The Cole fireplace is a solid fuel burning furnace designed for use with solid fuels like wood, wood pellets, charcoal or even coal (although I heard a strong recommendation to use bituminous coal rather than the other kind that smokes a lot).

It’s a simple construction with a two drawer ash tray beneath a firebox and metal grate beneath.  By sliding out the drawers or sliding up the damper on the front you can adjust the draw and combustion rate.  The exhaust port is on top, a 3″ circular port to mate with a 3″ circular flue duct.  I found flue was a little long.  This was kind of strange because it must have fit at some point.  It may be that they had the elbows adjusted for more acute angles.  I adjusted them to get as smooth a transition as possible.

In any case I cut it the flue down to size with some tin snips and set up a fire to test it.  I built the fire in the drawer which turned out to be the ashbox, so it didn’t draw well.  When I found and installed the grate and built the fire up higher I had a much better draw and the bits of wood burned very nicely.

The stove heats up quite a bit. The original installation had the fireplace surrounded by 2″ square tiles.  I’ll probably go with some 4×12″ floor tile I found at restore that is teak colored wood grain planks.  For my test I put the furnace on top of some tile coasters and kept the heat low.