Troubles With Kitchen Coal Stove Draft

I fail to see how the ash dump slide could affect draft. It should enhance the amount of under fire air coming in.
I also would get everything cleaned out of the firebox,all ashes above the grates,in the grates & below the grates.
THEN start over with the wood fire & add coal.

The ash chute can be plugged with fiberglass from the ash compartment in the stove. five minutes, but I doubt that is the problem.

Good hot fire with wood which thrives on over the grate air, but the coal dies which needs under grate air. Do the leak test with a wood fire.

A manometer is an instrument to measure draft precisely. An inexpensive model is the Dwyer Mark ll model 25, under $30 at Amazon or you could try Ebay..

Lifting a cook lid and holding a lit paper there should give a good indication though if it draws readily with a cold stove.

Here's a picture of the manometer that Franco suggested. Like he said, it measures the draft pressure so you will be able to see exactly what the draft is doing. They are inexpensive, easy to install and are a valuable instrument for burning coal. Don't mind the reading. It's not currently hooked up and needs "zeroed". I haven't prepared to start burning for this season yet.

coalstovelady wrote: ↑

Tue. Oct. 17, 2017 6:54 pm

Thank you - I love my stove. It is the heart of the home. I do not see the broiler door top left that you are referring to here???? What are you seeing on my stove that I do not know? Please help me identify. As for the coal depth, please help me to understand what you mean? I started a whole new fire directly on the grates. I burned paper, then wood, then kept adding coal but if I added too much coal it would have smothered the wood embers? So it never got to build up to 6 inches as you say - it died before that. I will attach another photo of my fire box that I took years ago red hot.

Ok, some range part names.
In your pictures your range is a very pretty, "roll-top, cabinet base" type range.

Some like my 1903 Sunny Glenwood just have a back mantel with an open shelf. And the base of mine is the leg type that is open on all four sides (my cat loves to go under there to warm up). Pictures 1 & 2.

What some folks call "lids" or "burners" are technically known as "round covers" (pic #3) and "ring covers" (pic #4). Ranges come with different sizes - the 8 inch diameter being the most commonly seen size. Often with range manufactures, the diameter of the round covers is part of the model number.

You might hear the terms "eyes" and "tees". It's actually the capital letters I and T. Those are the support plates for the round covers. Their names come from their shape. Pictures 5 shows an "I" plate - looks kinda like a capital I on it's side. Picture 6 is a "T" plate - looks like an upside down T for the forward one, but right side up for the rear one.

The flues.
Flues are just the exhaust channels inside a stove. From your firebox the exhaust can travel two ways by moving the "oven damper". With that damper in one position it's an exhaust shortcut from the firebox to the chimney when you are starting it and refueling it. With that oven damper in it's other position and it shuts off that shortcut and sends the exhaust around the walls of the oven and then on to the chimney.

Flues,
The flues start right under all those removable cover plates that make up the cooktop surface. Under them and over the top of the oven. Then the exhaust has to travel down an oven wall - usually on the opposite end of the range from where the firebox is. Then is passes under the oven. On mine, the exhaust then travels back up the rear half of the right hand end wall and back under the right rear round cover (say that five times fast ). In your range, I think it travels up that back "stack" that bolted onto the rear of the oven.

Pictures 7 & 8 show the front flue of the right-hand oven wall leading downward to turn under the oven floor. Picture 8 shows the rear flue of the right-hand end of the oven wall where the exhaust comes back up from under the rear half of the oven floor and turns toward the top of that picture to go to and exit through the stove pipe. Down in through the round cover hole, you can make out the ribbed top of the oven in the left-hand 3/4 of the opening, and your looking straight down from above the cooktop into those sides flues to the right of the oven.

However the exhaust travels inside the range, it travels through flues. And being that the exhaust is carrying ash and creosote, the entire length of the flues needs to be brushed and vacuumed clean at least once a year. I clean the ones in my range at least twice a season because the ash build up reduces the stove's ability for heat transfer - therefore some heat is wasted up the chimney.

BTW, most ranges have the firebox on the left end, like yours and mine. I've seen a few rare, right hand firebox ranges. They work the exact same way as the left hand ones, just in reverse.

