I have found hard "rock" or sugar maple maple to light easily and to burn hot but I have not found it to coal as well as most other hard wood species used for wood burning. I have a charmaster wood burning furnace where the air comes over the wood not under the wood and woods that coal well like Oak and black locust form charcoal like coals that last long into the night and sometimes into the AM. The hard "rock" maple burns out somewhat quickly after burning hot and gets reduced to fine ashes without coals so the stove cools quickly. That may be a desirable trait if one likes it cool during the night but I prefer waking up with warm walls and floors! Please understand that Norway maple is barely a hard wood and loses a lot of weight when dry and is easy to split where true rock maple / sugar maple remains quite heavy and is often quite hard to split by hand.
