Old Treacle tins and fuel saving- bizarre but true

[indy]

Just wanted to share this little titbit that I have discovered, I am a real magpie for old cookbooks and in the back of one that I recently rummaged for (published in 1933) it has fuel ecomony tips. It suggests that you can put old treacle tins, custard tins and the suchlike on coal fires and rayburns. It says that as long as they are not pierced by the poker they will glow red hot and burn for 4-5 days, thus saving on coal. I have been doing this out of interest for 2 weeks now and I think it does work, they give off a lot of heat. I have been using old black treacle tins, golden syrup tins and birds custard tins on my rayburn (tops off for obvious reasons)

[Milims]

When I had a coal fire I often put empty drink tins on it - they butned hot and well - so I guess it's the same sort of thing

[old tree man]

what great ideas, i do love the old ways you usually find that they are the best ways of doing things that are tried and tested.

[Thomzo]

Wow, I never realised that you could burn tins. I wonder which is better for the environment, burning or recycling?

Zoe

[spitfire]

old used bricks are great as well, just place them around the inside of your fireplace. they dont "glow red" but they heat up and hold their heat for a long while. you use less coal as a result of the bricks taking up space in your fireplace but get the same amount of heat

[spitfire]

clay flower pots work great on the stove top/rayburn, just turn them upside down, they hold their heat and can be make to look pretty as well

[indy]

I sort of thought I was still recycling and being environmentally friendly by not using so much coal, the chimney certainly does not appear to smoke so much and I'm still warm, will try the brinks in my front room open fire- thanks for the tip

[The Riff-Raff Element]

Metals can be burnt. It's not easy, but on a coal fire (which burns very hot it must be remembered) steel and aluminium cans should gradually burn away. The products are inert metal oxides which are not going to present any hazard. Just my view, but it sounds like a fabulous idea. A calorie saved is a calorie earned and all that.

[Annpan]

Do you think it would be good on a wood fire? Mine gets beyond 400ºF.... though I wonder if the ash (which I put in my compost) would be a bad thing?

[frozenthunderbolt]

Do you think it would be good on a wood fire? Mine gets beyond 400ºF.... though I wonder if the ash (which I put in my compost) would be a bad thing?

if the tins were actualy tin or aluminium then i would be cautious - heavy metals being less than good and stannic (tin) compounds actively poisonous, but i rather suspect that many 'tins' are now cheap steel coated in something - i would need someone else to confirm this though

[mamos]

I'm intrigued by this idea

If the lids are off why does it matter if they are pierced by the poker or not?

mamos

[indy]

I have no idea why it says about not being pierced by the poker, am guess is just to hold the heat and their shape for longer, is just what it says in the book am thinking the longer they hold their shape the more space they use meaning less coal

[indy]

I have no idea why it says about not being pierced by the poker, am guess is just to hold the heat and their shape for longer, is just what it says in the book am thinking the longer they hold their shape the more space they use meaning less coal

Also, perhaps if you pierce them with the poker they would get stuck to it and you wouldn't be able to get it off! or am I being too simplistic

now I just know that would happen to me

[The Riff-Raff Element]

Do you think it would be good on a wood fire? Mine gets beyond 400ºF.... though I wonder if the ash (which I put in my compost) would be a bad thing?

I would doubt it. Wood is very impure carbon, which is one of the reasons that humans learned to smelt metals at the same time that they learned to make charcoal. Charcoal / coal fires can exceed 1100°C at their core, which should be hot enough. The metals will burn only at their edges: piece the can and you make more edges, so they will burn faster.

Tin could be a problem (it would depend on the particular chemistry of the soil as to whether it would become available to the plants) but in any case the days of tins being coated with tin are long gone. Today they are steel coated with a food-grade varnish.

[snapdragon]

We use the old fashioned side bricks - saves a shovelful of coal on each top up.
The only thing that worries me is that when we burned the containers of tea lights we quickly had damage to the fire grate - maybe not the reason but close enough in time to be. Anyone know if that particular metal would cause damage to the iron grate?