VA-600 Air Adjust

 
mjm4jc
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Post by mjm4jc » Sat. Mar. 05, 2022 11:04 pm

Hello everyone,
It's been a while. Hope everyone is well. I have an air adjust question concerning my Van Wert VA-600. So I'm finding that my coal isn't burning the way it should. There's way too much un-burned coal in the ash can. The only thing that changed was that I changed suppliers. I've used this coal supplier years ago and didn't have any problems. My assumption was that if the coal wasn't burning all the way, the air should be turned up. I also was under the assumption that giving it more air meant pulling the metal plate upward......(the thingy with all the notches and numbers). But in a video I just watched on youtube, (I believe from a member on here), he said that to correct the fire from being too low in the pot he gave it more air by going down in numbers, not up. I believe he said that he started at around 7 and ended up around 3 to get the flame to rise up high toward the coil. So now I'm wondering if I have this backwards??? I am at number 11 now, meaning that I have the metal plate pulled up as high as it can go. Is this correct for more air?
Thanks!!!!


 
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StokerDon
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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. Mar. 06, 2022 7:49 am

No, your not backwards. A higher number means more air will go through the fire.

What size coal are you burning? What size pulleys and sprockets are you running?

-Don

 
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Post by Rob R. » Sun. Mar. 06, 2022 7:53 am

You may have some poor quality coal, or some sort of blockage in the pot that is preventing proper airflow.

I would give the boiler, stoker (clean the gaps between the pot rings, make sure fines are blown out of air chamber), and flue pipe a good cleaning, and restart with factory recommended settings. If you still have excessive amounts of unburned coal, try some different coal.

 
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Post by mjm4jc » Sun. Mar. 06, 2022 8:36 am

Hey Stoker Don, I just realized that the video was yours......the blue and red VA-600, lol! You said that you brought the air down to 3.5 to get more fire????

Thanks Ron! I gave my stoker a complete service this past October to get it ready for winter. I think poor quality coal is the most likely culprit. I used Blaschak for several years with no issues. My supplier retired, and the local delivery guys around here were not delivering Blaschak, b/c of distance. So I went with another supplier with coal from Mt. Carmel. That's when I saw the decline in the burning of the coal. But I also saw that the coal was unburned mostly at the edge of the fire pot at about the 8 o' clock area. So I was led to believe that it was the rings in the pot. I actually replaced all the rings in the pot about 10 years ago and also had both augers filed and replaced the gearbox too. Anyway, when I got more coal delivered by yet another supplier just a few weeks ago with the coal from Tamaqua, It improved slightly. But I still have much unburned coal in the ash can. So I guess it's pointing toward the quality of coal more than anything else at this point. As soon as we get a warm day, I'm going to let the fire go out and completely clean the fire pot and see if I can clear the gaps between the rings.

Thanks for the comments guys!

 
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Post by mjm4jc » Sun. Mar. 06, 2022 8:42 am

Stoker Don, I'm using buck coal, and the gears and everything else is whatever came from the factory at Peckville.

 
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StokerDon
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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. Mar. 06, 2022 7:15 pm

mjm4jc wrote:
Sun. Mar. 06, 2022 8:36 am
Hey Stoker Don, I just realized that the video was yours......the blue and red VA-600, lol! You said that you brought the air down to 3.5 to get more fire????
Yes. By more fire I meant more lit coal, not more flames.

I can't get Buckwheat here so I burn Rice. Mine is geared down to about 5.5 pounds per hour. The Van Werts have a pretty high feed rate as delivered from the factory. Add to that the fact that Rice will increase the feed rate by about 20% over Buck and you can see why I geared mine down like a lot of other people have.

A few years ago I had a load of Pea coal that came from the mine in MT. Carmel. It was a Very, Very hard coal and did not burn well in stokers and my Axeman Anderson wouldn't completely burn it. I had to do a LOT of adjusting to get it to burn right. Although the stoker didn't like it, It burnt great in a hand fired stove.

-Don

 
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Post by lzaharis » Mon. Mar. 07, 2022 9:26 am

Buckwheat coal is the correct coal size if I remember correctly, how often to
do you open the fines drain in the base of the tuyere/burn pot of your VA600??
That may be a lot of the issue you are dealing with. You may have to kill the fire
and clean the air passages between the rings using a vacuum and a piece of
steel bar stock.


 
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Post by mjm4jc » Mon. Mar. 07, 2022 9:22 pm

StokerDon wrote:
Sun. Mar. 06, 2022 7:15 pm
Yes. By more fire I meant more lit coal, not more flames.

I can't get Buckwheat here so I burn Rice. Mine is geared down to about 5.5 pounds per hour. The Van Werts have a pretty high feed rate as delivered from the factory. Add to that the fact that Rice will increase the feed rate by about 20% over Buck and you can see why I geared mine down like a lot of other people have.

A few years ago I had a load of Pea coal that came from the mine in MT. Carmel. It was a Very, Very hard coal and did not burn well in stokers and my Axeman Anderson wouldn't completely burn it. I had to do a LOT of adjusting to get it to burn right. Although the stoker didn't like it, It burnt great in a hand fired stove.

