How much coal do you go through in a season?

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levskipetrov

New Member
Sep 17, 2010
6
Northwest, PA
I imagine someone has already asked this question but I couldn't find the topic. I just bought a Alternate Heating Systems S130 ( http://www.alternateheatingsystems.com/CoalBurners.aspx ) to heat my >3000 sq ft (R-13 walls R-38 ceiling) home in Northwest PA using hydronic baseboard upstairs and raidiant in the joists downstairs. We always used wood in the past so coal is something new to us. Looking to see what tonage per year other people are using. I bought 3 tons of nut and am suspecting it will be enough. Thanks.
 
levskipetrov said:
I imagine someone has already asked this question but I couldn't find the topic. I just bought a Alternate Heating Systems S130 ( http://www.alternateheatingsystems.com/CoalBurners.aspx ) to heat my >3000 sq ft (R-13 walls R-38 ceiling) home in Northwest PA using hydronic baseboard upstairs and raidiant in the joists downstairs. We always used wood in the past so coal is something new to us. Looking to see what tonage per year other people are using. I bought 3 tons of nut and am suspecting it will be enough. Thanks.

That's about four cord or a dozen face-cord of firewood. Did you use more or less than this amount of wood?

Check out http://nepacrossroads.com/ for more coal-oriented topics.

To answer your question, we have been using about four ton for an 1800 sq ft somewhat drafty old house.

Cheers --ewd
 
Our old furnace was in bad shape and very inefficient, plus the wood we were getting was a mix of junk wood that was still very wet so we burned about 13 cords last year. The first year we burned wood we had good dry hardwood and got through with around half of that, then over the next two years I tore off all the siding, windows and boards, insulated with R-13 (there was nothing before that, just 1" foam behind the siding), installed new windows, tyvek and put the 1" foam back up. I also filled the attic with blown-in insulation on top of the R-11 fiberglass that was already there, so its about R-38 now.

The first year we owned the house, we heated with oil and went through about 1200 gallons. The old furnace was a forced air Duo-Matic which was a wood/coal/oil furnace with the oil burner in a seperate chamber behind the firebox. I suspect I will just have to wait and see how much I go through this year, its quite a switch from an old wood furnace using forced air, to a coal furnace using hot water.
 
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