[mab]

seasoned sycamore burns ok not as good as ash but good enough.

good enough is what I wanted to hear  - wouldn't want to think my efforts to cut it up were wasted  .

Coal certainly is hot - I remember a couple of winters back I lit the fire when I got home from work, and once it was going, poured on half a bucket of coal. 2 hour later I poured on another half bucket and took the dog for her walk. When I got home I paused on entering the living room thinking: "what's that funny noise?"; then I realized - it was the sound of water boiling in the backboiler - had enough hot water for 3 REALLY hot baths that night. 

[deepinthewoods]

3 hot baths? how dirty were you??

[SallyintNorth]

Coal certainly is hot - I remember a couple of winters back I lit the fire when I got home from work, and once it was going, poured on half a bucket of coal. 2 hour later I poured on another half bucket and took the dog for her walk. When I got home I paused on entering the living room thinking: "what's that funny noise?"; then I realized - it was the sound of water boiling in the backboiler - had enough hot water for 3 REALLY hot baths that night. 

BH bought a tonne of coal 3 years ago and we're still using it.  We have a couple of shovels of coal ready on a really cold night, and use them (usually half a shovel at a time) to jazz the (wood) fire up. 

Half a bucket of coal would have us having to sit out in the yard to cool down!   

[Buffy the eggs layer]

Thanks everyone,


  what is the average price of coal per tonne?


Buffy

[tazbabe]

i pay £10 a bag, so £100 a ton.

we have an open fire, in the cold part of winter use about 2 bags a week plus logs. (its our only heat source and on constantly)

[SallyintNorth]

i pay £10 a bag, so £100 a ton.

A 100kg bag?  That's a very big bag.  More likely to be 20 or 25kg?  Our coalie delivers a tonne in 20 x 50kg sacks - but I can barely drag one of those 50kg bags.

Anyways, coal down here is way more than £200 / tonne now, so if your figures are right we'll be up directly! 

[Fergie]

Yes, retail coal is over £200 per ton, but I've just collected a trailer load direct from the local opencast for £85 per ton (plus 5% VAT).

The total gross weight on the weighbridge was 4.08 tons, of which 1.3 tons was the net weight of coal.  You need a substantial trailer to withstand a giant loader tipping coal direct into it, but the saving in cost is worth it.  Together with the wood, that's us set up for winter.

John

[SallyintNorth]

I am gobsmacked, John.  We have a trailer that we fetch up to 1.3T of cattle cake in (tipped in from a big loader), so I am certainly going to make enquiries about possible savings if we fetch our own either from our local merchant or, if I can locate one, our local mine.  Thanks for posting!   

[colliewoman]

i dont know the technical terms for output, but this is how ours works...
i live in a static caravan, early 80's (not much insulation).
i use pine off cuts (free in one ton bags for the collection ) i sort that into kindling and bigger bits.
this stuff burns hotter than nuclear i swear.
once the fire is burning well i use elm. there are so many dead elms that can be had for the asking round here, and they dont need to be stored.
i spent all last winter indoors in a bikini it was that hot 
a really good sized elm log or a scant shovel of coal and the burner closed down will tick over all night, then a good load of pine the next morning and we start again.
i cook everything and heat all my water of my little burner 

if you use elm wood, when you come to split it, use a proper splitting axe and turn your rounds upside down so you split with the growth direction not against it. it truly is a bugger to split otherwise

[SallyintNorth]

Yes, retail coal is over £200 per ton, but I've just collected a trailer load direct from the local opencast for £85 per ton (plus 5% VAT).

BH says I'm to find out where your opencast mine is and we may take a trip up.  Would you share details please?  (PM me if you don't want to publish on here.)

Thanks
Sally

[Fergie]

Hi Sally,

pm sent.

John

[mab]

3 hot baths? how dirty were you??

no comment 

£85 a ton!!

I don't suppose anyone knows of a coalmine anywhere near Suffolk? 

mab

[Buffy the eggs layer]

Hi guys,

    the coal would be cheaper than the wood around here. How do I find out where the local pits are for the Leeds / york/ hull area?


Buffy 

[Pheasant pharmer]

Hi Buffy

There is a great coal merchants in Maltongate, if you are interested I will try to get the name and tel no.  We don't use much coal now we have both fireplaces with multi-fuel stoves in, as we burn wood all the time. Luckily we have a licence to collect in Dalby forest as we live there.

With our two stoves we find that when they are closed down and in 'tick-over' the glass will blacken up. We then open them right up and burn on a high flame for a whilebto burn off the soot on the glass and this works really well.  When burning wood we only use the top vents on the one that has both top and bottom vents. Our other stove only has one vent so that keeps it simple!
We also never clean our ash box out as the wood ash creates a good bed that never seems to grow past a certain point. ( either that or my OH does it on the sly!!)

Hope that helps, let me know if you need details of the coal merchants in Maltongate.
 

[deepinthewoods]

the only problem with wood ash is it eventually corrodes the metal of the grate in the burner, so im told.