Coalpail.com Forum

I live in N/E Ohio within about 15 miles of Akron, and I have found a source there for coal which is claimed to derive from Eastern Kentucky. Would it be at all possible to burn Eastern Kentucky bit coal successfully in a hand fired stove with a feed hopper that was designed exclusively for anthracite (such as a DS Machine or an Alaska Kodiak), or would a different type of stove altogether be required here? Are there any stoves currently manufactured (commercially, not home-made) for use with bituminous coal?

The DSM hoppers are removable...
So you can burn bit...

What issues would the inevitable clinkers bring? Would they eventually damage the grates or bend the shaker handle? Is it a bad idea to consider bit coal in a DSM?

And why would it not work with the feed hopper left in place?

Bit no like hopper feed...
Needs the space to feed thru door...
Bit is very different from Hard Coal...

Anthracite coal will sit in a hopper, the coal sitting on the hot fire, and the coal will not burn untill it is in the firebox, and combustion air is flowing up through the coal bed..

Bit coal is much like wood, it will burn with free combustion air around the coal.. the air does not have to come from below.. so a hopper full of Bit coal would most likely ALL catch fire and burn.. probably melting down the stove, and for sure being a safely hazard,, quite possibly causing a house fire..

So Bit can be hand fed, but not hopper fed to a stove..

I think the Kentucky coal is almost as expensive as brining in Anthracite from Pa.. I'd keep looking for a source for anthracite coal..

Bit coal in a hand fed stove will usually clinker at a lower temperature than Anthracite,, it depends on the bit coal.. If you don't burn the fire really hot, you will minimize the clinkers and how hard they are.. If your stove has an aggressive shaker grate design, most clinkers will grind up and fall through into the ashpan..
If not, then you will probably have to let the fire go out weekly and clean out the firebox, and restart the fire.. this is what I had to do with my big hand fed boiler. Sometimes I could get a poker with a hook and drag the big clinker from under the fire, and postpone the cleanout by a few days or a week, but eventually the grates would clog up with hard ash and smaller clinkers and block the airflow.. My grates were NOT aggressive enough.

Greg L

Thank you! I think I will stop considering bituminous. Too risky and too much potential for stove damage or worse, house damage.

Talk to Amos about burning bit in the DSM with no hopper...

i have the 96,000 BTU circulator with no hopper burning eastern kentucky bit rated at 12,800 BTU no trouble at all. LOVE IT

I'm getting excited about this again. Is the hopper removable in the DS stoves, or do they need to be ordered special without a hopper? Do you have trouble with clinkers jamming up the grates? How much trouble are the fused clinker blobs? Is the clinker issue terrible under low fire conditions?

you can order with hopper or without, what clinkers their is the grates chop them right up I don't have no blobs were its stuck together.

good eastern KY bit will burn easier, longer and with more heat and less ash than anthracite. good bituminous coal won't produce clinkers so that's really a non-issue, and KY coal is "free-burning" so it doesn't bridge or melt in the firebox. try it out, you'll probably love it, many people I know have actually switched from anthracite to good eastern KY bit coal at similar and even higher prices.

Berlin wrote:good eastern KY bit will burn easier, longer and with more heat and less ash than anthracite. good bituminous coal won't produce clinkers so that's really a non-issue, and KY coal is "free-burning" so it doesn't bridge or melt in the firebox. try it out, you'll probably love it, many people I know have actually switched from anthracite to good eastern KY bit coal at similar and even higher prices.

Yes, good Kentucky coal has around 2% ash. It burns down to a fine white ash. I loved it when I used it back home. I never had any problems with clinkers or caking problems. If I had it now, I would use it without a second thought.

Berlin wrote:good eastern KY bit will burn easier, longer and with more heat and less ash than anthracite. good bituminous coal won't produce clinkers so that's really a non-issue, and KY coal is "free-burning" so it doesn't bridge or melt in the firebox. try it out, you'll probably love it, many people I know have actually switched from anthracite to good eastern KY bit coal at similar and even higher prices.

Berlin, I never would have imagined it, but you are quite right about the high price for KY coal. I just found out that 'Church Coal Firewood, & Mulch' in Akron, Ohio (couldn't be more than 15-20 miles from me) has what they call "Kentucky Lump Coal" (no clue what that means) at $200 per ton. I discovered this by listening to their recorded answering machine message just a short while ago. Per the same recorded message they also offer anthracite now, and at only $225 per ton. With the two prices being that close, I could actually go with either one.

A different source for local Ohio coal (referred to as "washed Stoker coal", whatever that means) is asking only $95/ton for that. Would it be a total mistake to consider this option?

I wonder if this Kentucky coal is the same as the cannel coal I posted about (it came from there, turn of the century). I know that cannel coal was sometimes referred to as "lump" or "fireplace."
http://www.caer.uky.edu/energeia/PDF/vol7-1.pdf

kentucky coal and cannel coal are not the same things - totally different. bituminous coal is not the same thing as cannel coal. as far as KY coal vs. anthracite, it's not just the cost per ton, but the cost per BTU to consider - KY coal can have as much as 2000btu's MORE per pound than anthracite, and with less ash (often less than HALF) you can go longer before taking out the ash pan. If you're going to burn bituminous coal, the Kentucky lump coal is what you want. Don't assume that because the prices are close that you should automatically go with anthracite - anthracite is NOT necessarily "better" than a good bituminous coal. yes, it would be a mistake to bother with stoker coal when you have access to some of the best coal in the world - KY lump coal.