My inlaw's have a 120 year old brick house, the brick chimney has a SS pipe running through it and they have a good seal on top. Frequently throughout the year they will plug the chimney tight and have to beat on the plug with a steel rod until it pokes through. They have a wood stove, they burn mostly crap wood, like 3/4 rotten box elder even though they have lots of locust and elm. And they often just let it smoulder along, putting out heat. Right now, in the middle of a little snow storm, they are without heat in the living room of the house because the chimney is plugged.

Any tips or hints or advice? I've suggested that the problem is because they don't get the pipe/fire hot enough, but they are terrified of a chimney fire. Funny, huh? No, not really.
Thanks...

 

you will get creosote no matter what you do, but you will get more with junk wood than you will get with a good dry hardwood. at the old house, i had basically the same thing. a 175 year old chimney with a SS pipe insert. with oak only in the stove, the fluepipe only had to be cleaned once at the start of the season. with crap wood, the fluepipe had to be cleaned every month.
with a SS fluepipe, they do not have to worry about fire if the pipe is one piece.

 

Someone told them back in 1948 that burning oak will cause more creosote due to the tannic acid/tannins. Therefore they don't burn much oak.

Sometimes they will dangle a log chain down the pipe and swing it all around. But dropping the chain on the plug doesn't break it loose.

 

First off, have a chimney sweep thuroughly clean the chimney, and the stove. Then go out and buy a product called ash-trol. You throw a tablespoon on the fire every coulpe of days and it will help dry out the cresote and turn it into ash. This is a product that we supply with our outdoor furnaces (www.centralboiler.com) and with it you can burn any kind of wood including green pine. Also helps to prevent damage to the steel in the wood burner by not letting the cresote build up in layers and trapping moisture between it and the firebox. Also to netralise the ash created by buring wood. Try to convince them that their burning habbits will cause a fire, instead of preventing it.


Btw, what size SS liner is in the chimney? Depending on the size of the wood burner it should be 6-8". I've seen a lot of homes where they install a 4" liner and that should only be used for gas burning appliances. Also, if you have a cap on the chimney with a screen, that can also cause issues. It slows down the draft too much and allows the smoke to cool and deposit cresote instead of blowing it out the chimney. Especially if it has a screen on it, make sure that is spotless. If they burn all winter long, they would be better off leaving it off. what snow/rain that would get down there would imediately evaporate and you would have a much stronger/hotter draft to help prevent cresote buildup. Just cap it when not in use.

 

LilDuke, thanks. I don't know for sure what size pipe they have in the chimney, going to the chimney is 6 or 8. I don't think they have any sort of cap on the pipe at all, they are up there way to often with those rods and chains to clear it to fuss around with taking off a cap/screen. UPdate, my wife says they do have a cap and a screen.


When I said it is sealed up good on top, I meant around the pipe to the chimney has a good seal, they put that on last year hoping to keep the pipe warmer to allleviate this problem.

Of course it is a 2 story house, 10' ceilings, it is a tall house. Be nice to get this figured out for them. And they do burn even on warm days. Thanks!

 

Yeah, a cap and screen causes the smoke to cool down and cresote to build up. I belive if smoke temp drops below 250F thats when it can solidify. unfortunately you hate to loose heat like that but the offset is chimney fires, and I'd hate to see anyone go through that.

 

Sounds like the problem is their burning methods/habits. They need to start their fire, let it get good and hot, and then damp it down. Also, their wood should be further scrutinized. Do they store it under cover or leave it out to get rained/snowed on? Finally, how they burn seems to be a concern (smolder, low heat, poor combustion). It sounds like they are damping it down too much; open the air intake a bit and let it burn at a reasonable rate. Myself, I like to see the flames low and gently rolling.

*Their fires must always be crappy and smokey since they haven't had a chimney fire. And if they ever do, with all that crap in there it's gonna be a real hot one. Something for them to give some serious thought to before it happens.

 

Funny thing you mention the wood. They will cut a tree into blocks, stack it against a tree and let it get rained on all summer before splitting it and moving it to the shed in the fall. The chunks onthe bottom are right in the dirt, so they get esp rotten.

"It burns and makes heat, just like anyting else..."

Thanks

 

Well the real solution would probably be a factory chimney such as Duraplus that is rated for 2100 degrees. It will cut down on cresote by keeping the pipe hot on the inside and cool on the outside. For a two story house it would probably cost about $1500 from northerntools.com. Though they do not sound like the type to make that investment.

