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Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Fri. Oct. 14, 2011 2:49 pm
by graffix
Thanks for the info Im brand new to the outdoor furnace world. I havent had a single fire in it yet.I have the 200css Heatmore.I have the shaker grate and that door kit(not installed)The instructions I have are poor.So at least thanks for the pics.How does that handle attach to the grate?Also can I ask for a link to get parts?I only find whole boiler systems through their main site.Thanks

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Tue. Feb. 11, 2014 9:35 am
by Sixkids
Hi!
Very interesting post. We also have a Heatmore outdoor wood boiler and are brand new to the coal world. We are taking delivery of our wood / coal cookstove today, (possibly) !!! :D We live on a farm in PA with no close neighbors and have hot water baseboard heat.
Did you go through your dealer or direct to buy the coal conversion kit? If you don't mind my asking is it expensive?
Right now we are buying hardwood log pieces, (pre cut), for $40 for a pickup truck load, (about 1 - 1 1/2 cord). It takes about 22 + cords per winter. We are also heating our household water with the OWB.
Thank you for your postings.

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Wed. Feb. 12, 2014 10:12 pm
by windyhill4.2
We have an Oak Tree OWB,no shaker grates,we have to rake from above the grates,we tried 2 ton of nut coal & found it to be too much hassle. Sixkids , did I read that wrong ?,you haul 1-1.5 cord on a pickup ? A cord is 4x4x8 ,cut 18",split & stacked, you might haul 1 cord on a F350 with dual rear wheels,Too much weight for F250 .

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Wed. Feb. 12, 2014 10:40 pm
by Sixkids
In our Silverado we stack the log pieces up to the height of the top of the cab. 3/4 ton truck. Perhaps that's why our truck cries "Uncle" when we go to get wood!! :) We are considering installing coal grates designed by the Heatmor company in our Heatmor outdoor boiler, I can hear our truck sighing a sigh of relief!! :)

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Wed. Feb. 12, 2014 11:18 pm
by windyhill4.2
4x4x8, cut,split & stacked is the official & legal cord,try doing that to your truck,on second thought,do not try ,it will break ! a load of logs piled like that is heavy,try the same cubic space full of toothpicks...way much heavier,that is why cut,split&stacked cord will not fit on a pickup.Just got in from loading wood in the owb,so much fun with the snow swirling in our faces,yes it has already covered things here again.Someday we will have a coal burner setup ,no more wood to toss !

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 6:52 am
by Sunny Boy
Not to insult anyone's choice of wood stoves, or get too far off topic. But, I can understand why you'd want to get away from using a wood boiler. Everytime I hear someone talking about them, I'm always amazed at how many cords of wood those things eat in a season. :shock:

Friend heats his old farm house with wood. It's a typical old farm house - large two story, lots of rooms, about 3500 square feet. He has a Vermont Castings Defiant in the front "parlor" and a Kalamazoo range in the kitchen at the back of the house. He averages 10 cords of wood a year.

When I was looking to buy a wood stove, I talking to others in the area with similar old places that did the same. A wood stove at each end of the house and about 10 cords a season.

Seems the wood boilers are about double that, or am I missing something ?

Paul

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 7:13 am
by windyhill4.2
Paul, we have regretted the owb choice many times ,especially in the last few years,but no liquid fuel,we have averaged 1 cord/week since mid Oct,we are heating 2 houses & 30x40 repair shop & dhw for the 2 houses.Lots of heat demand,lots of wood demand,LOTS of work out in the weather.Wish I had found this forum prior to setting up the owb,but .. there's always tomorrow,another chance to make a better choice .

