Coalpail.com Forum

My coal and oil boilers share the same chimney. Here is a pic of how it's setup. Thanks to a member of this forum I finally have a set of replacement grates so this is the first year we will be using the coal boiler since we bought the house.

I plan on burning coal when the weather turns colder but I've been burning a bit of wood during the milder fall weather. This old 1957 coal boiler is not very air tight. Even with the baro-damper from the oil boiler set to stay closed, I can't close the manual damper on the coal boiler at all because smoke rolls out around the door, so we won't be using that...lol.
I got a good deal on a draft gauge so as an experiment I set the draft on the coal boiler breech to 0.05 using the baro-damper on the oil boiler which enters the chimney above the coal boiler smoke pipe.
The wood fire is much more controllable and I seem to get more heat to the house and a longer burn from the wood.
I'm a little concerned that the air entering the chimney through the baro-damper might cool the smoke enough to cause creosote buildup.
What do you think? What are your thoughts on how it is set up and how I should run it?

Many say NO to have a baro in use with a wood fire...
If a chimney fire starts due to creosote build up, the baro will feed it fresh oxygen and you will be in serious trouble my friend...

just to be clear- do you have oil...coal...and wood burning sharing the SAME flu pipe???

You should cover the baro when burning wood.

Rigar wrote:just to be clear- do you have oil...coal...and wood burning sharing the SAME flu pipe???

Nope, coal/wood is a single appliance. I'll be burning either coal or wood in it.
The pic shows how the 2 appliances are feeding into the chimney. The coal/wood boiler enters the flue on one side and the oil boiler enters above and on the opposite side of the flue.

Lightning wrote:Many say NO to have a baro in use with a wood fire...
If a chimney fire starts due to creosote build up, the baro will feed it fresh oxygen and you will be in serious trouble my friend...

Thanks, that is certainly a big safety concern. I had the baro-damper weight set so it would never open. I tried setting it so it would control draft to 0.05" as an experiment.
I was rather surprised at the increase in efficiency and burn time. However, safety will have to trump cost.

Rob R. wrote:You should cover the baro when burning wood.

I have been setting the weight on the baro to keep the flapper closed. Covering it is a safer solution.
I hate to lose the increased efficiency, the boiler literally sucks the wood up the chimney when the baro-damper is held closed, but safety comes first.

I hear ya lol. I love my barometric.... How about a manual damper? You could control draft with that too, safely using wood.

Lightning wrote:I hear ya lol. I love my barometric.... How about a manual damper? You could control draft with that too, safely using wood.

I installed a manual damper but if I close it, even a little, smoke comes rolling out the air intake in the door and around the door. As a matter of fact, smoke rolls out the door whenever I open it, whether the barometric is set to open or when it is forced to remain closed, even though I measure plenty of draft both at the breech and over the fire.

imaddicted2u wrote:

Lightning wrote:I hear ya lol. I love my barometric.... How about a manual damper? You could control draft with that too, safely using wood.

I installed a manual damper but if I close it, even a little, smoke comes rolling out the air intake in the door and around the door. As a matter of fact, smoke rolls out the door whenever I open it, whether the barometric is set to open or when it is forced to remain closed, even though I measure plenty of draft both at the breech and over the fire.

...something is amiss
...got a better pic of ur set up?
...is the oil boiler running when this happens ????

Hmmm..... wow ya know that tells me your chimney is restricted since it can pull hard, but at the same time won't take a big volume, like when the load door is open. But at the same time, the manual easily chokes it too. Something don't add up. I would check the whole length, from the breech of the furnace all the way to the chimney top. How do you prevent the oil burner from allowing room air into the chimney when it's not in use?

Edit: I saw the mano.

re read ur first post...
you got a good deal on ur draft guage..??
is it used ??-more importantly....is it working accurately?

So when you close the manual damper, the reading on the draft gauge starts falling towards zero right?

...something is amiss
...got a better pic of ur set up?
...is the oil boiler running when this happens ????[/quote]
There is a pic at the start of this thread.
No, the oil boiler is not running.

Rigar wrote:re read ur first post...
you got a good deal on ur draft guage..??
is it used ??-more importantly....is it working accurately?

The good deal was for a brand new Dwyer manometer as shown in the pic. I got it on ebay.
The draft gauge is a Dwyer manometer filled with the proper gauge oil. It has been properly zero'd. Being a simple device with no moving parts, I see no reason to question its accuracy.