Coal Stove?

[banana]

Does anyone here heat their house with a coal stove? We are thinking about getting one with the rise in oil prices. If anyone has one I would appreciate any info..........

[baronmom]

We use to, but we got rid of ours. I was tired of the mess. It was a lot cheaper to heat with coal. But, it does take work. You have to empty the ash pan a few times a day. The newer stoves are more efficient and maybe are not as much of a mess as the one we had.

[banana]

I was wondering if it was messy. Thanks! Guess I will be toughing it out this winter

[bandysmom]

Hi Banana,
We bought one this past fall, and saved a bunch. In October we bought 4 tons of coal and now there are 3 tons left. 4 ton cost $550 here last October. It will last us at least 3 years. The stove is an Alaska Stoker Stove. We empty the ashes 2x/day when it is very cold, otherwise we only need to empty them once.
Hope this helps.

[baronmom]

Wow, I can't believe that 4 tons of coal would last you that long. We would go through about 2-3 in one year. We also used the biggest size coal. I did love the heat we got from the stove, but after having the ash pan handle pop out of the pan and dump hot ash on my carpet and burn a bunch of holes in it, I am so glad not to have to worry about doing it anymore.
The dust was horrible too. Everything was coated in black dust. I use to clean the carpet after we were done for the year, and the water was black.
There are stoves out there that are very efficient and a lot less work. Just do your homework when you are looking for one. Good luck.

[banana]

Does the stove heat your whole house? If so what type of home do you have and where did you put it? I live in a ranch with a semi-finished basement. We have a fireplace in the living room upstairs. My son is asthmatic so that is another concern that I have.

bandysmom - Does the stove you have produce a lot of dust also?

baronmom- What do you use to heat your house now?

We are considering all of our options since I just got another letter from my oil co stating that prepay will be $2.50 a gallon. Last year we only used 537 gallons and that was for hot water also. I dont know if it would pay to get a stove or to upgrade our furance which is 27 years old. I was thinking we might get better efficiency with upgrading our furance. I also dont want to deal with a big mess that a stove would make or have the house extremely hot in one area and cold in another. Oh boy decisions, decisions!

[baronmom]

Our stove would heat our entire house. We have a split level. so the heat would go right upstairs. Some rooms were warmer than others though. When it was windy outside, it did not heat very well. We still had to run our heat pump to compensate. We have a fireplace mantel that had the coal stove inserted in it when we bought the house. We were going to go with a new stove, but we decided to go with a propane log set. We love it. Although it is more expensive, it is nice to be able to turn a fire on in the fireplace by the touch of a button. Plus it heats pretty good too. The heat tends to go up the stairs quicker than making the downstairs hot like the coal stove did. Our stove use to make it 90 in our house during the winter. I always was running around in shorts inside because we could not control the temperature of our stove. (some have that feature)
With a coal stove, you have to keep it going. Once it is lit, you should keep it going until you don't need it. Sometimes during the winter months, it would be 30 out or 50. On those 50 days, it was extremely hot in the house. If you go away often, you need to let it go out before you go away. That was a pain. Especially when we would come home and have to restart it up again.
If I was you, and I had the money to do it, I would up grade your furnace first. If you wanted to add something else to help your furnace out like a stove, then do it later. Price wise though, coal is the cheapest option. But you have to weigh out the work involved, and the mess. Do you really want to deal with it.

[banana]

Thanks for your opinion Traci. I appreciate it. I got a lot to think about.

[YankeeMom]

We have two coal burning fireplaces (circa 1882) that I'm trying to talk dh into using. They are in working order, it's just a matter of getting him on board. It took me a year to convince him to use the woodstove And even then I think it was more the heating bill that convinced him rather than me LOL.

Anyway, nothing to add other than I am also interested in this thread

[miss_thrifty]

never used coal, sm old fashioned 1900's wood burning stove years ago, too small always putting wood in it, the mess beacuse it was in kitchen, and the dust, ruined my curtains. The newer ones are usually the best.