Though they could get a hot fire going and not worry about it with the correct chimney. It sounds like they might have single wall stove pipe going up the masonary chimney and it is against code in many areas for good reason.

My opinion is if they are not going to do it correctly, it is cheaper and far safer just to seal up the chimney (heat loss) and go propane or oil.

Wet wood will consume 50% of the wood's energy burning the water off, if it is not dry, and will be creating cresote as a by product. If they have the proper chimney (not single wall - double or triple) and a hot fire they will not have much to worry about.

They probably will not take your advice, so go the the FAQ here:

http://www.firewoodcenter.com/firewoodpedia/index.shtml

maybe they will believe Ben Franklin from 1787 :-)

But Franklin clarifies authoritatively,
“. . . smoke is really heavier than air; and that it is carried upwards only when attached to, or acted upon, by air that is heated, and thereby rarefied and rendered specifically lighter than the air in its neighborhood.”

 

DANGER - Carbon Monoxide poisoning.

Burning any fossil fuel produces carbon monoxide. If the chimney is plugged - even partially - and the escape of the CO is hampered, they may be filling their house with CO gas.

Odourless, colourless - causes headaches and flu-like symptoms. Can cause irreversible nervous system damage long before lethal doses.

Anyone burning anything for heat in their house - oil, gas, or wood - shoud have a modern CO detector on each floor of the house.

http://www.carbon-monoxide-poisoning...-cleaning.html

Carbon monoxide poisoning associated with using fuel-burning appliances kills more than 200 people each year and sends more than 10,000 to hospital emergency rooms for treatment," said CPSC Chairman Ann Brown. It’s important to have your fireplace checked for leakage or blockage by creosote or debris. If you see black stains on the outside of the chimney or flue it could mean pollutants, like carbon, is leaking into your home.

 

The problem with most modern woodstoves is that the combustion is controlled by starving the oxygen to the fire - no way around getting creosote in the chimney when you're doing that. In our old farm house we had a masonry chimney with no liner, you could almost see the flames between the mortar! But with an old non-airtight stove the chimney never built up any creosote, no cleaning required ever.

One more modern solution that might help would be a pellet stove - some of them actually have fans that force feed air to the combustion chamber which pretty much eliminates the creosote problem. Of course you got to buy pellets then...

But good wood is the key though - cutting wood in the spring to burn in the fall doesn't cut it. We try to cut wood and leave it stacked, under cover (cover the top, not the sides) for at least 18 months before burning, preferably two years. It really makes a difference - you can light two year old with a match, nothing else and it burns so totally that there's almost no ash...

 

they need to change there cutting and storing habits--i burn maple of all types--softwood--if its blocked-split-and stacked--in a row--NOT in a pile--itll be dry by fall--and will burn 1000% better--towards end of fall--needs tarp on top so it stays dry--i run a low fire--and have no creosote problems--but the wood is dry also---wet wood is a killer--in more ways than one---

 

have your realitives check out www.hearth.com

 

Stress, why not go over there and educate them via example .

General (keyword) rule of thumb is wood cut from a live tree needs six months to dry before burning. Of course, summer months are ideal. Rain and snow on the wood pile are not what you want as is tarping the pile and creating a greenhouse when the wood is supposed to be drying. Myself, I seek out dead standing trees first and if the weather has been dry I will take dead fallen trees. Anything dead and fallen get's put in one pile that has a few extra months to dry out over the winter. The good dry stuff is the first to go. Also, fallen dead trees that might be somewhat moist dry much faster once the rounds are split. I never store rounds; only split wood that's ready to use. I also store mine on concrete, however anything that get's it up off the earth will stop the bottom row from absorbing moisture. I also make it a point to grab some cedar for kindling as it burns real hot and fast, assuring that my fires get going quickly.

The stinking gov't here would like people to "burn clean". This means that they would REALLY prefer people to use gas inserts, but in their eyes burning clean means small and hot fires and thus minimal smoke. We all know that fires of this type don't make it through the night but they won't talk about that issue . What one needs to achieve this is a compromise. Not so hot that the fire is done in two hours, but not so cool and smokey that the heat output is low and creosote accumulation is rapid. Face it, there's going to be some creosote accumulation. I'm more than happy if I stoke it up real well before going to bed and it's upper 60's in the morning with enough coals to get the next fire going. The furnace is there for backup if needed at $1.15 + tax per therm.