Better way to use an ashpan - don't rake so often!

[fire_man]

I've been using my ash pan wrong all these years (bought stove in 2012).
My usual routine is every time I reload, I scraped most of the ash with a rake thru the grates into the ash pan and just left heavy bright coals behind.
This worked fine, except the pan filled up every 3-4 days when burning 24/7.
The trick is to mostly stop using the raker! The coals burn down to a finer powder and tend to sift themselves thru the grate just by reloading. Now I just do a LIGHT raking every couple days instead of after every reload.
I was filling up the pan with bits of unburned coal and giving myself more work emptying the pan too often. Now I'm emptying it about half as often.
Jeez it only took me how many years

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Just let the ashes sit in the bottom until you can no longer fit the amount of wood you want in. It’ll keep reducing until it no longer can, then it’ll compress down into a surprisingly small amount! When you eventually do scoop it out you’ll be amazed how much fit in there! lol.

I’ve taken 6 gallons out of my NC30!

 

[fire_man]

I actually wore out the latching mechanism in the pan's door. It needs fiddling and extra care now to latch properly.

One thing you DON'T want is an ashpan door that is not latched properly.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Latch it and leave it! Just scoop the ash out as needed.

 

[Woody Stover]

I noticed this when I started burning the coals down further. I can still get a good amount of heat when I open up the air a bit on the coals at the end of a load. The bright coal radiate against the sides of the stove, releasing heat into the room. When I finally get to the point that I need to load to keep the stove burning without using kindling, the ash is reduced down to the fine powder you mentioned.
I know what you mean about the .
Many times I don't come up with the good ideas, I stumble upon them. 😏

 

[fire_man]

Latch it and leave it! Just scoop the ash out as needed.

The ashpan has cut WAY down on the dust in the room since I added it. That's why I refused to put a Fireview in the living room, too much dust.

Some say it's easy to scoop up ash without making dust. My poor draft says otherwise.

 

[Woody Stover]

Latch it and leave it! Just scoop the ash out as needed.

Not scooping; The grate is great! 😏

 

[Woody Stover]

Some say it's easy to scoop up ash without making dust. My poor draft says otherwise.

Yep, it takes good technique to slip the ashes off the shovel into the pan without creating much dust, but it helps to have good draft. When I had the Fireview, I tried not to remove ash unless it was cold out and the draft was pulling hard.

 

[Todd]

Here’s my Fireview ash pan. I scoop out the ash and gently let it slide off the shovel. The fly ash gets sucked back into the stove through the door by the draft.

 

[EbS-P]

I like my ash pan. The less I touch it the more dense it gets. I push it away from the door and the boost air.

 

[barnaclebob]

Good tips here. What did you have to file to get it to slide smoothly?
It's probably just the picture throwing me off but it looks like you barely have 7" clearance from the rear heat shield to the wall.

I actually wore out the latching mechanism in the pan's door. It needs fiddling and extra care now to latch properly.

One thing you DON'T want is an ashpan door that is not latched properly.

Ha. I opened my ash pan door for like 5 seconds once when the wood was already burning good on startup just to see what would happen. Holy crap, it was like tossing gas on the fire.

 

[begreen]

Our ashpan has been empty for 16 yrs now, except for an occasional bun warming.