Should I Be Concerned?

I fired up the Chubby last night since its been pretty chilly si ce Friday. Last night was my first fire in it since my toying with it several weeks ago.

I've abandoned the us of pea all together as it seems to just suffocate the fire. Which means I am strictly using nut. My wife has been keeping an we on the stove while I am at work an has been updating me as the day has wore on. She just sent me a text message that the blue flames are disappearing and all of the coals are turnig red.

Before I left for work I shook te stove down and fillled it right to the top of the pot with nut. I had my wife close the mpd partially and then close the air down to 1/8 open. She had blue flames up until 1:40pm. She said the stove body was sitting pretty at 560°. Should I have her open the air control slightly? Should I have her shake it down and refill it or is it good until I get home at 5pm?

I'm paranoid because I don't want to have the same issue I had with my first fire a few weeks ago.

I'm On Fire wrote:I fired up the Chubby last night since its been pretty chilly si ce Friday. Last night was my first fire in it since my toying with it several weeks ago.

I've abandoned the us of pea all together as it seems to just suffocate the fire. Which means I am strictly using nut. My wife has been keeping an we on the stove while I am at work an has been updating me as the day has wore on. She just sent me a text message that the blue flames are disappearing and all of the coals are turnig red.

Before I left for work I shook te stove down and fillled it right to the top of the pot with nut. I had my wife close the mpd partially and then close the air down to 1/8 open. She had blue flames up until 1:40pm. She said the stove body was sitting pretty at 560°. Should I have her open the air control slightly? Should I have her shake it down and refill it or is it good until I get home at 5pm?

I'm paranoid because I don't want to have the same issue I had with my first fire a few weeks ago.

The blue flames will go away and you will have a red bed of coal but 560 sounds hot for these temps outside. Close the damper all the way, (your damper does have the holes in it right?) and see if that alone slows the burn down if not reduce the air a little at a time waiting at least one half hour between adjustments and bring the stove down to 350 - 400 degrees. You either have to much draft or to much air flow. Important to wait the half hour between adjustments to let the stove settle in then take your reading of temp. From reading these posts on the chubby they should burn 12 hours. I don't know how much you have burned already today it might not be a bad idea to add a little coal, don't shake, have her leave the damper open all the way for 10 min then close it all the way and take a reading in a half hour.

The fire is doing what it is supposed to do. After the hydrocarbons are burned/cooked out of the fuel all you have left is the fixed carbon. The blue flames are the hydrocarbons burning off. Anthracite is mostly fixed carbon and so after the hydrocarbons are gone, the fixed carbon burns with a orange/red glow. It will then burn in this manner for many hours until the fixed carbon is burned up and all you have left is ashes.
It sounds to me like you are running the stove a little bit hot. If you close your dampers and the fire doesn't respond or just slows down a little, I would suspect you have an air leak somewhere around your doors or around a seam. With a fire in the stove, close the dampers all the way then light a candle and move it around the edges of the doors and any other seams. If the candle flame pulls inward toward the stove, that is where you have an air leak. All you have to do is fix it with some furnace cement.
If you have no leaks then you are giving the fire too much air, try cutting back on the dampers a little at a time and watch what happens.

The answer to my question should have been. "Yes. Yes, you should be concerned." the other part of the answer should have also been, "Yeah, don't trust a thing your wife tells you because unless you've drawn pictures in pink crayon she has no clue what she is looking at or doing even though earlier in the day you physically took her over to the stove and showed her what to do."

Sure, I can't completely blame my wife. She did try. Hell, she even tried to put coal in the stove. Although, her idea of "red coals" is one coal surrounded by greyish, burnt up pieces of coal.

Terrific.

If you hadn't noticed I'm pretty angry right now. I'm beginning to think I'm not going to be able to get any more than just the initial 24 hours out of the stove. I'm pretty angry that I've burned through 200 pounds of nut coal already and 100 pounds of pea and its not even winter. I'm angry because its in the low 50's where I live and I had a day out of my Chubby and not I have to start all over again.

I am now asking myself, "Why bother?" I'm getting pretty discouraged.

I'm confused. Wish there was a book or something I could sit down and read. Every one is extremely helpful but the amount of information is overwhelming. It'd be nice to be able to kind of look in one place.

It was asked if my MPD has holes. Below is a picture of my MPD.

I am confused because I was told originally to keep the MPD open during warmer weather, for example, when I played with the stove a few weeks ago it was in the 60's so I left it partially open. I followed the same suit this week even though it has been hovering around 45 - 52.

