# Coal vs Wood



## neumsky (Oct 15, 2012)

Did any of you wood burners ever consider coal??? Or am I gonna get shot for asking this question lol?


----------



## clemsonfor (Oct 15, 2012)

cant put it in my stove. Plus its pretty pricy around here.


----------



## sebring (Oct 15, 2012)

coal is twice as much as c/s oak in my area ... I still tried coal, and wont buy anymore.. Some people like it. Coal companies are filing bankruptcy so the price probably will go up in the future.


----------



## gmule (Oct 15, 2012)

I have burned coal before. Puts off a lot of heat for a long time. It is expensive if you buy it by the 50# sack but cheap if you buy it buy the ton. The biggest thing I don't like about is that it stinks when it burns and the coal dust when you bring it in. You also need a stove that can handle burning  it. You need a shaker grate that is made out of cast iron.

When the weather monkeys are calling for extended sub -10 / -20 deg temps I will pick some up for the basement stove. I usually load 50# or so in the stove and then it is good to go for
12 - 15 hours.


----------



## fire_man (Oct 15, 2012)

Is there any such thing as a "Shoulder Season" coal fire? I'm guessing it would be hard to control the heat in warmer weather.


----------



## dafattkidd (Oct 15, 2012)

My father in law has a VC he burns coal in. He's had it for 30 years. Seems like it's its steadier heat and less work than wood.  For shoulder season he burns wood in it.


----------



## BrowningBAR (Oct 15, 2012)

I really considered it for at least one of the stove locations (which is now occupied by the 30). I liked the burn times that were offered and coal is pretty cheap in my area. Cheaper than wood, if I recall.

But, I could never figure out if the problems and dislikes that were mentioned for coal would apply to me. I knew the good and bad from wood and I was okay with that. But, I didn't want to introduce a new set of pros and cons that may have made me regret my purchase. And by the time I got to the point of choosing, I really didn't want to have regrets and force myself to end up buying a *seventh* stove.

If I would have tried coal, it would have been a modern VC Vigilant due to the size and style of the stove. I find a lot of coal stoves to be odd looking.


----------



## Dunragit (Oct 15, 2012)

looked into it, availability may become a problem in OK(Oklahoma is talking about ending subsidies), bit coal seems to be very expensive for what it is

$120 a ton for bit at the mine, you pick it up, Oologah was the closest mine to me


----------



## BrowningBAR (Oct 15, 2012)

Dunragit said:


> looked into it, availability may become a problem in OK(Oklahoma is talking about ending subsidies), bit coal seems to be very expensive for what it is
> 
> $120 a ton for bit at the mine, you pick it up, Oologah was the closest mine to me


 
1 ton of coal is 2-3 cord of wood, if I remember correctly. Obviously it would depend upon the type of wood.

So, that would $40-$60 a cord. Which is pretty damn cheap.


----------



## KaptJaq (Oct 15, 2012)

Since my wood is free (except for my labor) coal costs more to burn. That said, if you get a good quality hard coal (anthracite) it is clean burning and long lasting. 50 pounds of coal will give me a hot 15 to 18 hour burn. Coal has about 12,500btu per pound. Low sulfur coal has little or no odor.

A ton of coal around here (LI, NY) goes for about $300 and is 25 million BTUs. A full cord of hardwoods delivered is about $250 and has about, depending on wood mix, 22.5 million BTUs.

If you are not gentle handling coal there can be a problem with coal dust. If you dealer does a good wash before delivery it is not too bad. I find it about the same as wood ash dust when I am not careful emptying the wood stove.

For me wood is cheap to burn and coal is a very easy burn. I burn the coal stove when the daily highs are expected to be below freezing or to keep the house warm for a weekend that I am away. If I load my stove completely I can easily get 36 hour low burns, enough to keep the oil boiler off for a weekend.

Either coal or wood are radically cheaper than oil.

KaptJaq


----------



## neumsky (Oct 15, 2012)

So...a coal stove is a special design than? Some of you can burn both?


