Firing with Coal and Ash Pan question

[JonRiley56]

Howdy All,

I ran my boat on wood this year and had some issues maintaining a steady fire, most likely due to the fact that I am an idiot, however........I was musing over the fact that our brethren in the home country do a lot of firing with coal, while we in the colonies typically dont. I know the sad tale of our dearth of welsh steam coal and peat harvested in the shadow of stonehenge, but was wondering if I would get a more even fire if I added some coal to my wood fire. I was also intrested to see that her majesty's steam contingent use a small paper bag of matchlight charcoal to light their fires. Is anyone doing that, it looked very civilized.

My second question involves tha amount of ash that one should (or shouldnt) carry in the ash pan. When I fired up for the first time I was literally roasting the deck under my boiler despite my air space and Fred "borrowed" some ashes and coated the bottom of my ash pan. Since then I have fired it four times and hav yet to clean out the ashes. How much ash is appropriate to carry ? Will the boiler fire better with a larger air space under the grate ? (even with the ash in it i probably have 4 to 5 inches of space)

Any comments would be appreciated.

jon

[steamdon-jr]

A nice layer of ash is fine as long as it does not interfere with airflow to your grates. I had a similiar problem in our old boat and finally the floors started to really smolder and burned a nice 12" hole in them. we have since raised boiler 2 inches higher and placed a sheet of 1/4" stainless steel sheet at level boiler used to be and all is well. firing with wood is usually cheaper and will work just fine but you need to let it burn down and get a nice hot bed under your fresh pieces that are being added, the bed provides the heat and the new boards add more ember to the bed if you folow what I am saying. coal is great but also has a learning curve if you want to burn only coal, you need a good got fire to get coal started usually with wood.

[Lopez Mike]

Don't feel alone in having some difficulties getting your fire sorted out. It's still all boom and bust for me. I suspect because it is easy to have holes around the edges of the fire where cold air gets past.

I'm burning only soft woods like Douglas Fir and Pine and they don't seem to leave much of a layer of ash. I've stuffed about half a pickup load of wood into that fire door and still only have a rather thin layer of ash in the bottom. Haven't yet removed any.

I have no experience with good coal. The stuff around here seems to produce more clinker than the amount of coal put in. I think this coal is about one step up from peat or clay. And the clinker comes out in big hunks. If I give up wood it will be for oil. Maybe crank case drainings as Den does.

Mike

[Oilking]

I had an old friend that used to fire on the SP going south out of Portland, OR. He related the following: On getting ready for a run the engineer would give a 20" warning. The firemans job was to have full pressure up when the engineer opened the throttle without lifting safeties. He said that by pushing the fire forward, and add green coal, keeping it spread evenly over the top, it would keep the fire cooled down while building a bed of hot coals beneath. Then when the engineer was ready, with a rake, he would pull the fire back exposing a full bed of glowing coals providing the fire needed and making the engineer happy. This all worked if you had proper warning or if there wasn't an unexpected delay. If there's a point I guess it's that the heat comes from the glowing coals.

Happy Holidays as you watch the Yule Log burn!

David

[Lopez Mike]

I wonder of he fired for A. B. Clancy. He was not only a senior steam engineer on that section but built a beautiful 1-12 scale S.P. 4-4-2 Atlantic as well as many Stuart stationary engines.
Mike

[JonRiley56]

Thanks for the replies all !

I have a couple of follow up thoughts/questions;

1. My firebox is about 28 inches deep and 18 inches wide. I am running a roberts type boiler so the clearance above the grate is the most in the middle of the firebox. The cross members on my grate are removable and are about 1.5 inches apart. Smaller pieces fall through the grate so I dont typically end up with embers on the grate itself. I will have an active fire on the grate, with some glowing coals, but most of the coals will drop through when they get small enough. Should I put a steel mesh screen of some sort over my grate bars to keep the coals at grate Level ?

2. How do i accomplish "filling up" the grate. Do people use relatively small pieces of wood and try to spread them out more ? I can get a 18" piece of oak in the firebox, but you cant get too many of those in and you are bound to have spots on the grate with no fire.

3. I know experience is the best teacher, but how can I tell if my fire is not getting enought air, or conversely, getting too much.

thanks

jon

[Lopez Mike]

The gaps in your grate seem large. Mine are more like 1/2". By the time the burning bits are that small they are so light that the draft keeps them from falling down into the pan.

I have been cutting my wood fairly long for convenience in storage and handling but come Spring I'm going to start whacking it up smaller so that I can get better coverage. The long stuff covers the front and back but the sides, where I can't see well, tend to starve. My VFT boiler has a round grate.

Also, I have been a bug on keeping water consumption to a minimum as I steam mostly on salt water. I plan on carrying more makeup water so that I can add a steam blower at the bottom of my stack. That way I can work the engine harder when needed. Most of the time I can get by with natural draft but to sustain speeds of above 4 to 5 knots takes a lot of small stuff and a box crammed full. Even then I tend to loose ground.

I start dragging a big stern wave above five knots so I only need to go faster to deal with adverse tidal currents or another steamer showing off!

[Oilking]

I agree with Mike on the on the grate spacing. My old wood/coal kitchen stove has 1/2" grate openings, and the gates that I've see for steam donkies had what looked close to 1/2".

Mike,
I don't recall being provided with a name of any of the engineers, but It was clear that if the fireman did not succeed the engineer had names for him, many names x&!o?%* and so on.

David

[Lopez Mike]

I fired for my father on an oil burner (90 ton Shay) and my ears still got singed regularly. It was all too fine a line between economy, in the form of a clear stack, and having the fire blow out for a moment with an attendant blast of cold air on the flue sheet.
Mike

[JonRiley56]

I'll check the spacing on the grate, I may be hallucinating...........If I really do have too large an opening between them, what do I do about it ? Will regular wire mesh hold up ?

jon