Coal cakes.

 
waytomany?s
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Post by waytomany?s » Wed. Nov. 16, 2022 9:43 pm

Lightning wrote:
Wed. Nov. 16, 2022 9:15 pm
I loved running stove size in the hand fed furnace. It was better for higher heat output performance during the colder parts of winter.
Did you just throw the entire bag in?

 
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Sunny Boy
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Post by Sunny Boy » Wed. Nov. 16, 2022 11:23 pm

Lightning wrote:
Wed. Nov. 16, 2022 9:15 pm
I loved running stove size in the hand fed furnace. It was better for higher heat output performance during the colder parts of winter.


Agreed. Stove will burn hotter because of the bigger air spaces.

But, in addition to jammed grates, I also didn't like having to refuel the stove size sooner because of less fuel density in the firebox. The range would easily go 12-13 hours on a load of nut coal, but I'd have to refuel at 10-11 hours with a load of stove in it. And if I slept late, I risked coming down in the morning to the firebed burned out.

Plus, stove size often jammed in the magazine of the Glenwood #6. Had to keep a steel rod by the stove to shove down into the magazine to break the jams loose.

Paul

 
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Lightning
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Post by Lightning » Thu. Nov. 17, 2022 9:10 pm

waytomany?s wrote:
Wed. Nov. 16, 2022 9:43 pm
Did you just throw the entire bag in?
I used bulk coal. My bin was designed with an opening at the base. I would scoop it off the floor with a flat shovel and load it into a 6 gallon bucket that I fashioned a chute on to. I called it the "coal cannon" lol. It'd hold about 65 pounds heaping. I'd get a nice even spread all the way to the back of the fire box with that thing..


 
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Post by lzaharis » Thu. Nov. 17, 2022 10:26 pm

Sunny Boy wrote:
Tue. Oct. 11, 2022 12:23 pm
When the economy gives you lemons,..... bake coal cakes.

Thanks to a few tons of last year's bagged coal, plus cleaning out my coal bin after two bulk dealers not delivering washed coal- like my now retired coal dealer did - I have about 600 pounds of fines in 5 gallon buckets.

I've experimented with making fines into easily burnable bricks in past, but still experimenting to improve my method. Nice to have a coal fired oven but theses could be "baked" on top of a box stove.

I dry mix the fines with cheap all-purpose flour. 4 parts fines, 1 part flour. Then add in water as I mix that to a firm consistency like mixing brick mortar. Then I pour that onto a half-sheet sized baking pan that has been covered with parchment paper, so it does not stick to the pan. Poured about an inch and a half thick and well pressed down to remover as much trapped air as possible. Then I score the mix with a dull knife to create fault lines so that after it's baked hard, I can easily break it into 3-4 inch squares. Then into the oven to bake overnight. That gives me chunks of coal I can just toss into the firebox like pieces of stove-sized coal and not waste the heat and money of 600 pounds of coal fines. ;)
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You could always use paper towel tubes by cutting them to length or toilet paper tubes and fill them with the fines and then pour black strap molasses in them to fill them up and let them dry out without the need to bake them.

 
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Sunny Boy
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Post by Sunny Boy » Thu. Nov. 17, 2022 10:42 pm

This was an experiment to save the fines with the least added expense to recoup what I paid for all those fines and small bits - about 600 lbs. in 5 gal pails. The cheapest house-brand 20 lb bag of all-purpose flour is cheaper than molasses, and I have a coal-fired range oven that is running 24/7 at no extra cost.

For the volume of fines in just these first 6 batches it was about a 5 gallon bucket, or about 50 lbs. That would take us months to go through enough paper towels and TP to do one bucket worth.

And the worst part is,..... I can't stand the smell of molasses. :hangover:

Paul

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