Old Newmac help

[stovehugger7]

Hello I have a thirty something year old new Mac wood/coal/oil combo
Need help regulating wood part .its old enough I can't see writing on the slide damper above loading door and even trying to figure it out by trial and error has given no insight. I can't keep a coal bed because the coal grates are to large and it drops my ash leaving me nothing but a quick burn .should I put a damper on the pipe going to the chimney as of now I have a damper that flutters air flow but you can't really shut it down so I burn loads of wood . The box is large can fill it up however in the morning will only have a small amount of coals because they fall through. Help

 

[Fred61]

In the seventies, when the energy crisis started, a local heating outfit sold the Newmac to several uninformed customers in this area. There wasn't much to choose from back then and other than a few well designed European box stoves there wasn't much available for wood heat.
I had some experience with one of these units and concluded that it's best to take it out of service if you don't want to deforest your area. Not only that, after loading it up and touching it off you will get all the heat in that load of wood all at once.
One thing you could do is lay a 1/4 inch steel plate on the coal grates and do your burn in a good bed of ashes. Other than that I see no resolution to the problem.

 

[brenndatomu]

Get a box of cheapy firebrick at the local hardware or farm supply store, you can lay those out on the grate with a gap between for air flow, that will hold coals pretty well. I've seen people drill a bunch of holes in plate steel to lay in too, but the firebricks are better.
Like fred said though, that furnace is not known for its efficiency, which I'm sure you are well aware.
Use the search feature here, over the years there have been quite a few threads about improving the newmac

 

[stovehugger7]

Get a box of cheapy firebrick at the local hardware or farm supply store, you can lay those out on the grate with a gap between for air flow, that will hold coals pretty well. I've seen people drill a bunch of holes in plate steel to lay in too, but the firebricks are better.
Like fred said though, that furnace is not known for its efficiency, which I'm sure you are well aware.
Use the search feature here, over the years there have been quite a few threads about improving the newmac

 

[stovehugger7]

T
Thankyou that makes sense

 

[maple1]

You can also measure your chimney draft to make sure it's not pulling too much. Anything more than is needed will suck a lot of heat up the chimeny. A Dwyer Mark (crap I forget the model number right now) is cheap & you can leave it hooked up if you want.

 

[brenndatomu]

A Dwyer Mark (crap I forget the model number right now) is cheap & you can leave it hooked up if you want.

Dwyer Mark II model 25. Check the for sale forum, there is a good deal on 'em there right now https://www.hearth.com/talk/forums/classifieds-for-sale-wanted-etc.10/