Wood vs Coal on a Multifuel Stove

Comparison of kiln dried logs versus smokeless solid fuel burnt on a multifuel stove by the Coal Merchants Federation

[roberthughes]

My multi fuel burner has been in 16 years. For the first 14 I had access to free wood so a no-brainer there. Now a bit older and collecting the wood is an effort, find the coal is slightly less than twice the cost of wood per ton but does give slightly more than twice the output so there is a benefit to the coal cost of maybe a 20% saving. There is also less storage space requirement but the wood pile did look good! For the Buddhists among you there is also less chance of accidentally putting insect critters in the stove with the coal. Don't laugh but several times I have had to make an emergency withdrawal of a log when I noticed spiders or woodlice running for their lives, poor little buggers. So coal can be more friendly to the wildlife.

[fiveminuteman]

Burning wood and wood briquettes for 4 years then switched to smokeless fuel this winter. Wish I switched 4 years back. So much less hassle than logs. Only prob I had with smokeless was a bag that was soaking wet.

[andy]

I miss my open fire in my old house years ago. Use to have the hottest fires in winter and use to be the chill out pad for parties. Man i miss that coal fire heat.

[Thomes-Maisling]

I've been burning Ecoal50 and even though it's one of the more expensive coal brands it still works out about half the price of when I was buying in seasoned logs.

[union]

The wood burner is being over fed. It is true however that coal has a higher calorific value.

[pa_maj.MARTINI-van-MAN]

My old smokeless glass front fire which was a Parkray was great. I lit it in late autumn and let it go out in early spring. I kept it lit 24 hours a day.
I cleaned the ashes out every morning, filled it up Good and when I seen the new coal start to glow I turned it down fully. It had a thermostatic controlled air intake on the bottom left hand side.


The control over this air intake was special indeed. When the fire cooled or warmed too much, it opened and closed to allow for a steady burn. It was also adjustable with a knob that had numbers marked on it, 1 to 5 or so, I can't remember exactly. The main door with the fire still glowing the following morning, could be left closed while riddling the grate and to remove the Ash.


It had a damper plate, I slid that forward to allow smoke to go straight up the chimney when I went to load it up with coal.
I stacked it with coal, turned it to as low as was possible after the new coals caught, and that was it until the following morning when I began the ritual all over again. Simple as that!.
I found that by keeping it lit twenty-four hours a day was more cost effective and kept the house warmer than letting it go out.


Now my gas heating system stays on twenty four hours a day, . Yes it has a thermostat,
It's easy, it's clean and It heats the whole house. I'm happy enough with my fond memories of that smokeless coal fire. I guess that will do 🙂

[martinfoster]

I use both. We live in a yurt camp in Mongolia. For a quick warm up we'll use seasoned wood ($130 per ton) but for an all night burn we use smokeless coal (correct term: semi-coke briquettes) in a coal burning boiler which feeds 5 radiators with anti-freeze. It burns 12-16 hours unattended. The firewood stoves need frequent attention and are a bit of a pain to deal with but get going quicker.

Overall semi-coke briquettes win for being far cheaper for us at $40 per ton vs $130 per ton and have 2x more energy by weight. So if you consider price per energy unit, smokeless coal is 10x cheaper for us. No contest.

Mongolia has loads of coal but not much wood.

[TheSoupdragon]

I have a multi fuel stove, I burn both smokeless ovals and logs, but never together. I've never burnt any stove as you did in this video. If it's logs I'm burning I lay the fire newspaper chopped wood, then a two small logs. Then when burned down I add three logs close the bottom vent top all way open. Once fire is caught I turn top vent to under half open.

For coal I lay newspaper, then chopped wood. Light it once it's burned down just red embers left I fill with coal and close door. Open bottom vent to Max and too vent to Max. Once fire is burning I close top vent bay three quarters, bottom vent about the same and just leave it. It's normally burning the next morning on coal. My multi fuel stove, is connected to an old Chimney that was clay flue lined from new. The stove was fitted directly to it by a fitter. I did not need a liner and to be honest it burns very well as is. The joy is the whole Chimney Brest is kept warm to the touch so even if the fire is out then an amount of heat is still there keeping the room warm...

[Draxindustries]

This is the future now gas and electricity prices have gone stupid.
We may be going back 100 years plus but wood Burner companies are going to see a big increase in demand..

[wmartin]

With my open fire I use a 50/50 mix wood and coal, so once the coal burning I just top up with a log of two

[robjones]

An unbiased look at coal brought to you by the coal merchants. Oh wait.

[amoryblaine]

coal lasts longer but I have never been able to get it as hot as wood. what am I doing wrong? air controls? any tips would be appreciated..hardly ever goes above 200-220..that too on a good day!

[jamesdaly]

I burn peat aka turf here in ireland it roughly costs 2.30euro a day whereas smokeless coal would cost me 9euro or more a day.i can get higher heat output from the turf as i dont have to spare it as i do with the coal.

[olliec]

Was watching this thinking it looks very biased. Then realised it's a promotional video by coal merchants.

[jrtUfhevz]

I'm thinking of getting a multi fuel stove to replace the open fire. However I still have a supply of house coal (I'm in UK). Can I use this on a multi fuel stove by itself, and then switch to smokeless? Or use it up, then get a multi fuel stove? I am not in a smoke control zone

[patrickcochrane]

what stove was used? looks like the perfect size for me

You can still enjoy a nice flame if you burn such approved smokeless fuels as Newheat, Newflame, Newburn, etc....

[JuiceBanger]

I never got a flame with these type of coals. Woods far better. And it can be slumbered too. This seems to be an advert for these coals

[arthurdaly]

Pure wood burning stoves burn wood far more efficiently than any multi-fuel stove though. This would have been a far fairer test if you'd used a proper wood burning stove on the left of the picture, and the multi-fuel on the right. As it is, it's not a fair comparison, because you used the same stove for both. You also can't do a fair comparison without doing some form of calorimetry. At most points in the video it looks like the wood is burning far more fiercely, which is what multi-fuel stoves do, because they aren't designed to burn wood slowly and steadily. I don't doubt that Coal lasts longer though, just not as much as suggested here

wood certainly takes much longer to grow and season than it does to make a smokeless fuel briquette. Yes wood is classed as sustainable and carbon neutral but only if a tree is planted in return for each one that is felled to make logs for fires. Also it takes many years for a tree to grow and after that the wood has to be seasoned and depending on the type of tree it could be anything from one to three years that it needs seasoned. Regarding the parts of the stove being damaged by the fuel, if the stove is maintained properly used correctly and the fuel is burnt correctly it should not damage the flue liner, baffles, firebricks or glass. These fuels are tested and approved by HETAS for use on multi fuel appliances.