When do I shut the MPD? Do I even shut my MPD all the way? Ever? If I have the wrong MPD where do I get one for coal? Should I even bother shaking the stove down tonight and start over? I'm kind of angry right now. I'm definitely going to be having a few beers tonight. At the rate I'm going I'm definitely going to need more coal.

Welp. I'm off to shake down the stove so I can start ALL over again. YAY1!!

It appears that you are going through the very hard school of knocks, but don't get discouraged. I'm burning my Chubby right now, but I'm only burning wood until it will stay in the 30's. It has been around 40-45 degrees here in Pittsburgh, wet and damp. Once I have the wood fire going well, I can close the stovepipe damper completely on wood at the current outside temperature, but I have a 35 foot 7" stainless lined chimney to keep a nice draw. I'm getting close to eight hour burns on a completely stuffed to the top Chubby with small split wood at 600 degrees. It will drop to about 250 degrees by the seventh or eighth hour though.

As for burning your nut anthracite, I believe that you could now close the stovepipe damper all the way at around 45 degrees outside. After you have it going, you can close the secondary burn flaps and adjust the ash door air inlet to your desired temperature. With a short chimney, you may have to open the draft more than normal to keep it going well, but once it is going at your stated 550 degrees, you should have at least a good 8 hours before you have to recharge.

All of the coal will turn red with very little blue flames later in the burn cycle, but opening the drafts for five to ten minutes and a bright hot fire should perk up and it will be ready shake and to reload. You never want to shake a low fire, it will probably go out. If you are at the critical stage, some twigs, bark, or small wood will hep bring it back up so you can add more anthracite.

I'd watch Larry's video once more and see what may have possibly not have been followed. http://vimeo.com/8506320

I don't blame you for feeling frustrated after all the effort and fine work you did.

The purpose of the manual pipe damper is to partially restrict the draft when you wish to have less heat output. It should be open on starting the fire and then closed or partially closed when the fire is established. As you can see from the picture of your damper there is still plenty of room for the gasses to exit the stove when it is in the closed position. A manual damper will still not be too effective if your draft is very strong. A barometric damper will even out the draft automatically, compensating for changes in draft.

You have an airtight stove so closing the air intake should slow the burn down enough so the stove body is about 300 degrees. Practice this keeping in mind that things take a bit of time to show results. Just monitor the temp of the smoke pipe and stove body, although the stack temp should be enough to tell you what to do. I think you can get the consumption down to 20 pounds a day with a stack temp. of 200 degrees or less using a magnetic thermometer. My opinion is that an airtight stove should only need a barometric damper.

My stack temp is always around 200*. I think the problem is like it has been stated on all of my threads lately is that I'm running it too hot. I generally leave everything open until it hits 500*.

I'm still very much in the "wood fire" mindset. I'm afraid if I bank it down without it being crazy hot it'll go out like wood. I have Larry's video. I watch it a lot. But evidentally I'm not retaining anything.

So, what I am gathering is that once the fire is in the 350* range I should start closing things down?

I have wood, but since the rain, it is wet. So, I've been using Cowboy coal. I'm going to try again tonight. Maybe I can make some headway.

Start it and once you have the blue yellow flames going good start closing things down, see if you can get it to hold around 350 400, stack should get down to 150 or so, if the stack is hotter then you are feeding to much air. The more air the faster the coal is going to burn up, so get the air flow slowed down for starters. By the way the damper has the holes and you should be able to close it all the way and be safe and this will also slow things down a bit. Once you have the stove slowed down now you can adjust things for your comfort zone up or down. Get a pad or something to keep a record of how you have the stove set at any given time, Damper, Ash door air, and any other air adjustment you have, where each setting is and what it did to the stove temp. Keep a record of the outside temp as well and you can always go to it on any given day and adjust your stove to what you want. I do not know what time you went to work but I'm assuming 8am, at 1pm you should not have had flame on top of the coal. Normally little or no flame after and hour or so after recharging just a nice orange-red glow.
Check your PM

Yes I Agree with you. You may be still in the wood burning mind set. Anthracite is slow to build up heat and that is what you want. You don't want to get the entire fire pot glowing when you recharge. Just get the first layer going, load it full to the top and close down the dampers. If you still need more heat after about a half an hour, then you can nudge the ash door draft open a fraction of an inch. I have found that Larry's video is full proof when using his Chubby. I think you will get it soon and once you do, you'll ask yourself why you were fighting the system.

