HINTS ABOUT COAL.

Franklin Times, Volume 9, Issue 608, 15 February 1921, Page 2

HINTS ABOUT COAL.

HOW TO ECONOMISE. Women are now such keen household managers that they need no incentive to practice economy, but gladly welcome any information which will add to their saving knowledge and lessen the household bills and expenditure. Thus at home they have lately been putting on their thinking caps with renewed zeal, for the coal shortage has caused everyone to look ahead and to put into practice all ideas which tend to make one’s supply of black diamonds go as far as possible.

And coal shortages and difficulties are wide and world spread; hence the following hints on conserving coal, or using up every particle of dust, or treating coal with other constituents in order to make it go further will come at 'a most opportune moment, for to-day it is as much a matter of supply as of having the wherewithal to purchase fuel. To begin with, coal should always be properly covered and sheltered, never kept in the open, for otherwise it deteriorates rapidly in heating value. Careful experiments have proved that exposure in the open for six .months lessens the heating value of coal by 10 per cent.; in plain words, there is a loss equivalent to 2cwt in every ton, and this is a loss no householder can afford to sustain. The next thing is to get the fullest burning value out of your coal, and this is both a simple and easy matter.

Take about 5 or 6 ounces of common salt and mix this well with a sprinkling of ordinary soda. Then add about two or three pints of hot water, and well saturate about 2cwt of coal with this mixture. The result is that your coal, while giving out just as much heat as before, will burn out about twice as slowly, and at the slightest computation will effect a reasonable saving of some 30 to 40 per cent. One experiment with your Coal supply will suffice to prove the truth of this assertion.

Many people are apt to despise coal dust, but this is a great mistake, albeit coal merchants are prone to include what householders deem an inordinate quantity. Just do as has lately been suggested, and to each six shovelfuls of coal dust add six small handfuls of common salt mixed with water.

Now take any ordinary tin mould, such as children use to make sand bricks ; fill these and then turn out and allow about 12 hours for drying. You have then firm- cakes of fuel, which will burn well and brightly, and thus enable you to conserve every particle of coal dust.

Another excellent method with such dust or “slack” is to mix it with ordinary common clay, with just enough water added to make it plastic and pliable, and here again the most excellent results are forthcoming, for, moulded into the shape of squares or balls, they burn brightly with a pleasing glow, and give out a splendid heat.. Of course, this only applies to districts where common clay is obtainable.