Chronicles of the Clayton

Wow, that's pretty cool man. Thanks! That may be my next attempt

So this morning I did a total clean out and pulled the grates. Took two hours from start to finish to do the repair and put it all back together again. I managed to pull one of the set screws out, the other three were locked. I put in a couple shims and replaced the one set screw with a bolt.

At start up I'm gonna put a layer of coal down first and then build the new fire on top of it. Hopefully that will protect the grates from glowing at start up. Once they have a layer of ash they don't get that hot, it's just at start up.

Getting up to 70 today and then still warm overnight so I'll lite it tomorrow after work.

I took MJ's suggestion as well.
Pulled the grates this morning and inserted a shim. I had some thin stainless pieces that worked perfectly. Drove the shim in and tightened the set screws. That thing is like one solid piece now.
My biggest issue with burning anthracite in my stove was that the set screws would loosen after a while. Once that would happen I could never clear enough ash from the back to keep the anthracite happy. I'd have a good fire in the front and a not so good one in the back.
It doesn't have anywhere near the same effect on bit coal. Bit just needs a little area cleared to the bottom for a few minutes to get fired up and then it's good to go.
Thanks for the good work and ideas guys!

Thanks for commenting Speedracer The shim job I did seems to have done the trick as well. These furnaces do pretty good, I just wish the shaker system was a little more reliable.

Ashley is running really good, since the temp drop I've switched over to a 12-18 hour tending schedule instead of 24 using stove size coal exclusively. I could still push for 24 hours if I had to but tending every 12 makes for a much happier fire and quicker recovery at tending with the current heat demand needed. With the 12 hour schedule I just do a quick tend in the morning with a simple single shake and throw in of fresh coal. At evening tend I'll do the full double shake and heave routine with brushing of the interior of the fire box. I'm using 55-60 pounds per day right now.

I'm pretty confident the snow is here to stay till April at this point. We have a foot right now and no warm ups in the foreseeable future. In fact the forecast is showing highs in the 20's with lows in the teens, frigid weather at the end of next week.

The top of a pine tree fell down about a week ago during a wind storm, I'm glad it missed the house. It'll look good there till May lol.

If anyone asks, just tell 'em the busted tree top is a snow depth gauge. When you can't see it anymore you'll know it's time to get out the snowshoes.

Paul

So we had a quick warm up and cool down outside. I ran a 28 hour burn maintaining 72-74 in the house with temps outside between 30 and 40 degrees. I used my last half bag of Kimmel's nut size to blanket the coal bed.

Here's a pic of the fire after the 28 hour burn before shake down
Here's a pic after the double shake and heave routine
Then I added 41 pounds of Stove size. Low of 8 degrees tonight. Back to 12 hour tending schedule now.

Looks great Lee.

Ditto Corey, Lee. "Thumbs up!"
We had the same screwy weather the past couple days. Single digits for a couple, and today hit 50, (I think) Was also layering the nut on top of the stove.

corey wrote:Looks great Lee.

Thanks man, love those black rocks. I have to admit, I've done many modifications to this unit. I think the best feature I put on this stove is the thermostat controlled primary combustion air. It runs off the thermostat in the living room. It opens when we need a little more heat and closes when there is just enough. In the meantime it's at a cruise setting wherever I want it be by the manual combustion air control. The occasional automatic revving of the fire seems to keep it healthier too.

Lightning wrote:

corey wrote:Looks great Lee.

Thanks man, love those black rocks. I have to admit, I've done many modifications to this unit. I think the best feature I put on this stove is the thermostat controlled primary combustion air. It runs off the thermostat in the living room. It opens when we need a little more heat and closes when there is just enough. In the meantime it's at a cruise setting wherever I want it be by the manual combustion air control. The occasional automatic revving of the fire seems to keep it healthier too.

Is it a bi metal tstast like mine has I love mine.

Lightning wrote:

corey wrote:Looks great Lee.

Thanks man, love those black rocks. I have to admit, I've done many modifications to this unit. I think the best feature I put on this stove is the thermostat controlled primary combustion air. It runs off the thermostat in the living room. It opens when we need a little more heat and closes when there is just enough. In the meantime it's at a cruise setting wherever I want it be by the manual combustion air control. The occasional automatic revving of the fire seems to keep it healthier too.

I'm really glad to hear your happy with the setup!

hotblast1357 wrote:I'm really glad to hear your happy with the setup!

Yeah man, thank you for the parts and I appreciate your contribution in posts with your experience with it.

corey wrote:Is it a bi metal tstast like mine has I love mine.

Not exactly. The living room thermostat controls a little motor that opens a primary air control when it calls for more heat, then closes when it's satisfied. The bimetal on yours more or less controls the temperature of the stove instead which is a great attribute also.

Lightning wrote:

hotblast1357 wrote:I'm really glad to hear your happy with the setup!

Yeah man, thank you for the parts and I appreciate your contribution in posts with your experience with it.

corey wrote:Is it a bi metal tstast like mine has I love mine.

Not exactly. The living room thermostat controls a little motor that opens a primary air control when it calls for more heat, then closes when it's satisfied. The bimetal on yours more or less controls the temperature of the stove instead which is a great attribute also.

I gotcha yours goes by room temperature.

You take real nice fire pix Lee! I love looking at anthracite fires from all types of stoves