What coal dust ? I have far more dust from my pellet stove than I ever had from the coal stove I burned for over 30 years. Anthracite is not particularly dusty and at that you can dampen it. Soft coal is dusty, we don't burn that in our houses in the US. The ash ( not the pellet or coal dust, the solid fuel dust) in terms of messy is about equal texture, except the pellet ash floats more. No I find that filling the hopper on the pellet stove is dusty where shoveling coal into the coal stove was not. Pellet ash is on everything remotely near the stove . I never had that with the coal stove.
Yep, that's how they used to do it, with oil rather than water. Also, spraying the ash tray before carrying it through the house and removing it and emptying it BEFORE shaking down both eliminate the dust.
Yea, that's why it pays to empty the pan BEFORE you shake down so that there's no hot coals in there creating updrafts carrying the dust up. Also wetting them down with a mist sprayer helps. It's the little things that help, just like we've all learned of better ways to handle pellets and the stove > presifting (for some), leaf blower trick, cleaning hidden ash traps, etc. The old stories of coal are just that 'old and tired and outdated'. As alternativeheat said, the modern stoker stoves have taken all the time-consuming labor out of using coal as well as waste. They've also allowed a wide range of output temps.
That happens when you empty the ash pan indoors. You don't empty the ash pan indoors though do you ?. Take it outside. I always shook the ash down with the fill door closed and the damper fully open, never saw any dust in the house that way. You have to know how to handle coal stoves. I had more than 30 years experience with them. I'm telling you I have never seen so much dust as with pellets.
Sounds like either you were burning bituminous coal or you need some 'lessons' on how to handle coal.
Bit coal is a whole lot cheaper than anthracite, isn't it? But you found out why people don't like to burn it! Huge difference in cleanliness and heat value. I wish you would have said that on your first post about dirty coal because it gives anthracite a bad name where it is not deserved. You can take a piece of anthracite and rub it on your skin and it won't even get black.
Yes learned a lot there. I'm the coalnewbie on there. I wish I had easy access to anthracite I've heard great things about it. But bituminous is cheap here so I use a little here and there when it's really cold. I'd never want to give coal a bad name I work In the industry so coal helps feed my family.
Thats why my hopper is self feed. I only handle the ashes. I wet them down as soon as they leave the stoker ,so no dust there. You can also get a light oil spray on the coal to eliminates dust. Coal,oil and even wood can be dirty. Depends how you minimize contact with the fuel,and how you handle the ashes.
Anthracite varies some but not so much from a given mine. I imagine anyone crunching coal down to pea or rice size is using decent Coal.
If it's an indoor hopper you can lightly dampen the coal. I used to have 3 tons at a time delivered by chute into an old cold storage room in my basement. Just close off the doorway to the main basement. I shoveled coal from the pile into 5 gallon buckets for decades. Twice in all that time I got a batch that was a little dusty. I used to walk right on the coal and shovel it though otherwise. Then most recently I switched to bagged coal and kept it outside. Dumped the bags of coal into the same buckets. The place I mostly got the bagged coal from bagged there own from the outdoor bulk hopper. No dust, might be frozen and have to bang the bag on the ground to loosen it up but no dust. The outdoor bin was open to the weather.
