Hearth ash buckets

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colebrookman said:
An ash can full of ash and smoldering produces CO as we have said.
Ed
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To further expand on Ed's comment: While I 'believe' I am only taking 'dead' ashes out of my stove via my ash pan, I would bet somewhere, down deep, all cozy somewhere in that ash pan, there is a hot coal just waiting for the right conditions to spring fire back to life. That is why my ash garbage can has a locking lid and sits outside on a fire proof surface.
 
Joe Matthews said:
Ash buckets have no place inside a home or garage, unless you are in the act of filling them with ash from your stove. Once that task is complete, they should be taken outside away from the home and stored in a maner where they absolutely can not be knocked over, blown over, or left uncovered where a breeze could blow any embers out of the bucket or blow leaves and other combustible items IN the bucket. Many homes have been burned to the ground due to improper ash removal, disposal and storage. Ask any fireman and they will tell you the same thing. Most people worry about creosote build up, but the single largest threat when using a woodstove is ash related, by far. Get a fool proof plan that works for you and your living situation that will 100% safely handle your ashes and stick to it always.
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Well as a firefighter and certified Fire and Life Safety Officer . . . I couldn't have said this any better . . . and for the record do what you stated . . . ash pan gets dumped into a 5-gallon covered metal pail outside on a non-combustible surface (currently a whole bunch of snow) . . . and then it is dumped in a pile, in the garden or on the driveway in a few weeks.
 
I take the ash drawer outside to empty into the ashcan for the dust. Mine raise a fine cloud no matter how careful I try to slide them into the can.
 
yooperdave said:
puting coals into galvanized cans (in or outside) runs the risk of creating phosgene gas...toxic and deadly. the gas is created when the zinc-plating is burned off. this is why galvanized cans should never be used to cook in!
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Phosgene has chlorine in it, there is no zinc in phosgene. Avoid burning PVC plastics in order to avoid making phosgene gas.

Arc welding galvy can cause you to get sick from the inhalation of zinc oxide fumes. It makes you really sick, but the effects are usually completely gone within 48 hours. The formation of zinc oxide will not happen at the temps found in an ash bucket or a deep fryer, particularly inside a fryer since there would be no oxygen present at the zinc surfaces.

I use an enameled cook pot with a lid. I quick-sift my ashes with a stainless deep-fry skimmer, and that gets 99% of the embers out. The bucket sits there by the stove, and I see no possible way for it to cause a fire where it is. A neglected candle is far more dangerous IMO. I was at a party where one of my wife's best friends had candles everywhere for ambiance. I went into the bathroom to lose some beer and her curtains were on fire! She had placed a candle on the window sill and someone must have turned to leave and dragged the curtain into the flame. In a worse event, my daughter's high school boyfriend burned his parents house to the ground with a neglected candle. No fatalities, but they lost everything, and the guilt had a very bad effect on the kid for years.

On the rare occasion that I have to remove a lot of embers as well as ashes, I put the pot outside the basement door and put a piece of firewood on top to keep the lid on in case the wind picks up. That routine caused a fire this year when loving wife tossed the bucket of ashes into a brush pile. Not a fun afternoon at all.
 
i must say i have a bucket sitting on the hearth...you make me sound like a criminal.

although when i empty ashes the stove is cold, and i mean cold, its actually hard to light back up, its that cold.

got a question...how can CO leak if you using a sealed container anyways? its meant its airtight for a reason right? to stop a smoldering situation, snuff out fire, keep dust down, and air out.

at least inside its not subject to wind to blow the top off spill ashes and embers to get picked up in the wind. i bet lots of your ash bins are close to the house, what if it spilled there? hot ember right on vinyl, wood etc.?
i guess an outside fire is better than an inside one?

i think i will still re-evaluate my procedures from this thread. that and the bucket isnt very attractive anyhow.
 
Ashes are stored in a five gallon galvanized can with a cover. The ash can sits next to the stove in my concrete basement. No concern about combustibles etc. to have to keep it outside. Coals get cold over time, bucket gets full, and out to the back yard, over the stone wall and voila- ashes are gone.
 
Shari said:
While I 'believe' I am only taking 'dead' ashes out of my stove via my ash pan, I would bet somewhere, down deep, all cozy somewhere in that ash pan, there is a hot coal just waiting for the right conditions to spring fire back to life...
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Ja, when I was young, I set my parent's house on fire putting what I thought was cold ashes into a cardboard box and leaving it in the house.
 
Battenkiller said:
yooperdave said:
putting coals into galvanized cans (in or outside) runs the risk of creating phosgene gas...toxic and deadly. the gas is created when the zinc-plating is burned off. this is why galvanized cans should never be used to cook in!
Click to expand...

