Black crap on my lawn

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soupy1957

Minister of Fire
Jan 8, 2010
1,365
Connecticut
www.youtube.com
Because of the construction work going on at our house, the wife and I haven't run the wood stove for about a month now. It was installed "new" in January, and we burned every day from about Jan 1 to the end of February.

We had been getting quotes from about a half dozen Chimney Sweeps during March, to prep for hiring one for an annual cleaning, starting this summer. The advice we received was that there was no appreciable build up of creosote in our chimney yet, since it is such a new stove, and we could hold off til next sumer (2011).

I noted during Jan/Feb that there is a black residue on the outside of the chimney, on the cap and on about 6 inches or so, down the pipe. I figure this is normal.

Yesterday, we happened to have a rainy, damp day, and we had a window of opportunity to have a fire, so I lit one. Good start up, good burn.........nice feel........we loved it.

Later in the afternoon, my wife noticed some black flakes laying all over the front yard, and obviously, I figured they came from the wood stove. I looked up at the chimney and cap (no fire in Flue), and I noticed that the coated black on the chimney flue and cap as mentioned before, was now spotty.

My quess: The heating of the flue after a month of not burning, flaked off any external crap that had built up on the chimney flue and cap, and THAT'S what's all over my lawn.

Your thoughts as to what it is? How to avoid that in the future?
(I'd believe that the Chimney Sweep would clean the external, as well as the internal, when they come out to clean it next summer).

-Soupy1957
 
On the cap, there is a big change in temperatures. It gets cold and you light a big fire which heats it up. Warm, cold, warm etc. and you know what that can do to metal. This can and will cause some small stuff to flake off; usually no problem. However, I would definitely question those sweeps idea of not cleaning the chimney until 2011!!!!!!!!

New wood burners I always say to check the chimney monthly. Most will find they have to clean the chimney 2 or 3 times per season their first couple years of burning. Later they can get by with once annually. But so much depends upon the fuel. Naturally how the stove is operated comes into play too but it is 90% or more the fuel which causes creosote (unless someone just gets a fire going and closes the draft without understanding what this does).

You very well might get by with the chimney this season but if I were you I'd plan on getting it cleaned before January 1 next season.
 
Backwoods Savage said:
On the cap, there is a big change in temperatures. It gets cold and you light a big fire which heats it up. Warm, cold, warm etc. and you know what that can do to metal. This can and will cause some small stuff to flake off; usually no problem. However, I would definitely question those sweeps idea of not cleaning the chimney until 2011!!!!!!!!

New wood burners I always say to check the chimney monthly. Most will find they have to clean the chimney 2 or 3 times per season their first couple years of burning. Later they can get by with once annually. But so much depends upon the fuel. Naturally how the stove is operated comes into play too but it is 90% or more the fuel which causes creosote (unless someone just gets a fire going and closes the draft without understanding what this does).

You very well might get by with the chimney this season but if I were you I'd plan on getting it cleaned before January 1 next season.

+1 to Dennis' advice.

As an aside . . . if the "black crap all over your lawn" isn't from your chimney you might want to check with your neighbors and see what if they've been letting their dog loose again . . . and what they've been feeding him. ;) :)
 
funny guy! (FirefighterJake). Seriously.......I told the wife I didn't think it was creosote from INSIDE the Chimney, because I figure the Cap would capture that stuff, and if there WAS any appreciable creosote in there, it would start a Chimney Fire first. I don't think the "pieces" would have gone through the Cap grating, anyway.

-Soupy1957
 
Oh, I thought you were talking about deep poop! That's the only black crap we see.
 
I noticed the same black flakes on my lawn last weekend. We had some significant wind storms a few weeks back and I figured the wind had blown out some creosote that had accumulated under the cap. I cleaned at the end of the season last year (1st year of burning 1-2 cords) and collected two cups of "stuff". Figured we could clean season to season especially since the breakdown, clean up and reinstall is a pain for our in-house, bottom-up cleaning.
 
The good news is that there was no fire in the Chimney..............and if only the "bad news" is that we had some black flakes in the yard,...........I can live with that.

-Soupy1957
 
The dry flakey stuff isn't a problem, its not near as flamable as the wet shiney kind. Still won't hurt to clean it.
 
That's kinda what it was, yeah..........little wafer thin irregular shaped black........like paper thin and not all that large....no bigger than a half dollar or smaller.

-Soupy1957

P.S. We have BIGGER issues right now anyway.........the water in our basement, for starters!!
 
I get the same stuff (wafer thin black flakes). I still haven't figured what it is yet, but I didn't think it was creosote.
 
My guess........."creosote".........just on the outside of the Chimney............it sure ain't burnt metal, THAT'S for sure!!

-Soupy1957
 
I was under the impression that creosote was more of a hard crystalized substance. This stuff is very thin, light and flakey and just smears to the touch.
 
woodjack said:
I was under the impression that creosote was more of a hard crystalized substance. This stuff is very thin, light and flakey and just smears to the touch.

that's creosote. the bad creosote is like tar and shiny. but semi burnt creosote will be like that or well burnt stuff will look like black Styrofoam
 
I call them "bat wings"... it's just soot and crap dried up on the inside of the flu. The temperature change and the increased draft through the flu raises it a bit off the surface and the draft carries it out... where it sometimes flies away. Sometimes it falls on the snow on the lawn.

No big deal... last time I cleaned my chimney that's all I got out of it...



fbelec said:
woodjack said:
I was under the impression that creosote was more of a hard crystalized substance. This stuff is very thin, light and flakey and just smears to the touch.

that's creosote. the bad creosote is like tar and shiny. but semi burnt creosote will be like that or well burnt stuff will look like black Styrofoam
 

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Aw give it a few rainstorms and some wind with an inch of grass growth and you will never know it was ever there. Even the little half bricks of corn clinker I toss out into the back yard are starting to break down and fade into the dirt. If you want to see fallout just put a corn burner in with a grinder type burn pot and a very short flue. Makes the yard look like a coal yard sometimes in the winter.
 
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