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 7:22 am
by Sixkids
We heat our water and home with about 20 cord plus per winter. To measure our wood cord we measured out an area and used temporary metal stakes to mark all 4 corners of the 'cord' and where the height of the cord would be and then 'fill the area with the wood when we get back from the pallet shop where we buy the wood. We LOVE the smell of wood burning, (I just know someone is going to make reference that it isn't the wood we are smelling burning - it's the money we are burning!), and at 20 cords per year IF it gives us a cord or so per truck load at $40 per truck load of hard wood ... $800 per winter plus all the exercise we can handle!
We might be better off heating our 3500 sq ft home and domestic water, with coal. Since my new cook range has arrived we do want to try using coal both in the range and in the outside wood burner, so we will be contacting our dealer to see what options we now have. Now our truck will have to haul coal instead ...hummmm... wonder where the nearest 'pallets-made-out-of-coal' shop is located and if they sell their end cuts too! :D

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 8:28 am
by Sixkids
If we do change to an outdoor coal boiler we will let you know our findings. We went from all electric to oil furnace hot water baseboard to outdoor water boiler and liked each change. We still have the option between wood heat and oil. LOVE when we are domestic water with outdoor wood boiler as the water is SO much hotter than on the oil furnace or electric. Would love to have a hooper of sorts to load itself with coal during the winter! :) .. and the outdoor wood / coal and oil furnace choice.

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 8:39 am
by windyhill4.2
I will never again set up an outdoor burner of any kind,fixing ours at 3 a/m with 30mph+ winds & 0* cured me of ever having that thought process again. Next unit will be in a building or shed,repairs & tending can then be done inside,out of the weather.Had thought of Leisure Lines outdoor coal burner,but that cold nite repair out in the weather cured me of that thought. One of the things we will miss with the owb is the wood smoke smell,all yr long as we use it for summer dhw too,but we had our smell times,want to move on to less work times.

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 9:51 am
by Sixkids
The way ours is set up we can run on wood when we want and if the wood is empty it will automatically switch over to oil on it's own. That saves us going out to feed the fire in the weather we don't want to experience! Can't wait to throw coal into the mix as well. :)
Our home-owners insurance was hard enough to find for a log cabin. It was easier to keep insurance with an OWB, (X amount of feet away from the house), than one inside the house.

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 11:31 am
by windyhill4.2
We committed to keeping our heating dollars here in this country back in 1997 & have done so ever since.Miserable weather or not,we will stick to that commitment & some day put a coal boiler to work instead. We went with the owb because we have no basement in either house & did not want a burner in our gasoline power equipment repair shop as gasoline fumes & fire tend to go :blowup: A coal boiler will either go in a separate building for it or an isolated room on the shop.Either way no oil or propain,not even for backup . :nono:

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 1:37 pm
by Sting
windyhill4.2 wrote:Either way no oil or propain,not even for backup . :nono:
Maybe resistance boiler backup then :?: :D 8-) it depends - maybe you have more "friends" than me but when the kind folks at the emergency room invite you to stay and bleed with them a few days - well you will wish you had a back up plan. Then too - and we can have a long cumbersome debate on this one - but I will not play further ----> beyond stating some insurance carriers will not pay freeze/burst claims if your infrastructure does not have the proper "provisions'

Kind Regards
Sting

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 1:45 pm
by dcrane
gosh... Greg answered this incredibly well! GG

Freddy says: "(Like once a week maybe the corners won't come clear), some will shut it down & start over. Others never shut it down all season. They will get it going hot, don't add new coal yet, then from the top dig out half & clean the built up ash, then the next day do the other half. After cleaning half I don't think they rake it level, I think they just add new coal & the fire will migrate over. Just not sure...maybe they rake a thin bed of "hot" over to the clean half & then add?"

DCrane says: "If you have stove like the one Freddy describes... get a new stove made for hard coal because the one you have SUCKS" toothy

Re: Setting up an Outside Boiler to Burn Coal

Posted: Thu. Feb. 13, 2014 1:59 pm
by EarthWindandFire
Wood was a necessity for cooking and heating until about 1840 if you read the historical accounts. After that the railroads and the Lehigh canal allowed coal to be shipped anywhere, even my town in Connecticut started importing coal around that time. Coal is timeless, a great fuel for past, present and future use.