Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Paul, Can I move in with you? (Just kidding!) My desire on the other side of the room from my wood / coal cookstove is for a cook-in fireplace!!! (I'm really from the 1700's, just haven't passed on as of yet!) When I designed our log cabin I left room for the fireplace to come up through the removeable floor in the living room. I deperately want to cook in the fireplace, (or on the hearth). Since we do Civil War re-enacting it isn't that far a stretch from my outside campfire cooking with my dutch ovens, cast iron and reflector oven to the fireplace! A Rumford fireplace may be in our future, heats well and could be cooked in or next to....
Kindred spirits!!
Carole

I'm not sure you'd like the work of keeping up with this beast of a fireplace ! That's why the Glenwood Oak 118 is going at the other end of the living room from the fireplace !

Now, if like Dave said, I could just get anthracite to smell like burning oak in an OAK stove. I'd have the best of both worlds.

1700's huh ? The girl friend is hooked on that too. She even loves nothing better than to go camping and cooking over a wood fire. That's as close as she gets these days to one of her favorite places - Williamsburg.

One of the things I liked about this house was how much like a 1700's kitchen the living room fireplace is, . . until I had to feed the thing. shock: That, and knowing what life was like in your civil war era from a few years volunteer work at Old Bethpage Village, swayed me into the "Iron stove, and oil lamp era". But , the ladies there did turn out some incredible cooking with the just a wood fire, some iron pots and a crane and beehive ovens. Yummmmm !

Yup, I love the smell of a wood fire, but I've sure gotten spoiled with ease of coal.

Paul

windyhill4.2 wrote:Paul,thanks,it's good to hear from those who have been there & done that but have not forgotten what it was like, & do not look down on those who are a little slower in the change process. Till this winter is over there is only 1 aspect of wood that I will miss when we do switch to coal & that is the "smokehouse" aroma many of our customers refer to when they stop in.Art ,as Paul said,enjoy while you are young . Our owb just doesn't function with coal.

Dave,
Anyway you could adapt another make of OWB maker's coal grates to yours ?

Paul

Paul ,i have thought about doing a modification,but the "grates" on ours are 3" pipes,filled with water as part of the system,that would mean cutting & sealing those among other things.One thing I have learned from this forum is that coal likes a smaller bed but deep,our firebox is 60" long x Approximately 38" sq..I believe that LS Farm or Richard S. ,my 56 yr old memory fails right now ,but one of them posted pic's about a similar modification,by sticking a stoker mechanism into a big wood stove,& achieving decent results.I think I would be wasting time & money doing a conversion to our owb,when we do switch to coal I hope to be able to sell the owb to a farmer or greenhouse as they are no longer legal for residential purchase in Pa.

Wow! Never thought about adding a stoker to an OWB. I bet some of the guys on the Forum could hook you up with a good, rebuilt stoker. Sounds like there is plenty of room to add one in the firebox. You might have to build a small enclosure for the stoker that sticks out of the firebox, however. I bet you could add a stoker, auger and covered bin for a heck of a lot less than a new complete stoker boiler system. I think One of the Forum member who rebuilds boilers is trying to liquidate odds and ends of inventory. I forget his screen name. Let me do a quick search.

Seems like it would be grossly inefficient. But maybe not.

Lee, I think you are right on that,the conversion on here somewhere was to a stove quite a bit smaller than ours.

Id be interested to see if it's possible and reasonably efficient. Since the OWB theoretically can burn coal, any heat source providing the required BTU's should work,....I think

How many BTU's is the OWB rated for?

I suppose if you had good enough control of the draft the boiler would be forced to soak up the btus.. Might work really good. A baffling system of some sort in the fire box would be needed so heat would have longer opportunity to be absorbed.

MPD!!! Lol!

somebody on here did a stoker conversion to a hand fed, I think it was a hot blast (or clone).

If I remember correctly he made it a dual stoker unit.

hmmmm.....thinking hard........

Low draft wouldn't be a safety concern, the unit is outside. Hmmmm,....yes,....thinking......

Found it....It was a clayton....pics and everything.....pretty slick!

Clayton Furnace With Dual Reading Stokers