----------



## Pallet Pete (Oct 15, 2012)

We looked at a few real nice coal stoves and decided that coal was not as reliable as wood price wise. The cost may have been low at the time but it varies to much for my comfort. 

Pete


----------



## geoxman (Oct 15, 2012)

bit around here can be had for under $100 a ton. I can burn both in my stoves an do....coal is easy and hot when in a pinch, I like the work out of wood though
*So...a coal stove is a special design than*

Air underneath the fire. good luck


----------



## Backwoods Savage (Oct 15, 2012)

I think the last time we burned coal was around 50 years ago. Don't remember for sure but seem it sold around $12 per ton then.


----------



## Prof (Oct 15, 2012)

I used coal for about 5 yrs. It was a bit expensive compared to wood. Wasn't crazy about the amount of ash and soot. Plus wood is much better for the environment.

btw--I never had a problem in the shoulder season. I could shut the stove down and not worry about the slow and low coal fire,


----------



## neumsky (Oct 15, 2012)

When I look at most or all of the stoves that ya'll own...it seems as tho there all woodburning only...or whats different on yours that you can burn coal? I guess what I'm asking is is I can't burn coal in my Oslo...can I?


----------



## BrowningBAR (Oct 15, 2012)

neumsky said:


> When I look at most or all of the stoves that ya'll own...it seems as tho there all woodburning only...or whats different on yours that you can burn coal? I guess what I'm asking is is I can't burn coal in my Oslo...can I?


Multi-fuel stoves are numerous. KaptJaq actually has a coal stove as a second stove. The old Vigilant I used to own was able to burn both. But required some internal additions to use coal properly.


----------



## FyreBug (Oct 15, 2012)

I cover PA & OH big coal areas and many of our dealers sell them. The advantage is if you live there the cost of coal (anthracite not the soft dirty kind) is relatively cheap. Also coal has more BTU per pound than any biomass.

However, a coal stove is power vented (vs naturally drafted) therefore noisier. Not a nice flame (ie. not romantic look) and my dealers tell me more work and ashes than wood & pellets which means you will have to clean the stove every day. Also likely more ashes & coal dust in the house. It has a special burn pot and feed mechanism. It's a fairly inexpensive appliance and boilers are quite common. However, you would not want them in your living room as they are typically quite bulky and ugly looking things. They also burn surprisingly quite clean - emission wise (again anthracite).

So the main advantages is cost of heating, cost of appliance and fuel availability.


----------



## billb3 (Oct 15, 2012)

My parents and grandparents had  coal boilers in their basements and  coal stoves in the barns. There was a HUGE mountain of coal ash in the back yard . Almost nothing ever grew on it. There's still huge black chunks of coal all over .


----------



## FanMan (Oct 15, 2012)

FyreBug, not all coal stoves are power vented.  Mine certainly isn't.

In my cabin, I have a wood stove in the living room and a coal stove in the bedroom.  The wood stove (not a good one) burns for a few hours, while the coal stove (a simple 1920s "cylinder stove", not bulky at all) burns all night long.  This actually works out well... when I arrive on a cold evening, I light both.  The wood stove heats the living room quickly while the coal stove takes an hour or so to get going.  By the time I'm ready for bed, the bedroom and kitchen (adjacent to the bedroom) are nice and warm and I let the wood stove go out.  In the morning, I relight the wood stove and have my first cup of coffee in the still warm bedroom.

I can also light a small fire of wood chunks in the coal stove to take the chill off without stoking it for an all night burn.  You can burn wood in a coal stove (that's how you start it), but you can't burn coal in a wood stove unless it's designed for both fuels.  A coal stove needs a shaker grate at the bottom and a secondary air inlet on the top.  On mine, the secondary air is the loading door, with a notch that holds it slightly open.

Coal ash is bulkier than wood ash.  It needs to be shoveled out frequently.  I'm using it to fill in rough spots on the trail behind the cabin as it packs down and binds together nicely with a few rainstorms.

