Not Enough Heat...

 
rberq
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Location: Central Maine
Hand Fed Coal Stove: DS Machine 1300 with hopper
Coal Size/Type: Blaschak Anthracite Nut
Other Heating: Oil hot water radiators (fuel oil); propane

Post by rberq » Thu. Jan. 01, 2009 5:21 pm

reckebecca wrote: The manual states that .03-.04 is "ideal" for the stove for optimum burn.
Forget the stupid manual! You said yourself that the manual is crap! You have umpteen experienced coal burners here trying to help you.

The reason I suggested covering the baro with aluminum foil, is that it would tell you quickly, with almost no effort on your part, whether higher draft would improve your burn. As others have said, you need to fix the baro installation. And before or after doing that, you should experiment with higher draft.

Also forget what the manual says about pea coal. You won't know what does well with YOUR specific stove and chimney combination, until you try both pea and nut for yourself.


 
reckebecca
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Post by reckebecca » Thu. Jan. 01, 2009 5:30 pm

rberq wrote:
reckebecca wrote: The manual states that .03-.04 is "ideal" for the stove for optimum burn.
Forget the stupid manual! You said yourself that the manual is crap! You have umpteen experienced coal burners here trying to help you.

The reason I suggested covering the baro with aluminum foil, is that it would tell you quickly, with almost no effort on your part, whether higher draft would improve your burn. As others have said, you need to fix the baro installation. And before or after doing that, you should experiment with higher draft.

Also forget what the manual says about pea coal. You won't know what does well with YOUR specific stove and chimney combination, until you try both pea and nut for yourself.
Point taken.

 
CapeCoaler
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Location: Cape Cod, MA
Stoker Coal Boiler: want AA130
Hand Fed Coal Stove: DS Machine BS#4, Harman MKII, Hitzer 503,...
Coal Size/Type: Pea/Nut/Stove

Post by CapeCoaler » Thu. Jan. 01, 2009 5:31 pm

We get the coal for my parents Hitzer from Agway here on the Cape so...'Ask Agway'...
Picked up a full pallet on the trailer, less work!
Forklift it on and back it to the storage pile outside.

Attachments

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'rents stackin' the black gold

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reckebecca
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Post by reckebecca » Sat. Jan. 17, 2009 6:17 pm

I wanted to give all of you who helped out an update.......with your help I got the stove burning well enough to produce heat and pretty consistently keep it at around 200*.

The other night I finally got around to rotating the baro so that it is now BOTH plumb and level! I am now getting stove temps of 250-275* and the baro is flapping in the breeze! I had a 68* living room when I got up this morning in spite of the -9* on the window thermometer.

I also discovered that there are slots in the stove so that the grate tool can slide inbetween coal bed and grate! Of course, there is NO mention of this in the manual. But, it was a good discovery none the less and has allowed for more thorough ash removal.

So, once again - THANK YOU to all who offered assistance! I am now a happy (and warm) coal burner. :D

 
titleist1
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Post by titleist1 » Sat. Jan. 17, 2009 9:12 pm

Way to go reckebecca!! Congrats on sticking with it and getting the warmth! I'm sure you'll continue to "fine tune" your burn methodology to get the most out of your set up.

 
rberq
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Location: Central Maine
Hand Fed Coal Stove: DS Machine 1300 with hopper
Coal Size/Type: Blaschak Anthracite Nut
Other Heating: Oil hot water radiators (fuel oil); propane

Post by rberq » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 11:20 am

Glad to hear it's working now. But don't give up tinkering, try some higher or lower baro settings and see what happens.

I think, from the stove picture you posted, that your surface thermometer is at the back-left corner on the stove top??? If that is a double top, with space for convection air to pass under it, then it is bound to be cooler than the actual stove body. I would be curious what the temp is on the side of the stove, say on the upper third of the side but not right near the top. 200 degrees seems awfully low!

 
reckebecca
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Post by reckebecca » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 11:42 am

rberq wrote: I think, from the stove picture you posted, that your surface thermometer is at the back-left corner on the stove top??? If that is a double top, with space for convection air to pass under it, then it is bound to be cooler than the actual stove body. I would be curious what the temp is on the side of the stove, say on the upper third of the side but not right near the top. 200 degrees seems awfully low!
You are correct, the thermometer is on the back left corner - for no other reason than it fit there beside the hopper door. I'll try moving it and see what it does.

