do carry Anthrocite coal. Props for pointing me in the right direction. They have nut or rice coal, this stove used stove coal? or can I burn nut coal also? Any help would be appreciated.

It is crazy that they are shipping it this far west at the same price. I wouldnt think there will be a big market out your way so you will likely be the only buyer, except for people thinking it burns like soft coal. I'm sure nut will work fine. Anthracite is a nice steady heat and easier to use than soft, less messy too. If you ever try the soft for any extended time, get a 6 to 8" pipe adapter and switch it as close to the stove as you can. I was burning soft with a 6" and in 4 days it would start to plug, even close to the stove. That is why 8" is recommended.

warminmn wrote:

BlueMountains wrote:So I got ahold of Tractor Supply in my area and YES!!!!! they do carry Anthrocite coal. Props for pointing me in the right direction. They have nut or rice coal, this stove used stove coal? or can I burn nut coal also? Any help would be appreciated.

It is crazy that they are shipping it this far west at the same price. I wouldnt think there will be a big market out your way so you will likely be the only buyer, except for people thinking it burns like soft coal. I'm sure nut will work fine. Anthracite is a nice steady heat and easier to use than soft, less messy too. If you ever try the soft for any extended time, get a 6 to 8" pipe adapter and switch it as close to the stove as you can. I was burning soft with a 6" and in 4 days it would start to plug, even close to the stove. That is why 8" is recommended.

Just curious, what stove were you burning the bit in ?

Does it have a pre-heated secondary air gas ring system like the Glenwood base heaters ? If not, I can understand how it would plug up a stack pipe so quickly.

According to the #6 owner burning bit, and William, the Glenwood gas ring does a good job of burning off the residual volatiles. It acts much like the hot blast type stoves that have pre-heated secondary air systems that are purposely designed to burn bit coal more thoroughly.

Paul

Paul,

Thats the crazy part, I was looking into getting it shipped over here to the west coast. I planned on getting 22-25 tons of stove coal to stockpile for my burning needs. Wood is getting harder to find and more expensive. I like the idea of burning Anthrocite over Bitumous better, I may loose some between the grates since its smaller but thats ok. I planned on burning it in the Glenwood NO.8 Paul, the NO.8 has a new gas ring in it and thanks to Wilson I was able to get the final gas ring piece and intall it last week. Did my first test fire as well, see my wood plate Thread on my mistake of leaving it in baseburner mode for the initial fire up. (thought I had it in Direct draft mode)

BM

BM,

With the nut coal, you might loose some small pieces through the grates when you first start up, but you can pick them out of the ash pan if it bugs you. Once it's been running awhile and there's some ash buildup on the grates, and, if you shake the stove properly and not more often than needed, you won't drop any. The smallest pieces get burned to ash well before they can get near the grates.

The grates in my range are exactly the same tooth size and spacing as those in my #6 and my 118's. For 11 winters, I've used bulk nut, plus last winter about 1/2 ton of bagged Tractor Supply Kimmels nut. All without problems. In fact nut works out better with the range's only 6 inch deep fire box.

I have used stove coal, and while it did put out more heat and reacted faster to damper changes while cooking, it needed refueling more often. And, it would not throttle down as easily or last as long through the night as a load of nut coal.

Some find a blend of nut and stove works well for them.

As for bit coal, at far less cost per ton than anthracite, you might want to try some in the #8.

Paul

Sunny Boy wrote:BM,

With the nut coal, you might loose some small pieces through the grates when you first start up, but you can pick them out of the ash pan if it bugs you. Once it's been running awhile and there's some ash buildup on the grates, and, if you shake the stove properly and not more often than needed, you won't drop any. The smallest pieces get burned to ash well before they can get near the grates.

The grates in my range are exactly the same tooth size and spacing as those in my #6 and my 118's. For 11 winters, I've used bulk nut, plus last winter about 1/2 ton of bagged Tractor Supply Kimmels nut. All without problems. In fact nut works out better with the range's only 6 inch deep fire box.

I have used stove coal, and while it did put out more heat and reacted faster to damper changes while cooking, it needed refueling more often. And, it would not throttle down as easily or last as long through the night as a load of nut coal.

Some find a blend of nut and stove works well for them.

As for bit coal, at far less cost per ton than anthracite, you might want to try some in the #8.Paul

I agree. I burn bit coal, and I don't have the sooting up problems that other have. Dunno why either, except that I do have a strong drafting indoor chimney. I'm running 6 inch pipe from the furnace to the rooftop.

I don't have time at present, however; I will comment on this at length as soon as possible. And to those who have PM'd me, I will get to you ASAP. I haven't been meaning to ignore everyone, I have a full plate right now.
Your friend, William

You can burn Bituminous in the Glenwood but you've got to understand it's nature. It's the total opposite of burning Anthracite.

Sunny, I was burning it in my Frankenstove. My problem was more the size of the coal as it was around pea size average, so more smoke Im sure. I made overfire air and commented about it in one of Lightning's threads. it was more fuss than it was worth for me (bit). If I could get larger size at affordable price I'd try it again.