I rather like the soft blue flames visible through the mica windows of the coal stove.

A 50# bag of coal (about $8 here) lasts for a weekend.


----------



## KaptJaq (Oct 15, 2012)

My Godin is designed for both wood and coal but works best with coal. With wood it gets 4 to 6 hour burns, coal can get 36 hour burns. It is a radiant, gravity fed stove with no motors or fans. Yes it has coal grates and shakers but those are used for wood also. I use wood for a quick warm up and coal for extended burns. No, I wouldn't want it in the living room. I am very happy with it downstairs, in the family room, near the garage door. I usually empty the ash once a day but have let it go for a few days when I get lazy. The better the coal the less ash there is. I have posted picture before but here it is again:





Many new coal stoves and boilers have auger feeds and fans but not all. Mine is quiet heat. There are new radiant/gravity feed coal stoves available as well as many classic parlor stoves and base burners on ebay or craigslist. They are old fashioned radiant stoves. www.nepacrossroads.com is the best place for coal information.

KaptJaq


----------



## Dunragit (Oct 16, 2012)

BrowningBAR said:


> 1 ton of coal is 2-3 cord of wood, if I remember correctly. Obviously it would depend upon the type of wood.
> 
> So, that would $40-$60 a cord. Which is pretty damn cheap.


 I live too far from the mine, it would not be worth the cost of transportation and I have been getting my wood for free lately


----------



## corey21 (Oct 16, 2012)

Before i started burning wood i burned coal the heat was much more even.


----------



## fishingpol (Oct 16, 2012)

neumsky said:


> When I look at most or all of the stoves that ya'll own...it seems as tho there all woodburning only...or whats different on yours that you can burn coal? I guess what I'm asking is is I can't burn coal in my Oslo...can I?


 
It does not appear to be so. The F-100 appears that it can burn coal. (Section 8, page 23-24, under English instructions)

http://www.jotul.com/FileArchive/Technical Documentation/Wood Stoves/Jøtul F 100/Usermanual_P04_060510.pdf

In the exploded view for it, it shows the coal grate and rod to acuate a gate to let air in at the bottom of the stove. The fire box floor is removed, ash pan put in and coal grate above it. It seems the coal grate may have to be removed to empty the pan.

The Oslo has an ash pan with a door on the bottom, different that the F-100. The Jotul UK site may have more info, plus so many different contemporary stoves to look at.


----------



## Billybonfire (Oct 16, 2012)

Most stoves here in the UK are multifuel, they have a grate on which to burn coal and have bottom air feeds for underfire air when burning coal, household coal is not recommended, smokeless fuels or anthracite is supposed to be used on them.
This underfire air supply is closed off when burning wood, on some of the stoves (like mine) you can remove the grate if you want to burn wood only, I have tried running the stove both ways and as I only burn wood prefer the grate out as the firebox is bigger.


----------



## theonlyzarathu (Oct 16, 2012)

You can't burn coal in most moden wood stoves since they have a bottom-back-sides unsulating firebrick buring box. You simply must have grates with the air coming up from the bottom. You need a lot of air for a a coal burn. I used to burn coal in my Riteway 37 in the early years, and in the later years only if I ran out of wood. It does produce sulfuric acid in the creosote, so I stopped burning it because it corroded the steel parts of my stove, and caused my exterior staniless steel stove pipe to "rot" out. In the long run, its much more expensive due to the extreme heat of the coals and the culfuric acid produced by Anthracite coal. Additionally, the coal dust coats everything, and you will have to repaint your walls every four years or so.


----------



## neumsky (Oct 16, 2012)

Dunragit said:


> looked into it, availability may become a problem in OK(Oklahoma is talking about ending subsidies), bit coal seems to be very expensive for what it is
> 
> $120 a ton for bit at the mine, you pick it up, Oologah was the closest mine to me


 
Hello from OKC. It's fire time!


