Axeman Anderson 1959 130M

 
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StokerDon
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Location: PA, Southern York County!
Stoker Coal Boiler: Gentleman Janitor GJ-5, Van Wert VA-600, Axeman Anderson130 X3.
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: Harman SF3500 reduced down to 3 grates connected to its own plenum
Coal Size/Type: Rice, Chestnut and whatever will fit through the door on the Harman
Other Heating: Noth'in but COAL! Well, Maybe a little tiny bit of wood

Post by StokerDon » Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 12:23 pm

McGiever wrote:
Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 11:49 am
A bag or two of another pea coal and a feed scoop to slide coal in at removed transfer head cover plate can get new fuel results quick and accurate...need to block auger during this test. Makeshift hopper may be nice...
Trying different coal might actually be an option now. We have blown through so much of the 5 ton in the bin that I could probably shove a divider down on each side of the dog house. this would allow us to either let the coal run out or shovel it out. Then we could add coal from a different source.

The big question is, where can I find coal from a different source? Pea size is not one of the top three popular coal sizes. My current Blaschack supplier is the only one in the area that stocks Pea.

-Don


 
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StokerDon
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Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 11:17 am
Location: PA, Southern York County!
Stoker Coal Boiler: Gentleman Janitor GJ-5, Van Wert VA-600, Axeman Anderson130 X3.
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: Harman SF3500 reduced down to 3 grates connected to its own plenum
Coal Size/Type: Rice, Chestnut and whatever will fit through the door on the Harman
Other Heating: Noth'in but COAL! Well, Maybe a little tiny bit of wood

Post by StokerDon » Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 12:50 pm

OK NOW!

I got tired of screw'in around and called the expert. As you may know, forum member Scrapper has worked at the Blashchak coal breaker for many, many years. I just talked to him about this years coal. If you pay attention to the coal news, you would know that Blashchak has purchased a mine in Mount Carmel PA.

Scrapper says the Mount Carmel mine is where a lot of this years coal supply has been coming from. He said it is from the Mammoth Vain and is very, very hard. He also said you have to push a lot more air through it to get it to burn right. This seems to match up well with my findings.

I am going up there next weekend to pick up my Van Wert. Scrapper said to bring a 10 pound sample of the coal. He is going to take it to the lab at Blashchak to test it. Then we will know exactly what we have!

And again, that's what makes this forum so great!

-Don

 
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McGiever
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Location: Junction of PA-OH-WV
Stoker Coal Boiler: AXEMAN-ANDERSON 130 "1959"
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: BUCKET A DAY water heater
Hand Fed Coal Stove: Warm Morning 414A
Coal Size/Type: PEA,NUT,STOVE /ANTHRACITE
Other Heating: Ground Source Heat Pump and some Solar

Post by McGiever » Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 1:02 pm

Don, Whether you may or may not be interested, my 1959 AA is setup with a variable speed motor drive that gives me very fine control, with a digital display, over the fan speed by simply turning a knob on a separate potentiometer.

Oh, and there are even more "pimped up" goodies on this unit of mine. :roll:
Last edited by McGiever on Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 1:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.

 
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StokerDon
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Location: PA, Southern York County!
Stoker Coal Boiler: Gentleman Janitor GJ-5, Van Wert VA-600, Axeman Anderson130 X3.
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: Harman SF3500 reduced down to 3 grates connected to its own plenum
Coal Size/Type: Rice, Chestnut and whatever will fit through the door on the Harman
Other Heating: Noth'in but COAL! Well, Maybe a little tiny bit of wood

Post by StokerDon » Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 1:05 pm

McGiever wrote:
Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 1:02 pm
Don, Whether you may or may not be interested, my 1959 AA is setup with a variable speed motor drive that gives me very fine control over the fan speed by simply turning a knob on a separate potentiometer.

Oh, and there are even more "pimped up" goodies on this unit of mine. :roll:
NICE!
Have you ever found a need to get more air through the coal bed? If so, how did you do it, increase the fans speed maybe?

-Don

 
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McGiever
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Hand Fed Coal Stove: Warm Morning 414A
Coal Size/Type: PEA,NUT,STOVE /ANTHRACITE
Other Heating: Ground Source Heat Pump and some Solar

Post by McGiever » Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 1:20 pm

StokerDon wrote:
Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 1:05 pm
NICE!
Have you ever found a need to get more air through the coal bed? If so, how did you do it, increase the fans speed maybe?

-Don
Yes, going against common wisdom, I have experimented quite a bit with more and even with less air being fed. Adding or reducing a little air goes a long ways to changing results...better than pulley swapping. ;)
As you can imagine it is very simple to adjust and the big bonus is the results are very repeatable w/ the digital display. That and I keep a log book to record many internal and external conditions for reference.
Besides the drive unit the motor gets changed and that was a breeze even with adding a new mount type for it.

Not an inexpenseve setup, but not too bad either as I work hard at not paying full price for my hobbies.

I did post some bits of it a while back here...How Should an AA130's Fire Look at Full Burn?

VFD driven motor and mount in the foreground...
That's a gear reduction motor to drive the auger independent of the blower motor you see in background...
Image

NOTE: As reported wayyy earlier in this thread...I have always used theFactory Recommended 5" Fan Drive Pulley, whereas Don uses a different size.
Last edited by McGiever on Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 10:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

 
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StokerDon
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Location: PA, Southern York County!
Stoker Coal Boiler: Gentleman Janitor GJ-5, Van Wert VA-600, Axeman Anderson130 X3.
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: Harman SF3500 reduced down to 3 grates connected to its own plenum
Coal Size/Type: Rice, Chestnut and whatever will fit through the door on the Harman
Other Heating: Noth'in but COAL! Well, Maybe a little tiny bit of wood

Post by StokerDon » Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 7:20 pm

McGiever wrote:
Sun. Dec. 09, 2018 1:20 pm
I did post some bits of it a while back here...How Should an AA130's Fire Look at Full Burn?
Yes, I remember. I have it saved in my Axeman Anderson reference library.
BTW; My motor pulley is 5" also. I have been changing the fan pulley.

