Coalpail.com Forum

Hello, I heat my home with a FIREPOWER wood/coal furnace. The furnace plate states that you can use ant or bit coal. This is a stand alone furnace and heats a 3200 sq ft home using wood. I would like to try bit coal due to the lower costs , but am not sure what size to use. Am also concerned with clinkers. If any-one has experiance with this type of furnace I would appreciate your comments. This furnace burned canal coal with no problems, but this type of coal is hard to find. I also burned ant nut with no problems. The price of bit is making it look real attractive. I have no previous experience with this furnace, previous owner has passed away, and the company is out of business. I am new to using coal. Thanks for your comments.

Welcome pjrs!!! If you notice the search box in the upper right corner of the screen type in Firepower furnace and hit search. You'll find several posts on your furnace. Read em and have some coffee ready. Some are a bit windy but they are pretty good.

Glad to have you on the forum. Our Firepower users should chime in pretty soon!!

Rev. Larry

Welcome to the forum.

If you plan to stay a while, fill out your general location such as a state or county or general town.
It will help in the long run

Do you actually have access to bit coal?

Someone can weigh out the pros and cons to using bit coal.

GoodProphets wrote:Welcome to the forum.

If you plan to stay a while, fill out your general location such as a state or county or general town.
It will help in the long run

Do you actually have access to bit coal?

Someone can weigh out the pros and cons to using bit coal.

I appreciate the response. I live in beaver county, pa. Have access to bit and ant. The gentleman that runs dettingers coal yard was very informative. He also gave me a bag of nut ant to try out. Im picking up a ton today. Would like to try bit towards the end of season because of the lower costs. There was some left over coal, apprx 400lbs I used when I moved in. It burned well with no problems. I took a bucket and showed him. He told me it was canal coal, but he did not have any on hand. Thanks for the imput and I look forward to reading the info on this site.

pjrs wrote:Hello, I heat my home with a FIREPOWER wood/coal furnace. The furnace plate states that you can use ant or bit coal. This is a stand alone furnace and heats a 3200 sq ft home using wood. I would like to try bit coal due to the lower costs , but am not sure what size to use. Am also concerned with clinkers. If any-one has experiance with this type of furnace I would appreciate your comments. This furnace burned canal coal with no problems, but this type of coal is hard to find. I also burned ant nut with no problems. The price of bit is making it look real attractive. I have no previous experience with this furnace, previous owner has passed away, and the company is out of business. I am new to using coal. Thanks for your comments.

funny you should ask that, I just posted how to burn bituminous instructions from an old boiler, for another fella here on the forum- there appears to be some tricks to it, i.e. leaving a red coal bed open in the back of the stove, to burn off/ignite the smoke, and make it smoke less. Here is the instructions, perhaps you'll find them useful.

Thanx coalcracker. Appreciate the info attachment on bit !!!

I think what you had there was "cannel coal" it's a lower grade, bituminous like coal. Not as good as anthracite. If you can get it, use anthracite. Easier to burn, heats better, no smoke.

cannel coal, cannel [ˈkænəl]
(Mining & Quarrying) a dull coal having a high volatile content and burning with a smoky luminous flame
[from northern English dialect cannel candle: so called from its bright flame]

can′nel coal` (ˈkæn l)
an oily, compact coal that burns readily and brightly. Also called can′nel.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannel_coal

Thats what the coal yard called it. canal. although it burned well, no problems it did pump out the smoke. I let it burn 9-11 hrs, then shook it down and reloaded. I had enough to burn for over a week, no clinkers and plenty of heat. The coal yard didnt have any canal on hand, They reccomended ant-nut, at 260 ton, which I am purchasing today. Maybe later on in the season I will try bit, due to the lower costs. I do not live in a residential area, so bit smoke wont be a problem. Am taking your advice on getting ant, lower learning curve. Want to get a bit more experience with coal before trying bit on a full time basis. Thanx for the advice!

I did learn one thing real fast about coal. Im used to opening the feed door and throwing wood in. Cant do that with coal. After losing parts of both eyebrows and a bit of hair, I quickly learned to leave the ash door closed, pull out the top bypass valve and wait at least 30 sec before opening the feed door. Damn that little experience woke me right up. Dont care to repeat that episode.

yeh the methane gas firing off over the coal fire, when you open the door, will get your attention quick, be careful. Many of the modern hand fired stoves have built in top window vents, that are fixed and nonadjustable, to constantly vent the top of the fire, and burn off the methane gas by hitting it with fresh air.

if the stove is loaded up and the ash door left wide open to get it cranking, there's a huge gas buildup inside any coal stove over the fire, and if the top door is left closed, the resulting puff and pop will be somewhat dramatic- sometimes it will puff back some smoke into the room through any open vents.

you'd want to avoid that situation

if the ash door is wide open, it's best to crack the top door, so it lights off the methane gradually- I open the top door, then close the ash door, then gradually close the top door and just before it gets fully shut, within an inch or so of the stove, the methane will slowly light off in a mild way, then I close the top door, and the methane just burns slowly- instead of closing it all up and having a puffback or small explosion inside the stove

this is the stuff you learn as you go on burning coal- and every stove is a little different

Thx for the advise coalcracker. Will put that to use later today. Got to jump off for now, work to do. Im already hooked on coal heat and looking forward to reading up and learning what I can from this site. Glad I found it!

Just want to clarify the flammable gas that comes off fresh bituminous coal when it goes in the fire is not methane its called coal gas. If you were to condense some of this gas it would look a lot like crude oil, In fact the Germans figured out a way to make gasoline from lignite.

I just want to thank you Folks for the helpful info. I followed your advice and have been burning ant, with no problems. Enjoy jumping on this site and reading the info here. Great Site, and Great Members.