Craigs list ad for free coal 2-5-2013

You people in Southern Maine might catch it:


http://maine.craigslist.org/zip/3594354927.html

I did catch it! The guy had about 400#'s of nut anthracite in a concrete floor coal bin in his basement. He also gave me this sweet coal shovel! Burning the coal right now. Can't seem to keep the heat down on my boiler. It keeps overheating to the dump zone. Have opened the baro damper all the way, no change, still rises to 200F and goes to the dump zone(1st floor).
Not sure if I should add more coal or add some pea coal. I'm still a rookie, thought I would experiment with just nut coal.

Glad you got it! Even more glad you have the chance to play with coal. There IS a learning curve. I hope you get to see that it's a good thing before the 400# runs out.

Too much heat? Isn't that a good thing? Heeheeee!

OK, seriously..... Got a CO detector? if not, stop using the coal! That said, you should be able to control it and the overheat would be an occasional thing. Usually over heat it from too much incoming air. Coal demands good air control. If your door gaskets are leaky or if the doors simply don't close tight, there's most of the problem. The next part is that coal demands accurate draft. It's pretty much mandatory that you use a draft gauge (manometer) to set the barometric damper. A Dwyer #5 is perfect. NOT a #7. Google it & you can buy one from the factory cheap as anywhere. You might have to phone them for #5. Next, coal stoves & boilers like a particular size coal. I'm going to guess you'd run better with nut size. Oops...sorry, I thought you got stove size. Perhaps your boiler would like pea size. But yes, you are thinking correctly to perhaps cover the stove size coal with pea size, that will slow down the air.

Comparing to wood, the only downside, if it's a downside, is that coal makes way more ash. For me, not much of a downside. If you boiler is where you have to carry ash up stairs, down the hall, through the loving room, through the kitchen, out through the entryway, through the garage, around the house and 1,000 feet to a dump place....well... then it might be a downside.

Welcome to the Forum and best of luck to you. Stop back anytime.

Fred

Freddy wrote:A Dwyer #5 is perfect.

I think Freddy meant this one
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Dwyer-Mark-II-M ... 27cfc2dc65

4Mainer wrote:It keeps overheating to the dump zone. Have opened the baro damper all the way, no change, still rises to 200F and goes to the dump zone(1st floor).

Opening the baro won't help very much. Close your primary combustion air feed some (air that comes in under the grates). It should throttle back for you unless, like Freddy said, you have door gaskets not sealing well.

Bigger coal will burn hotter/faster if you demand it to. Smaller coal will idle easier. At least thats what I've observed in my experiences so far.

Good Luck and Welcome partner

wow, nice catch on the coal! Free is a wonderful price

OneDollar from this forum caught an item for me ive been praying to god for every night... made all my efforts to help others all worthwhile here and its nice to see others helping people catch some good stuff too! GG Fred!

[quote="Lightning"]
I think Freddy meant this one

Ohhh man! Yes, Thank you for catching my error. The #25 is the one, the #27 is of no use to coal burners.

Maybe the "2" on my keyboard isn't working, Yaaaa, that's it, blame the keyboard. Oh, wait! The "2" just worked.... gotta find a different excuse....something better than "Fred made a mistake". How about "When I'm stupid, I'm stupid for a long time"? Nope...I'm going to go with intermittent keyboard, OK, OK, that sounds good.

How about a free stove? http://longisland.craigslist.org/zip/3557668165.html