are there different grades of anthracite?

 
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VigIIPeaBurner
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Post by VigIIPeaBurner » Fri. Dec. 14, 2018 8:39 pm

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There once was a post on the forum about free coal in Avenel NJ. I teamed up with Coalheat at his request and we mined 3 pickup trucks full, maybe 6 ton, of probably 50-60 yr old coal. There was both blue and red painted coal in the pile at different points. I wish I had taken a pic of the red painted coal but at the time I was burning Reading coal and wasn't quite as interested in photographing their red paint branded tag.


 
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Post by franco b » Fri. Dec. 14, 2018 10:01 pm

StokerDon wrote:
Fri. Dec. 14, 2018 7:27 pm
Neat, I didn't know that! I had to search it out on Youtube.
A trip back into those thrilling days of yesteryear. Looks like i got the quote out of place, but he did say that.

Good job tracking it down.

 
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Post by ShawnLiNy » Sat. Dec. 15, 2018 4:58 pm

I thought I remembered reading that the Blue coal company did that for advertising its product and to help keep dust down as others had used mineral/ coal oil

 
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Post by filix » Sat. Dec. 15, 2018 6:06 pm

That's cool about the shadow! Blue coal. I just bought a ton for 324.00. Half stove and half nut. What size would you guys use with my stove? Is there any benefit to using smaller coal? I should buy a truckload of Lehigh" 24 tons" Sell half of it, Then keep the rest for myself.

 
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Post by ratherbeflying » Mon. Jan. 14, 2019 9:01 am

in the spring or summer im taking a ride up to tamaqua pa to buy some lehigh direct.. i noticed another great name is blaschak who is about 25 minutes past lehigh.... anyone feel this extra hour of my time and 28 total extra miles is worth it?? i keep hearing lehigh is pretty much as good as it gets, and i have been using it and i love it, i just didnt know if anyone has compared it to blaschak and noticed any differences?

 
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Post by ratherbeflying » Mon. Jan. 14, 2019 9:12 am

filix wrote:
Sat. Dec. 15, 2018 6:06 pm
That's cool about the shadow! Blue coal. I just bought a ton for 324.00. Half stove and half nut. What size would you guys use with my stove? Is there any benefit to using smaller coal? I should buy a truckload of Lehigh" 24 tons" Sell half of it, Then keep the rest for myself.
i would think that stove would like nut for the most part, you can do a layer of nut then stove then nut if you want thats popular, bigger coal burns hotter faster, smaller coal is good for low and long burns. problem is you will loose alot through the grates during shake if you use anything smaller then nut... i some times throw pea over the top if i want to burn low and long, i also do that with my fines, ill make a few lines down the fire bed with my fines..

 
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Post by ratherbeflying » Mon. Jan. 14, 2019 9:13 am

in the spring or summer im taking a ride up to tamaqua pa to buy some lehigh direct.. i noticed another great name is blaschak who is about 25 minutes past lehigh.... anyone feel this extra hour of my time and 28 total extra miles is worth it?? i keep hearing lehigh is pretty much as good as it gets, and i have been using it and i love it, i just didnt know if anyone has compared it to blaschak and noticed any differences?


 
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Post by ratherbeflying » Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 10:00 am

i cant imagine there would be much of a difference that would make it worth it, ill probably just head up to tamaqua and get some lehigh.

 
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Post by Sunny Boy » Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 11:06 am

ratherbeflying wrote:
Mon. Jan. 14, 2019 9:13 am
in the spring or summer im taking a ride up to tamaqua pa to buy some lehigh direct.. i noticed another great name is blaschak who is about 25 minutes past lehigh.... anyone feel this extra hour of my time and 28 total extra miles is worth it?? i keep hearing lehigh is pretty much as good as it gets, and i have been using it and i love it, i just didnt know if anyone has compared it to blaschak and noticed any differences?
Have used both Blaschak and Lehigh and both are good. Had some rocks in the bags of Lehigh stove size, but no problems with the nut size.

Paul

 
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Post by ratherbeflying » Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 12:27 pm

rocks huh? thats not good, how many? i hope you found them before they got to the grates!

 
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Post by Sunny Boy » Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 12:44 pm

ratherbeflying wrote:
Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 12:27 pm
rocks huh? thats not good, how many? i hope you found them before they got to the grates!
About a half dozen so far. And no, the first few jammed the grates by the time I discovered them. Fortunately, it was in my range and the shallower firebox made it easier to hook them up to the top with the angled poker and then lift them out with BBQ tongs. After that, I stopped using any stove size in the GW #6 base heater with it's twice as deep firebed - too deep to go fishing.

I still use the stove mixed with nut in the range, but now I check to see if any of the stove I mixed in has not burned to ash before I rotate the triangular grates to grind up and dump ash and clinkers before shaking it.

Other than that, the stove coal burns fine. And no rocks have turned up in any of the many bags of nut that I've bought from the same local dealer that I got the ton of bagged stove from.

Here's pix of some.


Paul

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Post by ratherbeflying » Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 1:28 pm

wow that sucks, im sure they were just as black as the coal going in too! theres no way to really tell if theres a couple rocks until its too late i would think, that would really piss me off! i dont even really know how i would locate and retrieve a rock or even a clinker, ive never come across either of those yet!!

 
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Post by rberq » Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 2:18 pm

filix wrote:
Sat. Dec. 15, 2018 6:06 pm
Is there any benefit to using smaller coal?
I have burned stove coal in the little bitty Harman Mark 1, and it did fine and I liked it. Unfortunately the stove chunks don't nestle together as close as nut, so I wound up being able to get about 15% less weight of coal in the stove. Doesn't sound like much, but 15% made the difference between a 12-hour burn and a 10-hour burn at fairly high heat settings. That was a problem in cold weather. Tried stove coal in my DS Machine stove, but the big chunks tended to get hung up at the bottom of the hopper and didn't drop properly.

 
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Post by ratherbeflying » Thu. Jan. 17, 2019 8:37 am

filix wrote:
Sat. Dec. 15, 2018 6:06 pm
Is there any benefit to using smaller coal?
you can load more in the stove, it will burn longer and at lower temps with the same primary air setting. some people use pea over the top to slow the burn, some use pea in the shoulder months because it can burn at a lower temp. smaller coal lower temps and longer burn, bigger coal higher temps shorter burn.

 
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Post by Sunny Boy » Thu. Jan. 17, 2019 8:51 am

ratherbeflying wrote:
Wed. Jan. 16, 2019 1:28 pm
wow that sucks, im sure they were just as black as the coal going in too! theres no way to really tell if theres a couple rocks until its too late i would think, that would really piss me off! i dont even really know how i would locate and retrieve a rock or even a clinker, ive never come across either of those yet!!
Yup. It all looked like coal on the shovel.

I still look carefully at each shove full, but it gets by anyway. Otherwise the stove size burns fine, just not as long because there's less fuel density per cubic space compared to nut.

However, when I want the fire hotter and quicker, for frying and baking, I use the stove size. I just have to remember to refuel it sooner or I'll have a dead firebed,..... which has happened a couple of times because my brain was 13 years of programed when to refuel based on nut sized coal.

So, I'll still use the Lehigh stove, but only in the range where it's much easier to clear a jammed grate.

Besides, using the Lehigh stove in the GW #6, I didn't see that it ran any better than with nut coal. But it did need to be refueled sooner than it does with just nut.

Paul


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