----------



## Jack768 (Oct 16, 2012)

We burned coal growing up -- my dad still does -- and there was never any need to repaint walls etc.  Very even heat, long burns, will easily stay lit and throw heat throughout the workday.  Coal stoves will burn wood but are not ideal for that purpose -- no secondary wood combustion system and they can be hard to control when fully loaded w/ wood because of the coal-optimized secondary air inlets high in the firebox.  We had a Coalbrookdale Darby, which uses gaps between the window glass pieces for secondary air, and you just cannot load that thing up the way you could a modern woodstove.


----------



## theonlyzarathu (Oct 16, 2012)

Jack768 said:


> We burned coal growing up -- my dad still does -- and there was never any need to repaint walls etc. Very even heat, long burns, will easily stay lit and throw heat throughout the workday. Coal stoves will burn wood but are not ideal for that purpose -- no secondary wood combustion system and they can be hard to control when fully loaded w/ wood because of the coal-optimized secondary air inlets high in the firebox. We had a Coalbrookdale Darby, which uses gaps between the window glass pieces for secondary air, and you just cannot load that thing up the way you could a modern woodstove.


 
That is exactly the case with my old Riteway 37.  It was most a coal heater that also burned wood.  If you filled it up with wood, even though it was an airtight, it could be very difficult to control.  Filling the 6 cu ft firebox with wood would lead to bad back puffing, a stove that would heat up too fast for the thermostatic control to close down the draft, and then a stove pipe that would glow cherry red.  Of course, it did none of those things when you burned coal.  But getting the coal started could be a bear!  it actually took me a whole burning season before I figured out how to get it to burn coal.


----------



## firefighterjake (Oct 16, 2012)

From the Jotul Oslo Manual . . .

Operations 5.0

DO NOT BURN 
*COAL* * TREATED OR PAINTED WOOD
* GARBAGE * CHEMICAL CHIMNEY CLEANERS
* CARDBOARD * COLORED PAPER
* SOLVENTS * ANY SYNTHETIC FUEL OR LOGS


----------



## firefighterjake (Oct 16, 2012)

As for coal vs. wood . . . there was never a debate on this . . . I had free access to wood, but no free access to a coal mine. Therefore I went with a wood burning stove.


----------



## dafattkidd (Oct 16, 2012)

I love the idea of the steady heat of the coal, but I'm a pyro and always have been. There's just not as much romance in coal heat as there is in a wood fire.


----------



## neumsky (Oct 16, 2012)

KaptJaq said:


> My Godin is designed for both wood and coal but works best with coal. With wood it gets 4 to 6 hour burns, coal can get 36 hour burns. It is a radiant, gravity fed stove with no motors or fans. Yes it has coal grates and shakers but those are used for wood also. I use wood for a quick warm up and coal for extended burns. No, I wouldn't want it in the living room. I am very happy with it downstairs, in the family room, near the garage door. I usually empty the ash once a day but have let it go for a few days when I get lazy. The better the coal the less ash there is. I have posted picture before but here it is again:
> 
> View attachment 77492
> 
> ...


 
I wonder if a guy/gal... could use lump charcoal in this. Cool pic btw.


----------



## KaptJaq (Oct 16, 2012)

neumsky said:


> I wonder if a guy/gal... could use lump charcoal in this. Cool pic btw.


 
You could use lump charcoal in most natural aspiration gravity feed coal stoves if the hopper could handle it.  It would burn hot, be expensive, and have limited burn times.

KaptJaq


----------



## woodchip (Oct 16, 2012)

Our stove will take coal as it's got a grate and optional air inlets below the grate. I burned some coal last year as an experiment as I do have a load of coal left from the days when we had coal fires regularly. I'm not mad about burning coal from an environmental viewpoint, and the ash is a no-no on the garden, but it does burn very long and hot (best long burn in our stove is about 8 hours on a load of oak, but over 24 hours on a load of coal). The stash of coal we have is useful as a reserve, but I probably wouldn't rush  out any buy any nowadays, it's about £350 - £400 per ton. If I want the smell of coal, I can go out and sniff the air any time a steam engine goes past on the preserved railway I volunteer on..........