Secondary damper/Broiler door. Pictures 9 & 10
The secondary damper is the one that is on the firebox end of the cooktop, and up near the cooktop surface. It feeds air over the fire for wood fires only. It's kept closed with coal or it will dilute the hot over-fire exhaust and make for a poor draft.

Since I don't use wood, the secondary dampers on mine only look like they are open, but I have them blocked off with mica so that they become windows that I can look in at the firebed.

On some ranges, that secondary damper is built into a "broiler door". The door opens and drops down to support a grill that is inserted in through the opening. In the last picture you can see a wire frame BBQ hotdog/hamburger grill sitting in on top of the fire of my range. The fumes get sucked up with the exhaust and fat drips into the firebed so no need of a stove hood or cleanup. However, because the grill sits right on top of a full firebed, I found that it's a great way to instantly burn meat ! Works better with a lower firebed than how high it is normally for cooking/heating.

In your pictures I see that the secondary damper on your range is on the front end of the firebox, not the side like many early ranges have it. And it looks like it could swing out and down. If it does open, then it is called a broiler door.

Paul

CSL.

I see in your pictures two pipe elbows under the left side shelf and above the primary damper, that I think connect to a "water front" - a cast iron jacket around part of the firebox for heating water. Is that where those pipes lead to ? If so, and that has developed a crack or loose connection, it might leak air in over the firebed.

One place to look for a cleanout door for the oven flues is in under that small oven door shelf just below the oven door. The vertical parts of the oven wall flues should be reachable by taking the round covers off.

I don't see where the lever is to switch over the oven damper from starting a fire to heating the oven. Where is it located ?

BTW, that round, three opening damper on the stove pipe, that is just above the cooktop surface, is called a "check damper". It's opened to allow cooler air to enter the pipe and reduce the strength of the draft if it gets too strong. Since that's not the case here then it's not needed. I'm just mentioning it so that you'll know if you hear the term "check damper" used.

Paul

Paul you are wonderful in describing the names used (terms) for the parts of my stove. I never knew what they were called but I learned how they work just from using the stove. I'll try and learn the correct names for our discussion and will try and print out your comment so I have it handy. I have some necessary appointments today outside my home so I might not be here but don't fret. I will read every single word. I love your stove and it's also beautiful as is mine. I wouldn't want to ever be without my stove and yet it has been couple of years now and it isn't burning. It's hard to believe that I cannot find the answer but I can see you all are trying to help me. That is why I wrote in this blog. I have talked to men, older people, stove stores, etc., but nobody yet has explained things as I am learning from this blog and I appreciate it. I have found that nobody takes things seriously and think I don't know what I am talking about so they dismiss my questions. I don't mean to sound disrespectful but I've lived in my historic home for 40 years and contractors seem to want to throw out and replace and that is not me. I don't throw out and replace things. Just as an aside, when I moved here I had a large plumbing contractor come as I needed some work in a bathroom on the second floor. When I looked they had torn out and smashed my hand on the wall toilet. There was nothing wrong with it. It is a good thing I was home or they would have done that to my cast iron bathtub. I almost died when I saw my toilet downstairs smashed - I screamed. I learned quickly from that experience. I would like to get one of those Dwyer draft meters but not sure of it's purpose but that it measures draft. It seems to me that my Kewanee furnace had something like that attached and I am going to look in my basement because I still have that furnace pushed aside and all of its parts. I treasure those things even though I never needed to use there but they were there. How would that draft meter help me in particular with the Beechwood coal stove. Forgive me but I don't grasp what you are saying although I know I need draft to burn my coal. I believe it is a draft problem and as one of you said, the draft is just not coming in strong enough to get my coal hot. It used to but why did it stop. Very little has changed except I keep going back to the fact that the Kewanee was removed. With plumbers and chimney men, I still don't know if my two flues in one chimney meet as one in the basement. I can't take the furnace pipe out on my own to look as that is where the plumber said he would use the shop vac to clean out. That is the only clean out area. He never thought to look up which he could have put a light inside my kitchen stove hook up and then if he would see the light he would know it was the same flue. I can't disconnect the furnace pipe without him here. My chimney man won't remove the gas exhaust pipe as that is for the plumber to do. He was here to fix my lose bricks at the top of the chimney when the plumber had gone up to check the chimney before installing the gas furnace and discovered two flues not one big one. Everyone is an expert in their profession. I will try and print out your information so that I have it on my desk. I must be at an appointment in a short while. I think we did a lot of brainstorming on this and I need to do some trouble shooting such as with the punk to see where the stove is pulling the air into it. You can give me some list of things to do and why so that I'm clear on my instructions. Thank you so very much.

