Best Coal Available in NEPA

Hey everyone I need to get coal this morning and just read the news about UAE. I have burned UAE, Superior, Lenig, and Hudson in the past. I need to pickup a ton this AM but want the best heat output coal available. Any suggestions? I have had the best luck in the past with Superior but have been using UAE the last couple years.

I have burned Sherman and Gale mining. Both are good but I never burned UAE to compare to. I felt the Gale Mining I got this spring was slightly better than the Sherman I got two years ago.

Sherman, you have to back on or out of the scale as it is not drive through.
Gale is a drive through but you have to back in under the chute for the breaker.

Not a big issure for me. My truck has a reverse gear.

I will be loading bags at the breaker with a full size van. My main concern is BTU and ash content.

You will have to give each breaker a call to see what their most recent test was. (if the did one).

Pursuit of the BTU and ash is a give load is like searching for the holy grail. It is my contention that the coal varies slightly with every truck load run through the breaker. It is some what a crap shoot on the day you get there.

UAE was fairly consistant as they were only digging from one mine. However, I once was told (believe nothing you hear and only 1/2 of what you see) that there was a considerable difference between the coal from the east to the west end of the mine.

Call DiRenzo's also. I have wanted to try their coal but have yet to do so. They seem to keep a tighter lid on quality control from what I have read.

Quote: However, I once was told (believe nothing you hear and only 1/2 of what you see)

The way I was taught was, "Don't believe anything you hear and only half of what you read." I added,
"And 100% of what you see."

Does anyone search out the BEST DIESEL or the BEST GAS when it is time to refuel? The best coal is the pile you have in your yard, or shed, or bagged. That will never change.

It is like having the BEST COMPUTER.....learn to relax and deal with the cards the good lord gave you, or find a tall place, with a steep drop-off on the other side.......Thelma!

When you achieve the BEST POSITION, with the BEST VIEW, and the calmest air; feel free to analyze the situation from your lofty point of view...and have the 'bag' to make a decision all by your lonesome!

I have NEVER had a bad experience with any coal I have purchased in the last 45 years....but why listen to an old bastard like me, anyway....

.but why listen to an old bastard like me, anyway....

.. but whistle that is easy to answer --- it's 'cause, errr hmm, I mean ... but then there's... errrhmmm..... OTOH err hmmm. Let's not forget your advice on .. err hmmm. The weather is beautiful today..... hahahahahahaha , I slay myself. OH, can I send you a really c rappy bunch of nut I have been wrestling with this winter.

Wow! Some guy's shorts are a little too tight What the heck would we have to talk about if not this? Politics. Stuff my underwear full of coal and let the bottom draft fire it up I had a bad bunch last summer. I noticed you weren't to fast to take it for free

I would tend to agree with WhistleNut. I have burned from 6 different sources now, included unknown rice coal scavanged out of an old coal bin.

I bet WN buys from estabished refiners, not the "New" guy on the block.

Even "bad" coal will burn if the appliance is adjusted properly, just with a little more aggravation.

I personally have burnt coal that approached 20% ash,, that's $.20 from every $1.00 worth of coal purchased,, NEVER again..

I've also bought a lot of rock and wood in coal,, also, never again..

UAE has been my standby for many years.. I used to buy Superior before..

If I buy any this or next year it will probably be from Superior. They usually do a test on their coal,, give 'em a call.

UAE was consistantly the best coal for low ash content, usually arund 6%, that means emptying the ash pan every 2-3 days
instead of every day.. HUGE difference.

Greg L

So far I've only noticed small differences in different coal from different suppliers.. Some had red ash some had white. Red ash would clinker, white ash not so much. Some had a hair more ash than others, hard to say.. Some was sized well, some wasn't and was saturated with fines. In a hand fed, overall, it seems to burn pretty close to the same lol.

rrob311 wrote:Hey everyone I need to get coal this morning and just read the news about UAE. I have burned UAE, Superior, Lenig, and Hudson in the past. I need to pickup a ton this AM but want the best heat output coal available. Any suggestions? I have had the best luck in the past with Superior but have been using UAE the last couple years.

Tuesday has come and gone...where did you end up getting the coal?

Early on in my coal burning adventure I bought some "coal" that would not burn. Period.

Most all I have bought burned well, a few times not so well. Best bet when considering a new supplier is to buy a small amount and see how it burns before buying that trailer full.

Three years ago I bought 3/4 ton of bargain pea coal from a supplier in Weigh Scales Pa. for a really cheap price. I figured for the price if it burned at all I was ahead of the game. I tried to burn that stuff in my Franco Belge hand fed and I was wrong. I could not get it to burn in that stove at all. I had about 3/4 ton of stuff I couldn't burn and couldn't give away so I just dumped it by the side of the garage.

Jump forward a year and my son had lost his job and couldn't afford fuel oil and ran out with winter coming. I picked up a stove that was one step away from the scrap yard for $25. It had a square vertical burn area that would hold about 1/4 bucket of coal and had two triangle shaped grates that had the rear grate support broken. I found info on the internet and it was made in Chicago in the 20's and was intended to be a quick warm up stove normally installed in the kitchen. It was advertised to fire up quick and put out heat fast for quick warmup of the kitchen area. On good ant coal it had two speeds; out and thermonuclear, but it burned the trash coal and seemed to like it! It was a royal pain to get lit and made an incredible amount of ash but once he got it lit he could get 8 hour burns from it. He heated his row home for a winter with that $25 dollar stove and free trash coal from my pile at the side of the garage. He found that if he mixed the trash coal with good anthracite he was able to semi-control the stove. It was a hassle but he kept his family warm all winter using that $25 dollar stove and trash coal that we couldn't get to burn in anything else. The key to burning this stuff turned out to be a whistling draft and keep the ash clear of the grates.

Jump forward to 4 months ago and I picked up a used coal fired water heater advertised on ebay that looks like a short R2D2 from Star Wars. It's basically a cylinder stove that is lined with firebrick and a cast iron donut on top with a square dump grate on the bottom. This thing will burn anything that has BTU content and will fit through the little loading door on top. I had about 10 buckets of the trash coal left and decided to give it a try. Guess what burns great in that stove? You got it! That trash coal that I couldn't give away. I hooked up the little water heater to a 30 gallon hot water heater tank that I pulled the gas burner out of and use it only for a storage tank. It thermosyphens and produces 180 plus degree water in about two hours using only that unburnable, unusable, couldn't even give away, trash coal.

Now I will go back to the place that had the "bargain" trash coal for the bargain price and see if they still have it for my little water heater. If they still have it for that price, I will provide all the hot water my wife and I can use for a bargain price.

This little adventure taught me that no matter what the fuel is or what quality you perceive it to have, someone has already made a device to burn it in. You just have to match them up.

This little adventure taught me that no matter what the fuel is or what quality you perceive it to have, someone has already made a device to burn it in. You just have to match them up.

Technically correct but the search for that elusive match costs a lot of time and money. People seem to dismiss the time, the fuel to search for that stove (often hours away) as far as coal goes quality is free in my book. Bargains are rarely that when everything is costed or perhaps I am too just dumb to find them. There are comparatively few grade A choices with coal suppliers and this board leads you to the grade A stoves (some staggeringly cheap). I needed to change suppliers and a little reading here left me with very few names. So I have just got 24 tons of stuff I bought blindly from a grade A NEPA illuminati-endorsed supplier and yes perhaps I could have got a few bucks off elsewhere or would the search prove fruitless and just cost time and money. Am I worried - nope - I just know it will burn great. I will revisit my bin in Oct but for now onto summer fun and I need a bargain mower. Now that's worth searching for but I never seem to find one of those either.