Keystoker Ka6 cleaning under grates

I was wondering how and how often does the area under the Ka6 grates need to be cleaned out and how is best to do it. I am sure fines and ash accumulate. I noticed that there are two loose bolts at the edge of the grate.
Thanks,
Jon

Depends on coal quality and how much you run it, It should be cleaned at LEAST once a season (normally after the heating season), depending. My stoves (Not a boiler) get some ash/fines built up under the plate, but normally I can run all season (Nov thru May) without cleaning it out.

Sometimes you can just pull the combustion blower off the back and vacuum it out from the rear instead of pulling the grates out.

I'd check under the grates after a month of burning, to see how much ash/fines have accumulated..[hopefully you can remove a fan and look under the grate] you may want to go by the # of tons of coal instead of time.. But use this inspection as a gauge as to how often to clean.. As Dave said, it depends on the coal and burning conditions... You may not need to clean untill springtime,, or you may need to clean every ton of coal or every month...

Greg L.

Keystoker claims once a year. I do mine once a year. I never got a lot of fines under the grates and once a year is often enough for me. If your coal has a lot of fines in it you may get more accumulation but I would still think once a year will do it. When cleaning out under the grates I let the fire go out and then remove the blower and stick a small 1 1/4" vacuum tube in and suck out the fines. This works well, no need to remove the grates.

Jon

Did you ever find out why the screws on the end of the grates are lose? Mine are too. There weren't even hand tight. I hope to fire it up tonight and I will just make them hand tight until I call Keystoker.

Why they don't put a plate on the bottom ala harmon is just beyond me. If I were to install one of these I would cut and fabricate a plate in with bolts or wing nuts. Pulling the blower or grates is a real pain with a potential for damage.

huntabsarokee wrote:Jon

Did you ever find out why the screws on the end of the grates are lose? Mine are too. There weren't even hand tight. I hope to fire it up tonight and I will just make them hand tight until I call Keystoker.

I did call Keystoker about the loose nuts and they said that they are supposed to be just hand tight because of the expansion and contraction of the metal. If they were too tight they could cause a problem, what I don't know. I will just leave them loose since it appears only to hold the fines catch tray in place.
Jon

I'm going to my first inspection on Ka6 tomorrow and cleaning. The 2 screws that is mention in this post, are they the ones you remove to clean under grates? This is what manual states "The fine coal and ash droppings can be removed by removing the screws on scrolling plate"

to remove the fines I removed the small blower fan and once that is removed there are two additional screws that remove the larger plate that the small blower fan connect to. You can then use a small vacuum hose and remove the fines.
Jon

I remove the fan and adapter plate. The shop vac in the hole removes all of the fines. No need to remove the screws in the fire box.

Thanks, today I clean boiler and found very little fines/ash under grates. Boiler only running for a month but just wanted to check everything before colder temps.

I do mine every spring, when the heating season is done. Simply remove the small blower motor, then use a vacumm cleaner and clean under the grates. I took a 3/4" diameter pipe of 30 to 36 inch long, flattened one end to approximately 1/4" thickness for about 24" then taped the other end to the vacumm hose, works real well to get all the way under the grates. This is part of my yearly end of season cleaning, along with checking the gear box oil level, especially easy with the hopper removed for touch-up. I have been heating for 3 years and no problem with my keystoker. thanks dan

Last year I did maintanence on my Kaa-2 by reaching into the boiler, running a drill bit through the holes, and a vaccume through were the pusher block is. What a Chore! This fall, 2 - nuts let the hopper come off. Two more let the stoker come completly out, once wires are disconnected. I went through the entire stoker assembly in no time. Hardly any fines under grates. That's the way to go. Way easyer than reaching through that little door, and trying to see in the dark. No cramps in the hands, and legs. No kinks in the back. No sore knees. And a though view/inspection of the entire unit. Easy to work on if need be. For summer shut down: Take the stove pipe off, and cap the smoke outlet. Put some insulation over the bottom hole of hopper. Then stick a small ceramic heater into the ash door during summer shut down. Works great! My ceramic heater has a thermostat, and actually shuts off.

That method sounds great for a stoker that is shut down for the summer.

Since there needs to be furnace cement on the flange for the stoker and furnace cement I use needs a day to cure I am stuck with sore knees,
cramps, bruises and scrapes method.

My boiler runs all year is still warm after clean out.

Is there furnace cement available that cures in a few hours and doesn't glue things together?

Also I've found that a paint scraper works great on the inside walls when cleaning it out!

Machinist wrote:
Is there furnace cement available that cures in a few hours and doesn't glue things together?

I've waited for 1-2 hours with no issue on furnace cement. Here is a link for you http://www.efireplacestore.com/rut-65.html