----------



## Wood Duck (Oct 16, 2012)

I had a coal stoker stove that was removed to put in the wood stove. My house and yard are not set up right to allow easy delivery of coal, so I have to carry it by hand in 50# bags. Purchased in bags it was about the price of electric heat as I recall.

I like the process of finding, cutting, and burning wood so switching to wood was an easy decision for me. Here in my neighborhood there are a surprising number of newer homes with coal burners as the primary heat. If the house has a convenient way for a truck to deliver coal to a storage bin I don't get the impression that coal is a lot of work, but it does require more or less daily loading of the stove and unloading of ash.


----------



## tfdchief (Oct 16, 2012)

The place where I bought my Hampton, S & S Heating is a small Amish run business.  He has a shop and showroom.  It is located on his farm.  They have no electricity and heat the shop/showroom with one of the display stoves, it burns coal.


----------



## Dunragit (Oct 16, 2012)

neumsky said:


> Hello from OKC. It's fire time!


 
Hi from Miami

It's 80 degrees here today


----------



## neumsky (Oct 17, 2012)

Starting to sound like it's not worth it...so I'm getting the idea that's the reason ya'll don't have em. You'd probably have a hard time selling your house afterwards due to the smell?


----------



## simple.serf (Oct 17, 2012)

I've burnt both Bituminous and Anthracite in a hand stoked steam power boiler before. Under heavy steam load, it was nicer because you didn't have to stoke constantly (as with wood). Problem is that it is more expensive (wood was free), and we didn't feel comfortable pushing a 90 year old boiler that hard anymore.


----------



## Jack768 (Oct 17, 2012)

Coal can be great as a sort of a base load heat producer.  It'll burn 24/7 with much less intervention than wood and easily stay burning and producing heat all day when you're at work.  In my childhood wood stoves would go out and be relit as circumstances required; a coal fire was on 24/7 November to April.


----------



## begreen (Oct 17, 2012)

neumsky said:


> Did any of you wood burners ever consider coal??? Or am I gonna get shot for asking this question lol?


 
Nah, we hang coal burners here.


----------



## pen (Oct 17, 2012)

neumsky said:


> Starting to sound like it's not worth it...so I'm getting the idea that's the reason ya'll don't have em


 
If you asked the question on www.nepacrossroads.com, you'll have a different picture presented to you

pen


----------



## KaptJaq (Oct 17, 2012)

neumsky said:


> You'd probably have a hard time selling your house afterwards due to the smell?


 
With clean/low sulfur coal there is little or no smell. As with any stove, wood or coal, if it is properly installed the only place you will smell it is outside & down wind.

You've gotten the wood burners opinion here. As Pen said:


pen said:


> If you asked the question on www.nepacrossroads.com, you'll have a different picture presented to you


 
Go ask the same question to the coal burners...

KaptJaq


----------



## SmokeyCity (Oct 18, 2012)

I have a Hitzer coal stove and I burn coal when the situation calls for a long continuous burn.
The wood stove is for situations where I know Ill only be in the room a few hours or more and I just want to heat that space for a short period.

Since I get coal for $170 ton and its deep mined Anthracite - it is a very effective and economical way to heat during the hawk of winter.
Not so good in the shoulder season.


----------



## SmokeyCity (Oct 18, 2012)

neumsky said:


> So...a coal stove is a special design than? Some of you can burn both?


 
It is very difficult to design a stove that burns both optimally. Wood needs a LOT more air than coal. Coal has to get its air from underneath, while wood can burn from the top.

Nearly any coal stove will burn wood (although usually sub optimally - no baffle etc) but most wood stoves will not burn coal even close to right.

