Heating With Wood in Coal Stove?

Hi, I have a Harman Mark 3 coal stove that I use to heat with each year. I have been heating with wood in it for a week now trying to save my coal for the colder months. My problem is im burning through wood very fast even if I open the knob up a 1/4 turn. Any tips and advice on burning wood more efficent in a coal stove or is this a bad idea to begin with? Also when I switch back to burning coal Do I need to clean my chimney?

Thanks for the help
Kenny

I think you answered your own question. It's not designed to burn wood. It will burn it but burn it fast. Also gunks up the stove and chimney. Burning wood not a good idea unless you doing it to start a coal fire. Don't worry, cold weather is coming!

I can't speak to the Harman stove, but I burn wood this time of year w no problem. The glass gets sooty, I cap my barometric damper when burning wood, and I do clean my chimney every year to be on the safe side. Some may not think this worth the bother.

The fast burn may indicate a strong draft that a damper would control. You will see strong opinions on dampers. I suggest that you read the forum topics on the subject to be sure you use them safely.

spiker wrote:I can't speak to the Harman stove, but I burn wood this time of year w no problem. The glass gets sooty, I cap my barometric damper when burning wood, and I do clean my chimney every year to be on the safe side. Some may not think this worth the bother.

The fast burn may indicate a strong draft that a damper would control. You will see strong opinions on dampers. I suggest that you read the forum topics on the subject to be sure you use them safely.

I have the Mark II and I wouldn't think of burning wood in it. IMO it would be too expensive and labor intensive. The Harman does not have a source of "over the fire air" so the draft is all coming from below the grates, rushing through your wood and resulting in a hot, quick fire. Someone suggested using a manual damper while burning wood in the Harman and that may help slow down the draft. You could always try it and see if you are happy with the results. Personally, if I was burning any amount of wood I'd clean my chimney when I switched over, better safe then sorry. Good luck, Lisa

I find burning wood in my Mk I is a lot like throwing it in a chipper. It just rips through the wood without keeping me all that warm.

Don't know your situation, but I have been full on burning since before Halloween. You should be able to idle yours down pretty well. If you can't, a better option might be to get some spare fire brick and reduce the size of your fire box so you use less coal.

We use a bit of wood in our Mark 2..

First block the baro if you have one. With wood you need a hot chimney.
Second place wood into stove. Lite it. Enjoy.
No you won't get burns longer than a few hours, Yes a few is actually 3-4, not 6. No it won't be hot the next day. But it's good for taking off the chill.

I also run the stove on coal, real low. To where the stove temp is in the range of 110-120F. This uses very little coal and needs tending only every other day. But you must have a baro IMHO to do this. I don't use bricks or molest the stove in any way. I just get the fire going good and turn the knob to 1/16-1/8 turns. It just hovers.

Im not familiar with the stove, but you may get longer, slower burns by leaving 1/2 to 3/4 of the grate covered with a couple inches of ash, or put a firebrick or two on top of part of the grate. The only wood stoves I have ever used were grate stoves and that always helped me. Good luck

I used a Mark III for many years, burning wood in the shoulder months, early fall, late spring. It does go through wood quickly even with the spinner knob barely open. The only over fire air comes from what gets in around the window gasket so most will come up through the grates. The bigger the log the better the burn time.

My strategy was to start a fire in the evening if it was chilly enough, load it up with wood around 11:30 and then throw another log or two on during the 2am potty run. That would keep the chill out of the house in the morning. I would let it burn out since the day temps would keep the house in the high 60's and then start up the fire again the next evening.

Once the daytime temps stayed in the 50's ( and no strong sunshine to heat up the house) I would switch to coal.

I burned scrap wood for a couple of evenings this fall. I closed the drafts and opened the door about 1/4". It burned well and held a fire for as long as could be expedted with small scraps of pine. I also did cover the damper.

If I burned much pine or a lot of any wood, I would give the chimney a good cleaning at least once per year.

Remember, that although flue temps are generaly lower when burning coal than when burning wood, if a chimney fire did occur while burning coal (from residual wood creosote) the baro damper would allow air to rush to the fire and ceate an extreamly hot fire.

With all this said, I see no problem burning dry hardwoods in the spring and fall if you follow precautions.

It says on the back of my Moso stove that it is a offense to burn anything on a stove than it was designed for, so I could be viewing the board from the prison library any time soon,
I some times burn wood, wood likes to sit on a bed of ash to burn slowly , it sounds like you are getting to much air, the problem is that if you get it to burn slow enough, unless you can get the chimney real hot,(hard to do with a slow fire), you may get tar build up which can be hard to remove, if you do get the wood to burn make sure the wood is very dry, hard wood like oak is best, pine fir ect make more tar.

I have a Gibraltar LCC and I typically burn wood until it gets cold enough to burn coal. Trust me, I perfer to burn coal, a lot longer burn time and better heat. Wood seems to burn quick, as I am loading wood every 4 hours, which is a pain and also the whole mess bring wood into the house, I'd rather deal with the black dust that I get from the coal any day...

Since it is too warm to burn coal and I am too cheap to turn on the heat pump, I guess I will be loading wood for a while... lol

Dan

I have the Glenwood No. 6 Base Heater designed for "coal or wood" says so right on the stove (LOL). It is a fabulous coal burner but it sucks as a wood burner because it does not have the same control as with coal- or maybe I am spoiled because the control with coal is so fabulous. Of course, I still have the odd wood fire in the fall but my strategy now is to burn coal at a very low temperature, just load it up, shut down the air, and don't shake it much and it hums along with very little coal consumption.

Thanks for all the replies. I just bought a damper to put in the pipe to hopefully slow down the burn time. Im willing to try this to see if it works. The main burn time will be at night and during the weekends. Thanks again for the different ideas and yes I will clean the chimney before I switch back to coal in december

I agree with most on this topic. Im new to coal, but not to burning wood.The hotter the better for green or pine type wood to keep creosote minimized . Nice dry oak or maple would be less of a worry for creosote build-up. I wouldnt worry too much about creosote build-up unless you have more than a month or 2 burning wood nonstop. I burned wood all last season, now I only had a tiny insert so I had a horseshoe makin fire tryin to keep up with heat demand. I had almost no creosote after 4/5 months burning.

I don't burn any kind of pine in the stove, too much creosote. I recommend you stick to the hardwoods. I will use pine in outdoor fires in the summer.