Coalpail.com Forum

The wife wanted a small wood stove for upstairs. Kinda like it. And being small in size, it doesnt burn much.
My Hitzer is in the basement. Heats the house decently but she raised a good point: Why are we heating the basement? I guess I don't really have to. I mean besides the warmer floors, I have comfy slippers. And the floors arent really that warm as there are dividing walls down there so its only a small portion of the flooring.

No, I don't want the hitzer upstairs. Most importantly, is is produces tons of ash and I don't want that upstairs what so ever.
I do enjoy coal burning, but for what we need in this tiny little shat box house, I think the little woodstove might do it. I might be selling a nice Hitzer 30-95 and about two tons of baged nut coal.

Doesn't the Hitzer burn wood fairly well?

Say it ain't so! If I were you I would be careful about getting near a wood stove with all those leaves and stuff stuck on you.

If you don't want ash upstairs then don't put a solid fueled heater in it. Every woodstove I have ever seen in operation has ash in front of it and allover the room its in. There are also gas stoves, and oil stoves available.

Bootstrap, I would move the stove upstairs and give it a try on coal maybe change the way you handle the ash and coal,I spray my coal with mineral oil to stop the black dust and made a box that I slide the ash pan right into from the stove so I get no ash whatsoever in the house( dust and I don't play well to gather). I used a wood stove for 20 yrs before switching coal and I will say that wood is far more dusty and dirty then then coal is and my stove is in a living area of my house. I wish you luck if you switch but remember wood isn't that clean either, but maybe cheaper and more accessible for you but I don't know. Take care Keepaeyeonit

I have my coal stove in the basement for one reason and one reason only.... to condition the air of a drafty area of my house. I've noticed that if I keep the warm air down in the basement my upstairs is warmer and my boiler doesn't kick on as much. Without the coal stove going my basement gets to about 50/55degrees on cold days/nights. With the coal stove I'm getting the basement up to around 72 which creates a buffer between the first floor and the basement.

I would run both for a while and see what happens. Then I would run just the wood stove upstairs and see what outcome you get. If you don't need the coal stove get rid of it but don't get rid of it until you try them both out first.

I've burnt wood and to be 100% honest with you, coal is much cleaner then wood. Dealing with wood be ready for insects, mice and snakes. I also had a Harman P68 pellet stove that could run a ton of pellets before you needed to empty ash pan. Down fall with pellets is the dust when filling hopper, good luck on what ever you decide.

Heat in basement has many benefits. Keeps it dryer, never worry about frozen pipes..
Other than that, burn coal upstairs

You'll miss the coal!! DONT DO IT MAN!!

Are you saying your main source of heat will now be your wood stove? I guess if the house is an 800-900 Sq/ft one story ranch, your wood stove is centrally located, and you don't mind cutting to stove size, splitting, seasoning, stacking, covering, and storing wood, or paying to have it delivered and stacked. Or do you really have an oil furnace, that you haven't needed since the Hitzer went in, and that once again will be the bread winner, and the wood stove just an alternate?

A man's home is his castle, both are happy when queen is happy! Good luck with you heating needs, will miss your occasional wise insert!

p.s. one of the best avatars in the forum!

Let me guess, you dump the ashes from the Hitzer into a can in the basement?

Crap ma, ya beat me to it--NICE POST--Enjoy Bs--stay in touch my friend:)

michaelanthony wrote:A man's home is his castle, both are happy when queen is happy! Good luck with you heating needs, will miss your occasional wise insert!

p.s. one of the best avatars in the forum!

Rob R. wrote:Let me guess, you dump the ashes from the Hitzer into a can in the basement?

Thats what I do and it sucks...

ASHDUMP wrote:

Rob R. wrote:Let me guess, you dump the ashes from the Hitzer into a can in the basement?

Thats what I do and it sucks...

Here try this

Ash Can Modification

My 2 cent. Keep the Hitzer going and the Wood stove upstairs. You'll prolly find the Coal Box can run a bit lower and thus lowering your attendance while the cute little Wood burner will make the WeeF feel all comfy and such.

Best of both worlds...except you'll still have to cut-split and lug frozen logs around in the dead of winter, annnd, welp deal with bark, bugs and generally messy Chit that comes with Wood.

Enjoy.