Home Sparkle #12 Is Home

The weather forecast was single digits for today so I filled HS12 with 25 lbs this morning after a 2 day idle. The fire pot was full when I left at 5:30 am and when I came home at 3:00 pm the outside temp was 19 degrees and the living room was approx. 80 or more. I had left the primary open about 1/8 of an inch, the stove was 430 on the bottom of the barrel, 290 on top and 210 on the base chamber...gottah' love window stats!

Sounds like you & the old girl are comin to an understanding MA. .>)

freetown fred wrote: ↑

Fri. Dec. 15, 2017 4:08 pm

Sounds like you & the old girl are comin to an understanding MA. .>)

Yup, and I the willing servant

So Mike after a 10 hr burn, you must shake her down, and reload, right? After you shake it down, how much is left in the pot, before you begin adding fresh coal? When I come home, and go through the routine, the pot will sometimes be 1/2 full after cleaning, (shaking), and then I'll continue adding to refill. (I do put a shovel full of fresh stuff, when I open it up for re-heat, and B4 shaking thoroughly)

joeq wrote: ↑

Fri. Dec. 15, 2017 5:58 pm

So Mike after a 10 hr burn, you must shake her down, and reload, right? After you shake it down, how much is left in the pot, before you begin adding fresh coal? When I come home, and go through the routine, the pot will sometimes be 1/2 full after cleaning, (shaking), and then I'll continue adding to refill. (I do put a shovel full of fresh stuff, when I open it up for re-heat, and B4 shaking thoroughly)

I don't know, I havent had a 10 hr burn. I had it idle for 2 days, my guess is it ate 40 lbs of coal total. Here is my ash pan after a shake. this is the last of 2 shakes, same results. my guess is 6lbs??
I just put 20+ lbs in to fill the pot, HS12 is filled to the brim as I go to work at 5:45 in the am

That thing does a really good job of burning to powder ash. You have to look closely to see any bits of unburned coal.

Yup, you've arrived at coal easy street.

Paul

Mike...you don’t use the draw grate? Usually I get huge chunks by pulling the draw grate then poking under the “bridge” then push in the draw grate and shake.

Sunny Boy wrote: ↑

Fri. Dec. 15, 2017 7:09 pm

That thing does a really good job of burning to powder ash. You have to look closely to see any bits of unburned coal.

Yup, you've arrived at coal easy street.

Paul

Those unburned pieces were new arrivals to the party, they fall through the "stove" coal" when loading as I poke from above. Everything loaded previously to that is talc powder grey.

scalabro wrote: ↑

Fri. Dec. 15, 2017 7:14 pm

Mike...you don’t use the draw grate? Usually I get huge chunks by pulling the draw grate then poking under the “bridge” then push in the draw grate and shake.

So far the stove coal doesn't bridge. This morning was cool, 5 degrees but I'm still cruzin' on low. Yesterday I closed the mpd 50% and the stove ran better than expected and rev'd up much quicker. I need to order a mano for HS12 and see what's what...but I also enjoy the dance

michaelanthony wrote: ↑

Fri. Dec. 15, 2017 7:39 pm

So far the stove coal doesn't bridge. This morning was cool, 5 degrees but I'm still cruzin' on low. Yesterday I closed the mpd 50% and the stove ran better than expected and rev'd up much quicker. I need to order a mano for HS12 and see what's what...but I also enjoy the dance

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but Mikes comment makes me think of an observation I "think" I've been witnessing lately.
It appears when I'm refreshing the stove after shaking, and beginning in direct draft W/ the MPD wide open, I wait for my barrel temp to recover after reloading. And it seems even while the temp is low, say about 200-250°, if I go to BH mode, and close down the MPD, it seems to heat up faster, than if I was in DD, W/ MPD wide open. Maybe it's because the heat isn't rushing out the stove, and up the chimney. I know this is the reason when trying to heat your home, but thought that the coal bed would recover faster in DD W/MPD wide open. It works to the point of getting the fire to ignite the fresh coal, but not to heat up the combustion chamber. Guess there's a fine line in there somewhere. I'm sure you guys have probably brought up this point on the past.

Joe, I also see a faster recovery in base burner mode and found the following procedure works best for me.

First I open my mpd, and flip it into direct draft. Then while the ash door is open, I open the internal check damper, wait a few seconds for it to suck the fine ash off the rim of the ash pan, remove the pan take it outside and empty it.

Come back in, replace the ash pan, close the ash door, and shake it down.

Next step is to close the internal check damper, open the ash door, slide the swing top to the side, fill the magazine, and floss the grates.

Once the grates are flossed, and the ash door is closed its time to flip it back in base burner mode and close the mpd.

The entire process takes about 5 minutes. Normally there is still about 10 lbs of preheated coal remaining in the magazine which probably helps speed up the recovery.

Paulie

I had to lower the exhaust collar on the back pipe approx. 6 inches to meet the flue pipe going into my fireplace. ...my thoughts are: when in base mode the gases have a larger (less congested) exit path down the barrel and then up the rear base and finally into the pipe system. To me it makes sense that the gases when hottest are also easiest influenced.

Joe, I see a similar result when I close the "exhaust diverter" door and ash pan door on my furnace once the blues show up. My thinking is that once everything is buttoned up, there isn't so much cool air entering the stove so that lack of cool air gives the fuel bed an opportunity to radiate it's heat instead of it heating a high volume of incoming air (by way of conduction). It's not that the fire all of a sudden increased its heat output, but more of a shift from conduction to radiation. Just my thoughts on it.

Don't forget that in BB mode, the hot base chamber is helping to preheat the primary air, which is being drawn in more slowly, and therefor having more time to pick up heat. Whereas in DD mode there's a rush of faster moving, cooler air hitting the firebed.

That could be a part of why your seeing a quicker recovery in BB mode.

Paul

Never shake down a cylinder stove with the check open especially if you have a horizontal stove pipe

scalabro wrote: ↑

Sat. Dec. 16, 2017 9:57 am

Never shake down a cylinder stove with the check open especially if you have a horizontal stove pipe

+1

Paulie