How "wet is wet coal " ?

I've got a question...
I've seen some threads here and read in my Harman Mag. manual "not to burn wet coal".
Does that mean water running out of it ? damp ? frozen ?
When I get my coal at the "yard", it's semi covered. ( shed) Depending upon weather conds. it can be rained on or have some ice in it.
The guy at the "yard" says " wet coal burns better" ?
I bag all my coal in plastic feed sacks and try to keep enough suppy that it can air dry in the bags for at least 2 wks. ( under roof/outside)

I suppose another question would be; if you run a shovel thru the coal several times and it gets wet, is that too wet ?

Would real damp coal lead to hopper condensation ?

Sorry for a bunch of questions...
Thx, Mossy Beard

Should have done it before...
I did a search ( wet coal) and got some answers.
If anyone has any additional input, it's welcome.

Thx,
Mossy Beard

If you want your hopper to last you will need to only load coal that doesn't make the shovel wet when you insert it into the coal. I have seen more Harman Magnums than not with rotted hoppers from using wet coal.

Can you use rice coal like Blaschak or Reading straight out of the bag (fairly damp) without drying or should you dry it? I have a Harman magnum and tried it befor and had condensation form on lid but have also since corrected a draft problem. I normaly use Centralia rice coal in mesh type bags that dry well but cannot always get this coal and would like to know what others have done in this situation. My cousin has an Alaska stove and uses the damp/wet stuff right out of the bag with no problems with condensation at all.Thanks for your help.

coal stripper wrote:Can you use rice coal like Blaschak or Reading straight out of the bag (fairly damp) without drying or should you dry it? I have a Harman magnum and tried it befor and had condensation form on lid but have also since corrected a draft problem. I normaly use Centralia rice coal in mesh type bags that dry well but cannot always get this coal and would like to know what others have done in this situation. My cousin has an Alaska stove and uses the damp/wet stuff right out of the bag with no problems with condensation at all.Thanks for your help.

Just FYI Centralia does not have there own coal they are a coal broker So you & They will not be getting the same coal all time. It will depend on what is available to them at the time you order it from them .The next load my be dry or even wetter.

http://www.centraliacoal.com/l1.html

If the coal looks damp going in the hopper, I usually just leave the lid off.

Thanks for the responses.
I usually try to keep my coal "rotated". That is, keeping the most recent load stacked on pallets for 2 weeks or more. So far so good...
Someone mentioned about leaving the cover off the hopper. There are no issues with doing this ? ( ie: more air passing thru the hopper to the fire, etc ?)

Thx, Mossy Beard

Someone mentioned about leaving the cover off the hopper. There are no issues with doing this ?

No issue if the stoker is drafting properly. The hopper on my Alaska is lidless.

In terms of leaving lid off to remove condensation, I had concerns about the hopper fire issue also since it seems that the fire in the stove is only several inches from the hopper, which has a lidless unlimited supply of air. I may be off but the way I understand it if all is right with the stove grate you should notice on the grate (beginning at coal entrance from hopper) new unburned coal section-next burning coal section-next ash section, and you shouldn't worry. If for some reason the grate and gasket were not afixed properly, the combustion blower air could be fueling the burn of coal right up against the side of the stove where the coal enters from the hopper. In this scenario because the coal is basically up against and potentially underneath the hopper coal, you could be in a possible hopper fire situation. Is this correct?

been using wet rice (water running out of bag) off and on in harman stoker for almost 3 yrs. hopper still looks good, almost like the day one. it seems that when the stove is running it dries right up. never left it get below 1/2 and kept lid on. empty out at end of season.

Sounds good I just put a damp (just a little moist in the middle) bag in and about an hour later I got some slight moisture on the lid so I'll try it and see what becomes. I really value the feedback from the people that have done this because I have only ran this 5 winters and dry coal was always easy to find. I always used the feed sack-plastic burlap or blue tarp style mesh bags so the wet plastic sealed bags are new to me Thanks again

I recently installed a Keystoker coal stove...this is my second winter running it. We also just purchased the house, so I haven't built a permanent coal bin yet. I've been picking up my coal via pick-up at about 1/2 ton at a time. I load the coal into the basement in several garbage cans, which have small holes in the bottom to drain out the residual water on the coal, and also in an old corrugated metal storage bin with timber bottom. Last year I had absolutely no problems with the stove...this year has been a different story. Several weeks ago, while the stove was running, I noticed a strong sulfur smell in the house. The smell seemed to be the worst at the rear hopper for the stove. I also noticed some faint steam, presumably from the evaporation of the water off the coal in the hopper, coming from the hopper. Within the past week, my CO detectors began to go off. I had the coal spread out in the basement near the stove to dry it out as best as possible prior to filling into the hopper. I haved checked my draft and it is good...the stove vents to a chimney and is the only thing feeding into the chimney. Is it possible that the wet coal is the source of my troubles? Could the water vapor be the source of the CO? I have since turned my coal stoker off until the problem is fixed and my digital CO detectors are now all reading 0. Any help offered is greatly appreciated...tonight's temperature is supposed to be 5 to 10 below...single digits for highs the next couple of days.

how did you check the venting? I am not questioning but wondering if it included checking to see if the venting has a buildup of fly ash that could be cause a draft that is too low?

AA130 settings and smell

Hopper Question

check the stove and the stove pipe for ash build up. Check every inch of exhaust vent. There is ash buildup hiding somewhere. Make sure you vacuum out the exhaust tract in the stove itself. Also check to make sure the grate has a good seal at the back end.