Ok, so I restarted the stove. I used Cowboy Brand Charcoal to light it (which now will be my go to kindling, it lights crazy fast.) I waited till the body temp was at 350 and began adding coal (nut) and just loaded it right to the top of the pot. I then set my stop watch for 10 minutes and waited for the temp to get back to 350 and began to close things down. At 10 minute intervals I adjusted as necessary. I also took FastCat's advice and got a notebook and took notes.

So, I started the relight at 711pm. Outside temp is 55 (a lot warmer than it was when I started it was only 49; weather report changed now it is going to be 61 tomorrow ) I closed the air control on the ash door to 1/8", closed the MPD all the way. Stack temp is 190, and my draft is holding at .03" (Chubby should be run between .03 - .05").

There are no blue flames, just a thin layer of black coal on top and red coal underneath, maybe 1" below; door is closed so it is probably more cause I can't see too well? Body temp is now at 400 and stack temp is still around 190-180.

Now, tell me if this sounds correct because this is what I did to get it going. Keep in mind I used Cowboy Charcoal to light the fire.

Start fire (used Cowboy Charcoal), wait for temp to be around 350, open secondaries add coal (nut) [fill to top of fire pot], wait 10 minutes; watch for blue flames, close secondaries, watch body temp to be in the 350 - 400 range, close MPD all the way, close draft control to 1/8 open. Wait 10 minutes watch temp. Check stack temp.

Currently, as of this posting stack temp is 180, body temp is 400, and draft gauge is reading .03" there are no blue flames. Does this sound correct? Should I open either the draft or air control? Should there be some blue flames?

Doug, I'm definitely in the mindset that no flames = no heat. I know I'm wrong but I've been burning wood since I was 9 so this is difficult to grasp. Hopefully you can all tell that I am determined to get this, hell, I've burned 200 pounds of nut and 100 pounds of pea in a month because; "I'm doing it wrong!!" I really appreciate all the help everyone has given me with my stupid newb mistake threads.

Ninja edit: I now see small blue flames dancing across the top of the coals. Body temp is still 400, stack is still at 180 and draft is still holding at .03", MPD is still closed, draft control is still 1/8 open.

I'm On Fire wrote:...>8...Doug, I'm definitely in the mindset that no flames = no heat. I know I'm wrong but I've been burning wood since I was 9 so this is difficult to grasp. Hopefully you can all tell that I am determined to get this, hell, I've burned 200 pounds of nut and 100 pounds of pea in a month because; "I'm doing it wrong!!" I really appreciate all the help everyone has given me with my stupid newb mistake threads.

Take a breath IOF We don't want you stroking' out on us now buddy We all have your back and don't worry about the learning curve that's marked by how many pounds you've burned. I didn't have the good fortune of the existence of this forum when I switched to coal after 25 yrs of wood burning. I had two drums as bins; one full of nut and one full of pea. It took me close to 1200 lbs before I had it on cruse control. by then I was on my third refill

I'm 33 now. I tend to get worked up when I can't figure stuff out.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I shake down and recharge the stove a 6am because that is when I leave for work. I also shake down and recharge at around 5pm when I get home from work.

Yes, like all the others have said, you're burning tooo hot. We use to run manual dampers when burning wood. We'd close the damper slowly, till smoke came out the seams. Then open it up just a tadd, till the smoke disappeared. Some stoves ran with the damper all the way closed. Never ran a coal stove with a manual damper in the pipe. I did install one for safty reasons, but then took it out (air tight stove). Anyways, I would think that you would close the manual damper once the gasses are burned off. Should you smell sulfer, open it back up a touch, till the sulfur smell disappears. Coal gasses are not as hot as wood gasses. That's why another member said to run with the damper open in warmer wheather. The damper being open would give you better draft , Should You Need It. Always open the damper when refueling. Control the fire by the air inlet below the grates. Over the fire air calms it down. Do you have an over the fire air inlet? If so, maybe it needs to be open a touch. You'll get it. Hang in there.

Close down the air some more and also close those secondary air ports most of the way.

When trying to maintain a low fire you can't be concerned about blue flames. With a deep bed only about one third will be burning, the coal above will be cooking with probably not enough heat to ignite the gas. The fire will look dead because the burning coal is covered. Don't worry the fire will slowly make its way up over time. In time you will get the feel of your stove and how it reacts under different conditions. Maintaining a low fire is the hardest because you are on the edge of losing it. Just make sure when you shake you do a thorough job of it so the starting point after a shake is always the same.