Show us your Blues

 
Hoytman
Member
Posts: 6019
Joined: Wed. Jan. 18, 2017 11:30 pm
Location: swOH near a little town where the homes are mobile and the cars aren’t
Hand Fed Coal Stove: Hitzer 354
Coal Size/Type: nut coal
Other Heating: electric, wood, oil

Post by Hoytman » Sun. Feb. 06, 2022 10:31 am

Lightning wrote:
Sun. Feb. 06, 2022 10:02 am
Did you help him see the light of truth with your coal stove? Or let me guess, the wood is "free" and the blood, sweat and tears don't count :lol:
Exactly the response. :lol:

I was going to help him out tell him about a wood stove that acts much more like a coal stove that I now know for a fact could save him on wood usage, but I declined to tell him. Some people won’t consider anything being better, so they just need to keep sweating. :lol:


 
User avatar
BigBarney
Member
Posts: 1853
Joined: Wed. Feb. 08, 2006 2:48 pm

Post by BigBarney » Mon. Feb. 07, 2022 4:45 pm

Most of the people burn wood in these gasifiers not coal, you have much more flexibility

with coal because of the low water content , so much less of the energy is used just to ev-

porate the water in the wood , sometimes up to 50% water content in wood even dried

25% is common. The second point is that they have to have heated chamber to be able to

make the gasification start , whereas in a coal unit the glowing coal itself provides the heat

for the reaction to occur.

One problem with coal is that it has much more ash so the straight down path is not

possible so a exit chamber near the grate is used. That way the ash can accumulate there

and can be removed by using a riddling bar or rod. My unit doesn't run out of coal it runs

out of air and needs to be serviced by riddling the ashes out of the top of the grate to continue

its burn , 12 to 24 hours apart except in sub-zero weather.

Most of the videos on youtube do not have a good enough control of the air in the top

to be able to create the gases needed for combustion.If you open the fill door care must be

taken because you have a volume of highly flammable gas that can cause an explosion and

personal injury and damage, once you do it thousands of times you get used to use caution.

None of these home built units can be true gasifiers because they usually have no way to

add a continuous supply of fuel and air at exact ratios to be able to run steady for days on

end. My boiler adds the air below the grate an keeps a hot fire above the grate and causes

the gases and smoke to constantly heat the coal supply in the magazine and cause the coal

to sweat out gases which are highly combustible ,because solid coal cannot burn only the

gases. When drawn out through the chimney they draw in secondary air to complete the

process to the heat exchanger and the water heating. This is where the videos were taken

looking right into the burning mass.

Any type of fuel can be used wood , coal , tires , hay, anything that's combustible.

BigBarney

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