Paul, yes those two pipe elbows connected to a copper water tank but that was sold before the house was sold to me. The stove was being sold separately from the house because it had antique value but I bought the stove as well as the house. I loved the stove from the moment I stepped into this house. .... You mention the oven flues being reachable by taking the round covers off but I don't know what round covers you are talking about. I did look inside my oven on Monday very carefully as I mentioned before and there is nothing inside, everything is solid. Is there another place and I'm confused? The lever to switch the oven damper is right at the front. It runs inside the lids to the rear and opens and closes when I pull the lever. That is what I tested while burning the paper and wood and a little smoke started to come in (which I knew that) so I closed the lever and the smoke kept going up the chimney. In the past after the firebox got very hot and burning coal if I wanted more heat I would pull the lever forward and get more heat instead of going up the chimney. The "check damper" I didn't know it's name, that is to cool things down as you say "reduce the strength of the draft" - I knew it's purpose just not it's name. Thank you.

CSL,

I know exactly what you mean about being without the range. We use ours about 9 months of the year. We enjoy using it so much that Melissa and I often do cooking together. Something we never care to do with a modern stove. And the constant warmth of the kitchen does add to the old saying that the kitchen is the heart of the home !!!!!

Try plugging those two pipe elbows by tightly packing some fiberglass insulating into them of a wad of aluminum foil. Since they are not in use it won't hurt to shut them off even if they are not the cause of low draft.

A manometer is just a very sensitive pressure gauge used where very low gas pressures are needed, such as medical oxygen equipment, testing wind musical instruments, and in the heating and air conditioning industry. It use differences between room and chimney system pressure to move a red oil up a very shallow sloping, clear tube to show lower pressures inside the stove and pipe (the draft) that are so low that you could never feel the difference.

Most of the stove owners on here that use a manometer have this Dwyer Mark II model. The tube for the gauge gets inserted into the stove pipe between the stove and the "MPD", short for "Manual Pipe Damper" that should be in the stove pipe to help slow down the hot exhaust to allow more heat to transfer to the room before it gets to the chimney.

A manometer is good for adjusting the dampers on your range, and letting you know if the draft is too low, or too high, but it won't tell you what is causing the problem and what the solution is. So it's not needed for now to fix your problem. It will just give a poor draft number with coal use that we already know about due to the dead coal firebed.

What you should do as part of your on-going process of inspecting, testing, and eliminate possible causes, is to open up the flues of the range and make certain that every bit of it's length is cleaned and clear.

In looking at your pictures I'm certain that rear vertical cast iron "pipe" is the flue that leads from the flues under oven to the stove pipe when the range is in "oven" mode. Since you mentioned that it has not been opened because your worried about breaking the bolts, I suspect that, with using wood, by now it needs to be cleaned. If your worried about breaking fasteners, have the plumber give it a try. Plumbers often have to deal with rusted together parts. And if a bolt does break, it can likely be replaced. But until then, the range is pretty much useless without making sure that all the flues are clear.

When your certain that all the flues are clear, and it still won't hold a coal fire, then next is to do the smoldering string test while you have a strong drafting wood fire. See if the smoke shows where there is any room air leaks into the range, anywhere downstream of the firebed, such as the flues and stove pipe/chimney connections, under all the edges of the cooktop surface. If you find a leak, make it with chalk and keep testing. With antique stoves, rarely are leaks just in one spot. Then come back later and put a finger smear of stove sealer refractory cement smushed into the leak.

One of the best stove sealers that I've seen for adhering to cast iron and steel is the Hercules refractory cement sold at Lowes and Home Depot. Easy to use, no smell, and cleans up with water.

