Never had a clinker

Thanks weatherguy, that's good to know. Growing up for years with a woodstove and having one in my own house I never had one so I didn't think it was a thing....

You're right about a customer not calling about it because the wood would still burn just as well, but I can see it inhibiting the amount of wood you could fit in there.

If I pulled one of those out I'd say WTF?

 

+1
If I hadn't seen them on forums I would think it was melted steel slag at first sight.

 

Ill get chunks of ash that stick together into something like a cookie. Only right in the core center of the fire where it's really hot. I can easily break them up and they are small compared to the overall firebox so no problem.

 

Wow thanks guys! I have never seen this first hand, ever. I'll have to keep an eye out. I'd love to make a mantle piece out of one lol

 

Clinkers do not form in wood stoves, and I do not believe they can form in pellet stoves either.

Clinkers are clumps of fused ash from burning coal and the reason they are called clinkers is because that is the noise they make when they rattle between the shaker grates of a coal stove. Well, as long as the shaker grates continue to shake, before they jam with the clinker that is stuck between them.

If an analysis is done on coal (anthracite or 'hard' coal- I do not know if bituminous coal even form clinkers or not) one of the pieces of information given is the fusing temperature of the ash from that particular coal. That temp. is important because if it is lower than the hottest temperature the coal is burned at, and it often is, the ash can fuse together and form very hard pieces of material that cannot be broken with a hammer. If they are large enough, they will not fit through the shaker grate of a coal burner, most likely cause the grates to jam and require the user get into the grates and pound the little fella' out however he / she can. And when it is red- to- white in the pit of the coal burner, that just ain't fun. That lump of fused ash is called a clinker and is basically the same thing that forms on top of steel during the Bessemer process, where it is called 'slag'. Very hard stuff.

It is not as much of a problem in a coal burning stove that would be used inside a house as they burn a bit cooler than larger, longer burning devices such as coal boilers or large coal furnaces. Those fellas can get quite hot in the 'pit' and form clinkers bigger than a human fist and a shaker grate simply will not break them up as they are so hard and strongly fused.

Wood ash does not have enough mineral in it to fuse and therefore will not form clinkers. Wood ash may combine into a lump but it is nothing even close to a clinker and as some posters have said, those lumps can be broken up with a bit of prodding. Corn burning stoves also form clinkers but again, not the hard, tough, true clinkers that coal produces.

Burning coal is really great but there is a learning curve. Clinkers are one facet of that curve, starting the fire is another facet (it usually seems to take wood burners about 5 tries to start their first coal fire 'cause there is no such thing as a 'moderate', 'slow', 'gentle' or 'low and slow' coal burning. Coal will happily light and begin burning only to go out as soon as the hardwood starter wood is consumed.

Brian

 

I'm sorry Brian but pellet stoves get clinkers all the time.

 

yeah, I've seen a few Quadrafires.... lol I hope you have the cast iron firepot, I had a customer poopy in his pants the other day when I told him he needed to upgrade because they don't make the ceramic ones anymore. The total charge will be just under a thousand bucks.... and very little of that is labor

 

And lets not forget about bark and all the crap that might go into it too, we don't always see what goes into them.. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of it comes from stump material etc. around here from uprooting beetle kill pine.

Clinkers are a pellet burners nemesis...

 

Hard to say Wildwest... I know I have more minerals in my water than any scientist could count. lol It's a good theory for sure though. I would ask a firewood guy around here but they mostly just know about cleaning chainsaw filters and such lol. I think it's very possible, I know our soil doesn't have nearly as many neat things in it as they have in PA etc. where you can grow almost anything by simply putting it in the ground and watching it get rained on.

 

When I first read about them, I thought maybe it was an EPA stove thing. I was burning an old Sierra.
Since then I've got 2 1/2 winters on the Keystone and still no clinkers. I suspect it has to do with the soil in the area.

 

You have yourself a nice woodstove fox, grats. Good decision