Ashes to extend your coal time

[jpl1nh]

Today, and tomorrow are temporarily warm here in the Northeast, but I don't want to let my stove go out. I've realized that the deeper the ash the more likely I'll find good coals after a long time. So I can put in medium btu sized loads, damp down low, come back ten hours later, dig up some coals and repeat. I can keep the house at the temp I want and not get it too hot. I've got an ash bed close to three inches deep right now. As soon as it gets colder, I'll start getting it back down to the 1-2" range. Anyone else let their ashes build up when they really need to stretch out the time they still have coals?

 

[BrotherBart]

The way to do it is to move the coals to the center of the firebox and then cover them in ashes. Called banking the coals. The coals will last for a very long time and keep the stove nice and warm. You can moderate it with the primary air input.

That is what I do on the moderate days. Fire the crap out of it once in the morning and then cover the coals. Stove stays around 300 for at least five or six hours after that and there is a nice bed of coals to uncover and fire up again. In fact that is what I am going to do tonight since it isn't getting real cold.

 

[Corie]

Yeah, Girl-Corrie figured this technique out on accident this weekend. I wanted her to not load the stove in the morning, so I could pull the stove pipe down and seal some joints. She loaded it anyway, but then tried to smother the coals with ashes. Meanwhile, 12 hours later, the stove is still filled with hot coals and I'm pulling the stove pipe down with heat still coming out of the stovepipe.

 

[BrotherBart]

In the days of old that is how you kept the fireplace heating overnight. You smothered the coals and some fresh wood with the ashes and "banked the fire" for the night. Not a good idea except for when it is all in the coal stage. The old way would crap up a chimney in a heartbeat. Which was irrelevant if it was do it that way or freeze to death.

With all coals it works wonderfully. The old Sierra used to be nothing but 650 pounds of heat with a big stack of banked coals in it for the day. The 30-NCL is learning fast.

My dad's father heated the boys' bedroom by filling the bottom of a bucket with coals and topping it with ashes and sitting it on bricks in their room for the night. Which explains why dad always thought I was insane to heat with wood. He thought the thermostat was mankind's greatest invention.

 

[jpl1nh]

Perhaps its due to the soapstone but my coals are all mixed in with the ashes so if I try to round them up into a group to cover them with ashes, I think I actually reduce them. It seems to me that its better to let sleeping coals lie until you need them in my stove. I'll try the banking technique sometime though to see if it works better. Interesting to be "finding" the things life long wood burners have known all along.

 

[BrotherBart]

Perhaps its due to the soapstone but my coals are all mixed in with the ashes so if I try to round them up into a group to cover them with ashes, I think I actually reduce them. It seems to me that its better to let sleeping coals lie until you need them in my stove. I'll try the banking technique sometime though to see if it works better. Interesting to be "finding" the things life long wood burners have known all along.

It works best after an active fire with lots of coals. Not a thing to do with a dying little coal bed.

 

[JohnnyBravo]

i always do that when im camping, makes starting a breakfast fire a lot easier.

 

[Mike Wilson]

I love you and all... but do you have any vague idea how annoying that avatar is? :long:

No, really.

-- Mike

 

[EatenByLimestone]

With my little Century, if I left too much ash in there I would loose much of my fire box. I bank whenever I can, but mostly I leave the ash in the pedestal ash drawer and give the little steel stove some thermal mass. The mass does more for me than the limited banking I can do. This year, it's been so warm I really haven't accumulated any ash.

Matt

 

[johnsopi]

I love you and all... but do you have any vague idea how annoying that avatar is? :long:

I'll 2nd that.

 

[velvetfoot]

Yeah me too. But then again, my avatar is beginning to annoy me as well.

 

[MANIAC]

Yeah me too. But then again, my avatar is beginning to annoy me as well.

It been annoying me sine 1986.

 

[precaud]

The solution - go to your Control Panel and turn avatars off. That's what I did.

 

[thephotohound]

Now what fun is that?

 

[precaud]

I don't know what I'm not missing!

 

[moondoggy]

whats wrong with BBs avatar? the little guy stuffing the stove? i like it.

and thanks for the bedding coals tip.

 

[BrotherBart]

whats wrong with BBs avatar? the little guy stuffing the stove? i like it.

and thanks for the bedding coals tip.

Ah I put up an animated irritating one and forgot it was there. Somebody should have PM'ed me and said "Hey ya old fool. Get that thing outta my face!"