-Don
Yeah buck coal is pretty abundant here. When I got the coal from Mt. Carmel, and it wouldn't burn they way I thought it would, I told the coal guy that I think the coal is so hard and of an extremely good quality that it doesn't have enough time to burn. And since I can only control air, not feed, I opted to get my next batch of coal from Tamaqua. But I did burn about 1/4 ton of the coal from Mt. Carmel in my Alaskan Kodiak in the garage with no issues. It's just may not compatible with my Van Wert. The buck coal I have right now is from Tamaqua.......pretty much the same issue as the coal from Mt. Carmel, but not as bad. I guess I'm going to have to get a few bags of Blaschak and see if anything changes. I was using Blaschak with no issues until I changed coal. So either the coal from Mt. Carmel and from Tamaqua is that good, or (2) they both are inferior to the Blaschak, or (3) there truly is something wrong with my stoker, or (4) I'm going insane! lol! Will keep you posted. I know that these Van-Werts are praised highly, but honestly, I don't understand why. The feed on the EFM's can be adjusted so easily by the click and last just as long IMO.

 
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Post by mjm4jc » Mon. Mar. 07, 2022 9:27 pm

lzaharis wrote:
Mon. Mar. 07, 2022 9:26 am
Buckwheat coal is the correct coal size if I remember correctly, how often to
do you open the fines drain in the base of the tuyere/burn pot of your VA600??
That may be a lot of the issue you are dealing with. You may have to kill the fire
and clean the air passages between the rings using a vacuum and a piece of
steel bar stock.
Thanks for the reply man. When I service the stoker, I always open up that little door and vacuum out the "fly ash" as we call it here. I opened it up just within this week to make sure. It's was clear and is always clear when I service the stoker. But yeah, two things I need to do to get to the bottom of this is to clean out the fire pot and in between the rings and to try some bagged Blaschak coal. Not sure which one I'll get to first.

 
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Post by lzaharis » Tue. Mar. 08, 2022 12:03 am

So much of the art of combustion inn a tuyere/underfed firepot is air flow and resistance created by the round fire and the fines above the auger. The circular fire begins to travel downward slowly until the fuel is pushed upward by the buckwheat coal being pushed up and forward as the stoker operates.

Low pressure air is lazy exactly like water in a garden hose fed from a well and every bit of coal dust that waddles through the auger will settle around the base of the auger as the larger pieces of Buckwheat coal get pushed forward and upward into the fire and eventually grind down to the point that they will slow the flow of air down.

If you can screen out the fines all the better but I don't know how much of a chore that would be to do.

 
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StokerDon
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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. Mar. 12, 2022 7:58 am

mjm4jc wrote:
Mon. Mar. 07, 2022 9:22 pm
And since I can only control air, not feed,
Don't think that you can't change the feed rate just because there is no adjustment, you can.

Some of the newer Van Wert's (1980'S) came with an adjustable split pulley on the motor to adjust the feed. You could just put a smaller pulley on to make the gearbox spin slower. The only problem with this is the combustion fan is also going to run slower reducing combustion air. This is a problem when burning Rice, might not be with Buck.

The best way to reduce the feed rate on a Van Wert is to install a bigger pot auger sprocket. The VA-600 comes with an 18 tooth sprocket, I run a 25 tooth on mine and it does the trick. There was a Coal Supplier in the Scranton area that recommended running a 30 tooth sprocket to all his Van Wert customers to eliminate unburnt coal and reduce coal consumption.

I go over this topic and my solution in this thread.

The Van Wert VA600 Project

-Don

 
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Post by mjm4jc » Tue. Mar. 22, 2022 12:38 pm

Hey Don,
Thanks for the info. Sorry I haven't responded sooner. I can see how the increased sprocket size would help with burning less coal, and in my case, burning the coal to complete ash. I'm not sure how the sprockets mentioned in your thread will work with mine, since I burn buck, and you're burning rice. Would have liked to have seen in the VA600 project thread above what the outside temps were in each of your experiments. Maybe I missed it. Anyway, where would I be able to get a larger sprocket? Did you have it custom made? What was the deal with the big hose clamp on the sprocket? Is it not a direct remove and replace kind of thing? Also, did you have to go with a longer chain? Sorry for the many questions all at once.
Thanks!

 
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StokerDon
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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 » Tue. Mar. 22, 2022 8:09 pm

The Van Wert owners that I was talking about and the coal supplier were doing this with Buckwheat coal, not Rice coal. I have no way of knowing where they got there 30 tooth sprockets from. I would bet that you could find them at McMaster Carr. The Chain is a #41 and the shaft (auger) is 1/2".

My 25 tooth sprocket is from my local hardware store. It was the only thing like it that they ever had. It was there for over 30 years before I found a use for it! :lol:

The hose clamp is just there to hold the shear pin in. It doesn't have a groove for a C clip like the Van Wert sprockets do.

-Don

 
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Post by mjm4jc » Wed. Mar. 23, 2022 1:40 pm

Ok, thanks! Mark's hardware in Shenandoah, PA is only about 45 minutes from me. I can call and see if he has one or something like it. I got all new firepot rings, augers, and gearbox from him within the last 10 years. Great to have a guy like close by.

 
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Post by mjm4jc » Sun. Jul. 10, 2022 8:54 am

Hello everyone,
Just wanted to give an update. So I ended up taking the fire pot apart and wire brushing all of the rings. There definitely wasn't the proper amount of air getting through those rings. Now they're nice and clean. I'll give it a few days and see how it's burning and get back to you soon after.

I do have a question about the felt that goes underneath the thick top ring/cover with the 3 bolts. Does the felt go in the outer groove/bevel, or the smaller diameter groove that's a bit deeper but has less circumference?

Thanks a bunch!
Mike


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