If you do burn wood in a coal stove there is no secondary burn mechanism (unless its a bit burner but that 2ndary burn mechanism is not really right for wood) and you need to run it on "high" or you will get a smoke dragon effect.


----------



## jjs777_fzr (Oct 18, 2012)

Yall aint hanging me.
I own both wood and coal stoves.   I've swapped them from time to time as I like going back and forth for a change of scenery.
The romance/ambiance factor goes to wood.
The ability to throw consistent heat for a long period of time I'd say goes to coal.
Under the right conditions - coal can and will knock your socks off.  When I have the chubby or penn stove going - and kicking it in full gear - I'm convinced aint no wood stove gonna even come close - looking at the coal lit up is like staring at the Sun with equal heat output.
There's some that like the smell of diesel in the a.m. - as do those that like burning coal.
I think someone mentioned creosote ?   No such thing with coal - thats a safety advantage.
I really like scrounging for free wood - and enjoy the C/S/S piece of the wood idea.
If I had to buy wood or buy coal - coal is going to get the nod.
In some of the books I've read - here's one excerpt paraphrased --->
"In the old days - there was a reason folks PAID for coal when wood was free."
In my 30 year old Chubby stove I can go 18 hours on a single load.   And at that 18hr mark its still >280F.  Its just that coal is able to produce a long slow burn in some stoves where I start out at 500F and cruise at 300-350F for the remainder of the burn.
The only drawback I experience is the amount of ash - more than wood thats for sure.
My comments above are of course for burning hard coal - anthracite.
Not the soft coal - like that seen billowing out of a old steam locomotive.
Theres no visible smoke out of my stack when the coal stove is hooked up and going.


----------



## Jack22 (Oct 18, 2012)

neumsky said:


> Did any of you wood burners ever consider coal??? Or am I gonna get shot for asking this question lol?


If you want to learn about burning coal check out this website:http://nepacrossroads.com/  Allot of people on that site switched to coal from wood and love it as apposed to hearth.com where the majority burn and favor wood. There are ups and downs to either side.


----------



## PA Fire Bug (Oct 19, 2012)

We burned coal in a Harman TLC 2000 for four years in our old house because I didn't have a wood supply. That stove threw some serious heat. When we moved, we installed a Vermont Castings coal (only) stove in our basement. We were not able to keep a hot fire burning with the stove damper closed. It could really heat up with the damper open but I didn't like the idea of so much heat going straight up the chimney. When we grew tired of having a cold living room (ground floor, opposite end of house from basement coal stove) despite basement temperatures over 80 degrees, we put a Pacific Energy Super 27 wood stove in our living room. After one winter of wood heat, we sold the coal stove (in one day on craigslist to a guy in the neighboring town) and put another Super 27 in the basement. We were paying about $200 a ton for hard coal and burning about 3 ton per year with was still much less than we we would've paid for oil in our 1979 Riteway boiler furnace. We grew tired of the dust and black film in the house and didn't like the smell of coal. Getting rid the ash wasn't a problem. I dumped it along the road for six years. The truck and tractor traffic from the neighboring farms packed it down. We are very happy with our wood stoves and have no problems having enough hot coals in the morning or after work to fire up the stove without restarting. After paying for two tri-axel loads of wood ($550 each) to get started, I have found enough wood from friends and neighbors that I will not have to buy wood for several years. I don't mind the work involved with cutting, splitting and stacking wood, at least for now, and enjoy keeping our home as warm as we want without burning a drop of foreign oil (other than gas an oil for my chainsaw). The wood stoves are much better in the fall and spring when we only want heat for part of the day but coal will burn hot for a very long time.


----------



## suprz (Oct 20, 2012)

The first house i owned had a VC Vigilant and it was set up with the hopper for burning coal, and the previous owner actually left me 200lbs of coal, so i,burned that till it was gone and set the stove up to burn wood   I liked the simplicity of,coal,  sort of set it and forget it.