4.9 hours of run time over the past day.
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3 days worth of ash. Not much ash, mostly rocks and heavy.
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.
Since we now think that this is most likely Mount Carmel coal that is very hard and requires more air, we are giving it more air. The 2" pulley gives a fan speed of 4312.5 RPM and is quite intimidating to operate. We are going to split the difference and run a 2.5" pulley at 3450 RPM.
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We have not changed any other settings. Still ashing 120 and 1 tooth, aquastat 160, dump zone 195.

When the fan first comes on the over fire draft is -1.6.
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I expect to get the lab test results for this coal sometime during the week of the 16th. In the mean time, we will just try to dial it in with the new air setting.

-Don

 
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StokerDon
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Posts: 7486
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Location: PA, Southern York County!
Stoker Coal Boiler: Gentleman Janitor GJ-5, Van Wert VA-600, Axeman Anderson130 X3.
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: Harman SF3500 reduced down to 3 grates connected to its own plenum
Coal Size/Type: Rice, Chestnut and whatever will fit through the door on the Harman
Other Heating: Noth'in but COAL! Well, Maybe a little tiny bit of wood

Post by StokerDon » Sat. Dec. 15, 2018 8:08 pm

We've been running with the 2" fan pulley for 4 days now. I did some tweaking, currently at 105 ashing and 2 teeth.
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It ran for 14.6 hours over 4 days, 3.65 hours per day.
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The ash is still rocky look'in.
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37 pounds.
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I dropped off the 10 pound sample with Scrapper today. We should have the lab results next week.

-Don


 
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StokerDon
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Location: PA, Southern York County!
Stoker Coal Boiler: Gentleman Janitor GJ-5, Van Wert VA-600, Axeman Anderson130 X3.
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: Harman SF3500 reduced down to 3 grates connected to its own plenum
Coal Size/Type: Rice, Chestnut and whatever will fit through the door on the Harman
Other Heating: Noth'in but COAL! Well, Maybe a little tiny bit of wood

Post by StokerDon » Wed. Dec. 19, 2018 7:19 pm

The results are in from the Blashchak Coal Lab!

9.58% ash. Hard coal, low fusion, slow burning.

Interesting, I would have thought this coal was high fusion temperature. It doesn't make much in the way of clinkers compared to last years coal and we are burning this batch hotter.

-Don

 
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Post by corey » Wed. Dec. 19, 2018 9:50 pm

Hey Don.

You do some great work I also enjoy your YouTube channel.

 
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Post by coalkirk » Thu. Dec. 20, 2018 8:22 am

StokerDon wrote:
Wed. Dec. 19, 2018 7:19 pm
The results are in from the Blashchak Coal Lab!

9.58% ash. Hard coal, low fusion, slow burning.

Interesting, I would have thought this coal was high fusion temperature. It doesn't make much in the way of clinkers compared to last years coal and we are burning this batch hotter.

-Don
No reason to doubt this result but they were testing their own coal.

 
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McGiever
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Coal Size/Type: PEA,NUT,STOVE /ANTHRACITE
Other Heating: Ground Source Heat Pump and some Solar

Post by McGiever » Thu. Dec. 20, 2018 9:36 am

So, this tested as SLOW BURNING, then where does that take you?

 
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Coal Size/Type: pea/nut/rice/stove-anthracite, nut/stove bit when I feel the urge
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Post by BunkerdCaddis » Thu. Dec. 20, 2018 9:59 am

McGiever wrote:
Thu. Dec. 20, 2018 9:36 am
So, this tested as SLOW BURNING, then where does that take you?
Wondering the same thing, what exactly does that mean? Does it take more air?

 
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McGiever
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Stoker Coal Boiler: AXEMAN-ANDERSON 130 "1959"
Hand Fed Coal Boiler: BUCKET A DAY water heater
Hand Fed Coal Stove: Warm Morning 414A
Coal Size/Type: PEA,NUT,STOVE /ANTHRACITE
Other Heating: Ground Source Heat Pump and some Solar

Post by McGiever » Thu. Dec. 20, 2018 10:12 am

Slow burning coal property would seem to require less air to lessen the rapid burn off or superficial roasting out of volatiles and then sending the remaining partially burned or cooked coal out into ash pan...but then what do I know???

 
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Lightning
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Post by Lightning » Thu. Dec. 20, 2018 2:10 pm

Can they test an ash pan full of ash to see what percentage of it by weight is unburned coal?

I guess that probably wouldn't be useful since after taking a closer look it appears that most of it is unburned coal.

 
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StokerDon
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Posts: 7486
Joined: Mon. Nov. 11, 2013 11:17 am
Location: PA, Southern York County!
Stoker Coal Boiler: Gentleman Janitor GJ-5, Van Wert VA-600, Axeman Anderson130 X3.
Hand Fed Coal Furnace: Harman SF3500 reduced down to 3 grates connected to its own plenum
Coal Size/Type: Rice, Chestnut and whatever will fit through the door on the Harman
Other Heating: Noth'in but COAL! Well, Maybe a little tiny bit of wood

Post by StokerDon » Thu. Dec. 20, 2018 6:59 pm

corey wrote:
Wed. Dec. 19, 2018 9:50 pm
Hey Don.

You do some great work I also enjoy your YouTube channel.
Thanks Corey!

I'm glad you like it.

-Don


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