Mixing Pea Coal with pellets

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Nov 15, 2018
21
NWNJ
Pretty sure I'll get slammed for asking this.....but
Hauled out my old Russo glass view stove and replaced it with a ComfortBilt HP22 and really happy with it. Have it in the basement with open ceiling vents to the 1st floor and 20" insulated flex pipe trunk line feeding the bedrooms and looks like it should be able to heat the entire 2500 sq/ft without using the oil furnace. Bought 6 tons of Stove Chow from Home-Depot@ $219/ton which also run great despite all the bad things I hear about them.

As for the coal question:
I have 4 bags of Pea coal I used in the Russo and decided to mix in about 1 lb coal per 40 lb bag of pellets and noticed a big difference in heat output. i was wondering if any long term problems doing this.

Thanks
Phil in North Jersey
 
will eventually be a pile of nothing but burning coal in the pot. coal burns hotter than pellets and will probably accelerate the demise of the floor of your burn pot. HP22 is a nice stove and coal will void the worranty.
 
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I got bored today and put a big piece of nut coal in our HP22 burn pot today. I had to leave and when I got back it was burned up so I don’t know how hot it burned. I think tomorrow I’ll put two pieces in it. We do everything we can to try and kill the stove but so far no luck.
 
i did it last winter with the quad. cast iron pot and had it glowing, I mixed pea coal about the same as Toasted.
 
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It got down to 18f last night and i got my coffee and went down to check the stove.
Noticed a lazy flame and the burn pot was 3/4 full and kinda crusted over like lava or a good top on a hot French onion soup.
Shut it down and grabbed the burn pot with pliers, cause I can't wait for the damn thing to cool, and emptied it out.
The coal had burned completely but the ash seems to be heavier that pellet ash and the blower didn't have enough power to suck it out of the pot and get it airborne, so it just laid on the bottom of the pot and restricted airflow. Ash was he usual dense crap you see with wood, not light and fluffy
Also saw shards of coal built up on the lower door frame, looks like some coal split and got airborne and settled on the gasket.

Put the pot back in and restarted, and got back to the usual hot flame and that blowtorch sound coming from the pot.

All in all, I'll stick to pellets only.

Thanks for the comments guys...
 
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yeah i forgot about the ash, that stuff was nasty