Paul

coalstovelady wrote: ↑

Wed. Oct. 18, 2017 11:20 am

Paul, yes those two pipe elbows connected to a copper water tank but that was sold before the house was sold to me. The stove was being sold separately from the house because it had antique value but I bought the stove as well as the house. I loved the stove from the moment I stepped into this house. .... You mention the oven flues being reachable by taking the round covers off but I don't know what round covers you are talking about. I did look inside my oven on Monday very carefully as I mentioned before and there is nothing inside, everything is solid. Is there another place and I'm confused? The lever to switch the oven damper is right at the front. It runs inside the lids to the rear and opens and closes when I pull the lever. That is what I tested while burning the paper and wood and a little smoke started to come in (which I knew that) so I closed the lever and the smoke kept going up the chimney. In the past after the firebox got very hot and burning coal if I wanted more heat I would pull the lever forward and get more heat instead of going up the chimney. The "check damper" I didn't know it's name, that is to cool things down as you say "reduce the strength of the draft" - I knew it's purpose just not it's name. Thank you.

Round covers, ... what some folks call the cooktop's removable "lids" or "burners." Your range has six round covers, of which one is a "ring cover" with three concentric rings. All six are supported by "I" and "T" plates. Your range is unique in that it has three "I" plates and four "T" plates. Most ranges only use two and two. Remove all the round covers, then the I and T plates and you will see the entire top of the oven under them. Inspect it for cracks of leaking seams.

Between the edges of oven top and the stove's outer walls there should be a space (flue) that leads down the side of the oven wall to a space between the oven floor and the top of the base storage cabinet. See if there is a small door in the front of the range below the oven door shelf, or around the right side of the range at about the level just below the oven floor. Also look inside the oven and see if there are any removable panels that give access to the oven flues.

When you find the clean out cover, or covers. Remove them and you should be able to see into those flues to clean and inspect for cracks, and/or, leaky seams. To make an extension to reach into the flues, I use a piece of plastic sink drain stuck onto the hose nozzle of a small shop vac.

Paul

A-ha. Now we're getting somewhere !!!!

Just to be clear, when you move that oven damper lever to the oven heating position, with a wood fire, and the wood fire has been burning for at least several minutes (by then the chimney is warmed and not going to back draft), you then get smoke leaking out of the range. Is that right ?

If so, that is a sure indication that you have a blockage, or at least a pretty good restriction somewhere in the flues leading around the oven and out to the stove pipe.

BTW, a smoke leak like that also shows that your oven damper is doing a good job of sealing off the exhaust shortcut and sending the heat through the oven flues where it will keep the most heat indoors and not waste it up the chimney.

Paul

Another thought, you mentioned you have new stove pipe from the stove going into the chimney. Check all seams to make sure there are no gaps as that will rob a lot of draft from coming up through the coal grates.

Randy

looks to me the stove pipe is going into the flange instead of over it, the exhaust boot in the back could very well be sucking air.
that style is heavy and is held on by two screws at the bottom and a couple at the cook surface, there is always a broken screw or a broken tab on that part. Paul I think you are prob. right the clean out is under oven shelf. very interesting thread............wilson

............

An exhaust boot ! Thanks Wilson, I wondered what the name of that rear duct was called.

Looking at the bottom most part of the boot, does that light colored area look like fly ash on the outside around the seam where it contacts the back side of the stove ?

I wonder if there could there be a small cleanout door down on the underside of that boot,.... like the back pipes on Glenwood Modern Oaks and the base heaters ?

Paul

it looks to me like the bottom lower corner is brazed , there could be a clean out there, I think you got it. that style stove,,, when you throw the lever to bake the path it takes is over the whole oven top , down the whole back ,then under the oven floor, there is one short flue that directs it to the exhaust boot, up and out behind the kindle and bake flap (which you can see in the upper part of the pic. of the back of the stove.) that boot almost has to have something wrong with it. they are always a problem. but that aside, the cleanout door could be there, I think CSL mentioned something about it back there????

So, if that short flue under the oven acts like a baffle to make the exhaust travel around under the oven before it can get to go out through the boot, then if there is a clean out door under the oven door shelf, the open end of that flue should be just across from the C/O door opening? Then, having the C/O door under the oven door shelf would make the most sense for allowing access to that entire flue space under the oven.

Paul