----------



## n3pro (Oct 20, 2012)

I thought about it but I never seen "free coal" ads and at work we get tree damage sometimes with storms and often thought about using it instead of just tossing it.  We used to just throw it in the dumpsters; then I got introduced to wood heat and then my view on tree damage went from frustration to excitement.  My one friend heated with it for five years until last year when he switched to pellet.  He would get two tons and noticed a big difference in the coal.  Some of the loads burned great, others terrible.  He tried two different suppliers with the same result.  Being not too far from the coal region I'm surprised they are not more that I know of.  I like the heat but I really did fall in love with the flames with wood, and the smell.  As with most things, there are pros and cons which differ from place to place, person to person.


----------



## corey21 (Oct 21, 2012)

The main reason i no longer burn coal is the smell and the ash.

Also wood is much cheaper for me.


----------



## laynes69 (Oct 21, 2012)

Our old woodfurnace was a wood/coal furnace. I decided to try a half ton of lump soft Ohio coal (mistake) for 90 a ton and we tried some anthracite nut coal which was 280 a ton from the Amish. Even though our furnace said coal, the firebox wasnt the right shape which was a v shaped. I tried over and over again to burn the stuff and finally gave up. The Ohio coal was very sooty, oily, dirty coal that could soot a pipe in no time. The neighbor burned stoker coal (bit coal) from Ohio and it ate his insulated stainless chimney out. I thought is was a good idea to try, but for us was expensive and we have access to wood so that was the route we went. There's a local stove shop here where the amish build coal stoves, they work well but the coal is expensive.


----------



## neumsky (Oct 25, 2012)

Thanx all...very enlightening as always.


----------



## jharkin (Oct 25, 2012)

When I was a kid my dad put both wood and coal stoves into the house (this was around 79~81, after the oil shocks).  We had a first generation VC Resolute in the living room and a small coal stoker (basically a steel cylinder with shaker grate and 2 doors) in the basement. I remember lighting that coal stove, my dad would cut splits in half on his table saw so they would fit in the coal stove to get the initial fire going before adding coal. The stove was very easy going, once the fire was established you just shook the grates and added a couple shovel fulls of coal once a day then just regulated the fire with the air control in the lower door.  Nice even comfortable heat. Never had issues with making a mess of the paint, but coal dust and the ash was a big mess.

We had the coal conversion kit for the encore but never used it.

Today my Dad _still_ burns that '79 resolute on wood, and I burn wood as well.  I never considered going back to coal, mostly due to environmental concern and just enjoying all aspects of wood (cutting, watching the fire etc).


----------



## razerface (Jan 15, 2014)

when i was small,,,50+ years ago, we burnt coal in a potbelly smokin,puffin, angry old stove that stood 4-5 ft tall. It set on a piece of brown colored thin sheet metal. It was our only heat until 1973. It was my job to keep it fed, and empty the ashes,,,which was fine with me since i didn't want to do dishes.

I could make the pipes turn red whenever I wanted ,, my family left it alone,, 5 sisters and a big brother. I started 3 wall fires before I was 7 years old. Codes? yea, right.

I became a master at running that potbelly. We had see thru cracks in the floor, and zero insulation anywhere, but I could still run you out of the living room whenever i pleased,, and did so on a couple occasions when we had company I disliked. I got a whippin for that when Dad figured out it was on purpose.

It was controlled by 2 different "triangle wheels" I called them, with an air slider in the ash door. That baby would cook! I could make it last all day while we were at school, then flip those wheels open and it would roar! Shoveled ashes every day. My Dad always kept ashes in his car during the winter for when he got stuck in the snow. The ashes, I carried to the railroad tracks and spread them out.

Our wall was black with soot behind the stove from it puffing back into the room.  A truck would show up and dump a huge pile of coal out back,,I would bring it in to the stove in 5 gal buckets. I hated when we got towards the bottom of the pile, and Dad refused to buy more till I burnt up more of the dust.

I never want to burn coal again.


----------



## begreen (Jan 15, 2014)

1.5 yr old thread.


----------

