AA - 130 Ash - TOO MUCH UNBURNT COAL!!

What am I doing wrong? The timer is running 45 seconds every 30 minutes, I'm at 2 clicks 95% of the time and 3 clicks 5% of the time, and look at all that unburnt coal (mostly partially burnt), and the boiler is stays at 170 degrees plus/minus 5 degrees. The draft is maintained between .02 and .04 wc - the higher draft during windy conditions. I have an extra weight on the baro. flap to help reduce draft. Any ideas? If this is what I can expect, then I'm good to go. If I can improve on the situation, I'd like to.

Make sure your fire is burning the full width of the chamber. You may remember Greg had the same problem with his 260 last year, it looked like a full fire from the top but it was not full width on the bottom.

Yes his fire was like a Mushroom burning in the center and all up top but not on the sides so when he ashed the fresh
and half burned coal fell out in to the ash tub How long did you wait on your relight if you had one before you started to
ash you should wait a hr or more to make sure the coal is burning in the whole fire chamber before you start to ash
The 260 has a bigger fire chamber then the 130 so your wait might not be as long but I would wait a hr anyway
And By the way your ash is ugly looking

It seems like your fire is too thin. I think you should go three clicks 100% of the time. Set the anthrasta to 140. Also, I set my timer for 1 minute twice an hour. This will lower the ash height and run it enough to keep your chimney warm enough to give you a healthy draft. Does that make any sense?

Pret, after looking at your pictures your fire is to thin/shallow and and your ash to deep aka starving for air. what are your settings on the stat and notches, I would use 135-140 and 1-3 notches depending on chamber fill. the only time the unit shouldn't ash is when the stat is satified mostly during winter months when the burn times are longer. use the stat for fine tuning after you have your notches set, once you get the fire deeper it will burn hotter and better.

edit: another thing I would use 1min every hr to get the fire hot, with the short run times every 30mins the fire doesn't have a chance to build some good heat.

I'll take a picture of my ash for you which is superior pea.

I have mine set for 4 clicks 1min/hr . I was doing the same thing at first not having the fire deep enough . Thanks to Greg for noticing in one of my pics I posted and setting me straight . I now use the anthrastat to adjust the ashing and leave it a 4 clicks on the handle . I normally run about .03 draft at idle after a full burn I am at .04-.05 except when its windy and cold I see higher . I need to install a larger Baro but I will worry about that later . My High limit Aquastat is at 215 . My high setting on my triple aquastat is 185 my low is 155 with a 15 degree diff setting . The anthrastat is at 135-140 right now and it is calibrated . I have to say since its been colder the boiler is much happier . When it was warmer I was down to 120 on the anthrastat but still 4 clicks . The handle controls the ashing the anthrastat regulates the depth of the burn . Seems like no less than 3 clicks 4 preferably works the best .
As far as using 2 weights on the baro seems to be a strange setup I would be worried about it getting stuck open . 1 weight about 3/4 out should give about .04 max pretty steadily under normal conditions. When its windy I still get more draft than my 6" baro can compensate for so I will be changing to my 7" when I clean the pipe next time . Dave

I posted 2 more in the aa full burn topic as well . After a few mins of idling the hot coals are barely visible under the unburnt coal .

Wow.... I'm so far from you guys, it's crazy. I feel my booms were because of my fire too deep, and too much unburnt coal on top. I'm keeping the boiler at 145-160, sometimes it creeps to 180, one windy day higher. My draft I've dropped from .02 to .01. Anthrastat at 120. Two clicks. It ashes any time it runs, but doesn't run a lot. One min ber hour on the timer. My ash is all burnt, but I am using more coal than I thought I might.... 50ish pounds a day or a bit more I think.

With these settings the coal burns very near the top and I like that. Keeping very thin new coal keeps the booms away.

I get no booms at this setup(knock on wood) . I have only had one small one when I first go it lit but that was pretty warm out as well . I had a few out fires at first because it wasn't deep enough . I was relighting it every week for 3 weeks . Now it has been running over a month perfectly . Very little overshoot . My anthrastat is working as it should . I will here it come on or go off during a long burn cycle . Dave

pret; here is a picture of my ash

**Broken Image Link(s) Removed**

BTW these are my figures and are most likly off but give me a general idea of load and I could even be way off but I keep using it since my lbs per month work out pretty right
AA260m
old small Superior Pea
total ash weight = 46.5 lbs
totals days = sunday night thru thursday night
asuming 14% ash that comes to = 332lbs
per day = 66lbs
per day BTU 969,144
per hr BTU 40,381
lbs used in October = 1,980lbs
BTU's per October = 29,074,320BTU's

Thanks fellas, I'll make the change to 3 - 4 clicks... I can't do anything about the timer right now. The timer I have is a 30 minute timer... so I'm stuck at the moment with a 30 minute interval. I do have it set at 45 seconds burn time per 30 minutes. The boiler might run three times during the day outside of the 45 seconds every 1/2 hour... I'm pretty happy with that. The idling boiler is keeping my house at 72/73 for 80% of the day - priceless!

I will take some pics in a couple of days after I dump this can and report what I find.

Pret what timer are you running make and model

I run 140 to 145 on the A-stat, the lowest possible setting on the shaker which is about 2, and my triple aquastat at about 140 and 200. No booms and minimal unburned coal.

I have been using Coal Contractors from Geer in Alexander, NY.

I have an old style Honeywell stoker timer set at 30 secs 2x an hour.

Just set it and forget it. Your settings will be similar. That's just the way the thing works.

My house is an old gravity set up. Lots of water in 6" mains. The unit burns best on cold nights when it runs a lot. Fall weather will give you the semi burned stuff.

What a great thread! All good info.

I did have some unbunrt pieces this morning so I changed my draft back to .02. I'll start creeping my anthrastat up & see how things go. It's 22* outside right now.

ive been getting a little bit of unburnt coal in mine as well. I figured it was normal. most of mine is all burnt, but some is half burnt. im getting a lot of clumps in my ashes. Blaschak Buckwheat. alot of iron content?