Coalpail.com Forum

Hi everyone. Im having major problems with my 5 yr old Pioneer stove. Replaced my exhaust pipes due to rusting for this season. So, I started up stove as normal and for 3 days I havent burned a whole lot of coal..havent emptied ash pan yet. The heat output is cool....like its on a slow burn all the time. Now I set it to come up to temp from 64 to 72 at 4:45 am. It usually takes an hour to get ramped up and stoking....about time when I get up and can stand in front and get toasty warm. Not so since I started it. Even though the feed rate is going up it takes about 2 hours to get up to the 72 degrees and even then its not stoking hot. I look at stove window and I never see any orange glow. So its been like this for the 3 days. Now, this evening I was hearing pieces of coal dropping down inside the stove. Wasnt sure where it was coming from but it was only once in a while. So getting ready for bed and looked in the stove and the fire is barely going, and there is a whole mess of unburnt coal all inside the bottom of the stove behind the ashpan. I checked the draft damper and there is unburnt coal all spilled inside of it. I shut everything down at once(not that it was putting anything out anyways). I was hearing the feeder plate going and previous to this evening there was a good 6 inches of burning coals on the grate and it was right at the edge of the grate. Also, everytime I opened my door to the stove I was getting a lot of gasuous smell in the house which never happened before (kinda smelled like sulphur or ash). What could be happening and what do I tell the guys from the stove company to have them come out and fix it? Im frustrated!
Thanks for any help.

I am going to guess the grate was removed for cleaning. It is not fully installed. There is a gasket supposed to be along the back edge between the feeder body and the grate.

That a stoker?

Fines under the grate blocking air flow, mb?

Yepper it's a stoker. Pull the grate, clean out the fines, reinstall the grate and make sure that rear gasket is in place and sealing good. Don't fill the hopper past mid point when starting back up just in case. Make sure it's right before you fill that hopper. Save yourself some work just in case the grate didn't seal correctly.

Rev. Larry

Thanks everyone! After inspecting the grate today, it was not seated properly when I cleaned it out last spring. The feeder gradually pushed it out and thats what caused the spilling of the coal. I am going to assume that was for the reason of the poor heat output...i have not started the atove back up yet. Going to be In the 50's here all weekend so I will wait until Sunday and let you all know when I start it back up. Thanks again! Love this forum!!

adirondacklady wrote:Thanks everyone! After inspecting the grate today, it was not seated properly when I cleaned it out last spring. The feeder gradually pushed it out and thats what caused the spilling of the coal. I am going to assume that was for the reason of the poor heat output...i have not started the atove back up yet. Going to be In the 50's here all weekend so I will wait until Sunday and let you all know when I start it back up. Thanks again! Love this forum!!

Did you make sure the gasket was still in place along the back of the grate? Tips & Tricks

I will double check it. Ive had my stove for 5 yrs and have had to replace all my gaskets(both doors and grate). Thanks!

A lot of the time that gasket will stick to the back of the feeder body and still be there. Just hard to see. But it is an important gasket.

The biggest reason for door gaskets failing is closing the door too tight. There is no need to crank on the door handle. Not saying this is what happened here but just advice.

The other is cleaning the glass and door and shutting it while its still wet.