Funny you should comment on the temp. (with the move in baro I was actually getting 275* consistently). Yesterday afternoon it was getting pretty warm in here so I started cutting the air intake (I know, I know, I slipped back into thinking like a wood burner again. sigh.).......well, I currently have the air intake adjusted to "0" and the stove is 350*! I'm contemplating the opening of windows and/or heating the garage. LOL The baro has been very active, not remaining in any one position for very long but doing a lot of swinging full open to closed and everything in between.


 
rberq
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Hand Fed Coal Stove: DS Machine 1300 with hopper
Coal Size/Type: Blaschak Anthracite Nut
Other Heating: Oil hot water radiators (fuel oil); propane

Post by rberq » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 2:52 pm

reckebecca wrote:Yesterday afternoon it was getting pretty warm in here so I started cutting the air intake (I know, I know, I slipped back into thinking like a wood burner again. sigh.)
No, you were correct. Once you have the bed of coals burning well, you SHOULD cut the air intake to reduce heat, and increase the air intake to increase heat. In Fall and Spring, when outside temps are 40s nights and 50s days, I let in lots of air after shaking and reloading with coal, so as to get the coal bed burning vigorously and evenly. Then I cut the air way way down, and it just simmers along and I don't touch anything again for 24 hours. Just remember that coal responds slowly to small changes in the air intake -- it can easily be 10 to 30 minutes before you see the effect of small adjustments.

Now, why did your stove top temperature go way up with reduced air? I'm not sure. My first guess is, maybe more air is passing through the stove than can be used for combustion, so all that excess air is cooling things off? If there are any air inlets above the level of the grates, close them tightly! If your baro is at .03 or .04, I doubt you want to set it any lower. But if you can check the actual draft with a manometer that might be helpful. Also, lots of people put another surface thermometer on the stovepipe, about half way between the stove and the baro. If stovepipe temperature is anywhere near stove-side temperature, then too much heat is being lost up the chimney. It's not an exact science, but it gives you a valuable second way to judge how the whole system (stove and chimney together) is performing.

If you can set your air inlet to zero, and the stove still burns happily, then it must be a leaky inlet, or air is getting in somewhere else. Too much leakage could cause a runaway uncontrollable fire in some stoves, but it doesn't sound like your stove would have that problem or you would have seen it by now.

 
reckebecca
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Post by reckebecca » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 4:22 pm

rberq wrote: No, you were correct. Once you have the bed of coals burning well, you SHOULD cut the air intake to reduce heat, and increase the air intake to increase heat. In Fall and Spring, when outside temps are 40s nights and 50s days, I let in lots of air after shaking and reloading with coal, so as to get the coal bed burning vigorously and evenly. Then I cut the air way way down, and it just simmers along and I don't touch anything again for 24 hours. Just remember that coal responds slowly to small changes in the air intake -- it can easily be 10 to 30 minutes before you see the effect of small adjustments.

Now, why did your stove top temperature go way up with reduced air? I'm not sure. My first guess is, maybe more air is passing through the stove than can be used for combustion, so all that excess air is cooling things off? If there are any air inlets above the level of the grates, close them tightly! If your baro is at .03 or .04, I doubt you want to set it any lower. But if you can check the actual draft with a manometer that might be helpful. Also, lots of people put another surface thermometer on the stovepipe, about half way between the stove and the baro. If stovepipe temperature is anywhere near stove-side temperature, then too much heat is being lost up the chimney. It's not an exact science, but it gives you a valuable second way to judge how the whole system (stove and chimney together) is performing.

If you can set your air inlet to zero, and the stove still burns happily, then it must be a leaky inlet, or air is getting in somewhere else. Too much leakage could cause a runaway uncontrollable fire in some stoves, but it doesn't sound like your stove would have that problem or you would have seen it by now.
I did something correctly?!?!? Yay!! :D

The air inlets above the grate have remained closed since I got that information on New Years - I took a vow never to touch them again! :)

I did set the baro with a manometer - set it to maintain just below .05 measured with the manometer. I can get another thermometer and check the pipe temp. I did move the thermometer to the side of the stove and there was about a 50* temperature difference - it read 350* when on top it had read 300* just before I moved it.

When the intake air lever is set to "0" it is not completely closed, there is a sliver of light that I can see when looking through the ash door to the back of the stove (maybe open 1/2"?). Could it be that the cold temps outside are causing an increased draw on the chimney which compensates for the closed down intake? I've also gone through a lot more coal since closing down the air intake - I typically fill the hopper twice a day and I filled it this morning at around 7 and just had to fill it again at around 3 which is different. So, that would suggest that the fire is actually burning hotter and not simply that I was losing most of the heat up the chimney before shutting down the air intake. Before I closed the air intake down yesterday it had been at 1/2 open.

