Hitzer 50-93 Producing A Lot of Ash

Still fairly new to burning coal.(Blaschak) Burning steady about 7 days. Patiently Running my Hitzer(in cellar) on setting 10to11. Ash vent about 1/2 open. First 4 days had stove temps b/w 200-210. Shaking grate 2X daily (lightly/choppy) till I see glow off coal reflecting off bottom of ash pan.(Very small amount of lit ash in pan). Stove seemed to be working good. Past two nights fire down to 110-120F with a lot of ash. Cant even perk fire with ash door open. Why? Thankful for any help..

Sounds like you have large build up of ash. I would suggest allowing the fire to die & starting over. This way, you can see if you are loaded up with ash. You may have to shake harder if you do find large ash buildup under new coal.

That is probably the solution. With the Hitzer, the grates can swing open wide and dump your whole load. So I would just take short and hard/choppy strokes? Won't that really disrupt the burning? I was shaking till I saw a pretty good glow from the grates..

Lets make sure you have the chain set correctly on your back damper. I have my hook on the 21st ball counting from the end of the chain. This assumes our chain lengths are the same from the factory. Your 10 and 11 oclock settings seem correct.

Once you get a good bed of red coals, filler up full of coal. I shake my grates once every 12 hours. Shake with a good firm shake about 5 to 8 times. You should start to see a hand full of hot coals sitting on top of your ash. Dont be shy when shaking.

I don't even use my front ash door holes. I even sealed them closed, air tight. This makes the box more air tight and better rear control with the back damper. Obviously this isn't your issue, but something to think about in the future.

Good luck.

I'm not home yet to see status of the stove. May have to start new fire. Will check the chain adjustment and will start to shake the grate harder. Will investigate keeping ash vent closed, but first I need to deal with the ash. Coal burning has a learning curve involved but its well worth it. Thanks for the help.

sheargate wrote: Past two nights fire down to 110-120F with a lot of ash. Cant even perk fire with ash door open.

Just re-read your complaint. I'm not quite sure what you mean by "lot of ash". Can you reiterate? Lots ash when you shake after 12hrs?
Also, do you have a baro damper? if so, is it stuck open or wide open?

Are you still using as much coal as you did the first few days? Coal fires burn hottest in the beginning due to a thin layer of ash.
Just seems like you have a good mature fire going with thick layers of ash, burning embers and fresh coal. If you let the ash layer get too thick you'll impede the fire and go into an idling mode. Try shaking down more ash until some....just some...burning embers fall to the ash pan....then add some coal and open it up to see if it burns hotter...you should get a thicker layer of burning coal and embers.
Just a thought.......

I actually have good news. Just arrived home and checked stove and was very surprised. It is burning much better about 180F. This is due to the more aggressive shaking I did 5:30 this morning. I shook a ton of ash down and really thought that I put the fire out. So your advice is definitely correct. Aggressive shaking is good. Chain setting seems to be correct. Not really sure about closing front ash vent? Thanks again.

i run mine w/o using the ash door ventas well. agressive shaking will help as well as poking any ash buildup in the corners or edge with a poker will help too. I have mine set at 14-15 running with a side temp right around 500 deg. what type of damper are you using. I have a manual and a baro. if I close the manual the hottest I can get the stove is 400 degrees. when I first started I wasn't shaking hard enough either.

Here's another tip. The HITZER stoves have a ledge at the left and right side of the fire box , just above the grates. Ash builds up on them ledges. Every two or three days , run a poker down through the coals , and fluff the coals up BEFORE shaking. Do it twice at each side , and once about 1/4 way in from each side. I found it is also better to use the ash pan air inlets , along with the dial draft on the back. Reason being , if you are useing the back draft only , you are cutting all air off to the fire. When the flapper finally pops opens , the stack temps really climb up there untill entire mass of stove is up to temperature , and flapper gets stuck to magnet again. When useing the ashpan vents , the fire always has air to it , and will respond nicely when back flapper pops off magnet and opens. Start out with the holes in ash pan door looking half moon shape. The back dial pionting strait up. The HITZER really shines when the two drafts are working in harmony.

I am burning the same stove and it's been lit continuosly for the past few weeks. I slow it right down during the day becasue the temps have been hitting 50. I leave the back draft set at about 11 o'clock at night and shut it a little during the day. I leave the ash pan vents CLOSED all the time. Shake the grates about every 12-16 hrs depending on my work schedule. Use short choppy striokes until red coals drop into the pan. Like stated above, every couple of days I use the poker on each side and the front of the firebox to break up the ash the the grates leave behind. I dump the ash pan maybe once a day, when it reaches close to the top of the pan. make sure you are running a baro damper. This really improved my burn quality, I was quite impressed.

Will try using poker on the side ledges of stove. Good idea. Had warmer weather this week. Coal stoves seem to run better when its cold. Probably because of a better draft from the cold air. Stove seems to run better with my ash pan vent open about 3/8". and stove on 10 to 11. Why would I need a barometric damper?