 
GRinRI
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Post by GRinRI » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 5:41 pm

Do you have a manual damper instaled between your stove and baro damper? If my manual damper is left open, the heat seems to run straight up the flue. I only leave it open 'till the blue ladies are dancing, then I close it and I can hear the stove heat up. (tick, pop, tick, pop) Maybe the manual damper helps keep the heat in the stove? Food for thought.
Also, I have bulk pea and I've tried nut in my Hitzer hopper fed stove. I think they both throw the heat but the nut is faster and seems to burn brighter. It burns better at lower heat settings than the pea. The pea seems prefer more air. It burns at more resticted air settings but it doesn't look like it's burning thoroghly. It looks like it's choked with ash untill I open 'er up.

 
reckebecca
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Post by reckebecca » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 6:19 pm

GRinRI wrote:Do you have a manual damper instaled between your stove and baro damper? If my manual damper is left open, the heat seems to run straight up the flue. I only leave it open 'till the blue ladies are dancing, then I close it and I can hear the stove heat up. (tick, pop, tick, pop) Maybe the manual damper helps keep the heat in the stove? Food for thought.
Also, I have bulk pea and I've tried nut in my Hitzer hopper fed stove. I think they both throw the heat but the nut is faster and seems to burn brighter. It burns better at lower heat settings than the pea. The pea seems prefer more air. It burns at more resticted air settings but it doesn't look like it's burning thoroghly. It looks like it's choked with ash untill I open 'er up.
Nope, no manual damper at all. My pea seems to be burning very well at this point - the only time I have chunks in my ash is when I am careless and bump the "dump door" in the shaker grate. I've got lots of bright red coals and blue ladies dancing all around.

At this point, I am no longer having trouble with not enough heat - thanks to everyone's help here I am contemplating opening windows (as they promised I would be once I figured it out)! The thermostat in my living room (where the stove is located) is currently reading 80* and that's with the ceiling fan moving air and the humidifier on high blowing cool air into the room at floor level. I'm not complaining mind you - at this point, with the temps outside this week, I'd rather have too much vs. not enough heat.

Now, the curiosity is that the stove is now set with the lowest level of air intake and it's burning hotter than it ever has - curious. Capecoaler promised me that I would soon be running the stove with 20% air setting, just didn't anticipate it being closed down entirely with an abundance of heat.

 
rberq
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Hand Fed Coal Stove: DS Machine 1300 with hopper
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Other Heating: Oil hot water radiators (fuel oil); propane

Post by rberq » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 6:23 pm

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, the one with the manual damper. Just kidding, sort of -- some people do very well with them. But the barometric damper should automatically adjust for different burn rates, winds that increase the draft, and so on. Unless your stove specifically recommends a manual damper (and then I'm not sure I would believe them), you probably don't need one.

It sounds like you have everything pretty well set up now, and you can just experiment with settings when you feel like it to see if you can tweak performance a bit. As to the air inlet never closing completely, maybe that is by design and maybe by accident, but it seems to be working fine. Just out of curiosity, how much coal are you burning per day? I think you said 800 square feet is being heated?

 
reckebecca
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Post by reckebecca » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 6:50 pm

rberq wrote:
Just out of curiosity, how much coal are you burning per day? I think you said 800 square feet is being heated?
The house is actually closer to 1000 square feet but, I had the spare bedroom closed off (it is now open to absorb some of the heat :) ). I haven't actually weighted the coal but, I've been loading the hopper twice a day with buckets that used to hold cat litter. The buckets held 30#s of cat litter. So, I am assuming that's about equivalent in coal?

Last week I had loaded it before I went to bed (11ish) and then forgot to load it in the morning - there was still a full bed of glowing coal when I got home at 3:30 the following day (was just down from the hopper so, hopper hadn't been empty long). But, today it was at the same state after only 8 hours. Now, granted, it wasn't as cold outside when I forgot to load it.

Today it will be taking 3 bucket/hoppers full and it's been burning at 300-350* all day.

 
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rewinder
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Post by rewinder » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 8:01 pm

Congrats !!! I knew you'd sort it out with the help from everyone here. That stove looked like it was capable of performing better than you first reported.

 
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Freddy
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Post by Freddy » Sun. Jan. 18, 2009 8:10 pm

You sure put the arc in the learning curve! Congrats on finally taming the beast.

I never noticed until right now that curve is one letter away from curse. Hmmmmmm


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