Phosgene has chlorine in it, there is no zinc in phosgene. Avoid burning PVC plastics in order to avoid making phosgene gas.

there maybe no zinc in phosgene gas. the zinc is part of the galvanized process. the metal is hot dipped in a zinc bath...this is where the zinc comes from and is evident by noticing the spangle pattern of the metal-kinda like the jack frost patterns of the old single pane windows. the galvanized metal is used for temps not to exceed about 400f. thats when the trouble starts. there is also lead used in the dipping process to promote fluidity. all kinds of good stuff to think about.

somewhere, earlier in this thread, someone stated that anything that burns creates CO. i still have a problem with this belief based on the definition of combustion. if everything that burned created CO, please help explain the use of gas ranges...and for pete's sake, where would the ladies be without their candles constantly burning??? and of course, the infamous vent-less space heaters that people always ask if its ok to put in a bedroom??? i just can't see getting overly concerned about any emissions that would be created by warm coals in an ash bucket-especially when the people that practice this have them in a covered container.

this post is not to create an argument or debate, its just that i don't see where the issue with CO is? if everything that burns is a source of CO, seems that we should be less worried about a few covered buckets on fireproof surfaces and more concerned about educating the masses about the dangers of CO emitting from everyday uses of above mentioned items and the like. i am very safety concerned and aware of anything harmful such as CO and fire dangers, so please don't think that i'm a careless bum. the last 3 paragraphs are posted by yooperdave. battenkiller has a partial quote of his post starting with "phosgene has chlorine..." and ending with "making phosgene gas." i just didn't know how to quote a partial thread
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ash pails purchased at a hearth retail store have a double bottom so the hot ash is never in contact with the bottom of the pail and the heat can not transfer to the surface the bucket is sitting on. but the bucket should not be placed on a soft flooring area , the non combustible hearth is fine. i leave my ash to sit in the ash bucket until i feel all hot coals are out . this way if it is dumped out side say...on the garden etc there is not chance of a fire starting in the yard.
coal hods and galvanize containers are not proper ash buckets :) the double bottom is key.
 
ruth140 said:
ash pails purchased at a hearth retail store have a double bottom so the hot ash is never in contact with the bottom of the pail and the heat can not transfer to the surface the bucket is sitting on. but the bucket should not be placed on a soft flooring area , the non combustible hearth is fine. i leave my ash to sit in the ash bucket until i feel all hot coals are out . this way if it is dumped out side say...on the garden etc there is not chance of a fire starting in the yard.
coal hods and galvanize containers are not proper ash buckets :) the double bottom is key.
Click to expand...

Sounds great - except - you have missed the discussion of possible CO emissions from coals in the ash.
 
ruth140 said:
yeah well i cant read everything :) keep the lid on it....no emissions then! :)
Click to expand...

I would suggest you take the time to read the entire thread. :)
 
I always put my ash in metal containers, and never take them outside until I let them set a week or 2 to let any coals burn out. The only time I dump them outside earlier is to put on solid ice or snow pack for traction so I don't slip and fall. I make sure the container is always on a concrete floor. My container is down stairs away from my living area. I never take a fresh bucket outside so wind doesn't blow embers around.
 
mbutts said:
I always put my ash in metal containers, and never take them outside until I let them set a week or 2 to let any coals burn out. The only time I dump them outside earlier is to put on solid ice or snow pack for traction so I don't slip and fall. I make sure the container is always on a concrete floor. My container is down stairs away from my living area. I never take a fresh bucket outside so wind doesn't blow embers around.
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Did you read the entire thread about this subject i.e. possible CO exiting from the ash bucket? Do you have CO monitors in your home and/or near where you 'store' your ashes?
 
Stump Branch, the voice of reason. :) mbutts gets an honorable mention for taking it a step or six too far, with tongue firmly in cheek.

Mine go into a 5 gallon galvanized metal pail, some still glowing in their enthusiasm, when I do ashes. The lid goes on it right smartly, and the bail is lifted to lock it down. The pail goes right back onto the stone hearth sitting next to the stove to cool down, which it does in a matter of minutes according to my IR gun. Any gas that is generated is confined to the inside of the can.

I think that they are just ashes, not poop.
 
Milt said:
Stump Branch, the voice of reason. :)

Mine go into a 5 gallon galvanized metal pail, some still glowing in their enthusiasm, when I do ashes. The lid goes on it right smartly, and the bail is lifted to lock it down. The pail goes right back onto the stone hearth sitting next to the stove to cool down, which it does in a matter of minutes according to my IR gun. Any gas that is generated is confined to the inside of the can.I think that they are just ashes, not poop.
Click to expand...

You said any gas in confined to the inside of your can. Try this test the next time your pail is empty: Put about a gallon of water in it. Secure the lid. Take it outside and tip it over. If water comes out your can is not 'air tight'. If water comes out so can CO.
 
Shari said:
Milt said:
Stump Branch, the voice of reason. :)

Mine go into a 5 gallon galvanized metal pail, some still glowing in their enthusiasm, when I do ashes. The lid goes on it right smartly, and the bail is lifted to lock it down. The pail goes right back onto the stone hearth sitting next to the stove to cool down, which it does in a matter of minutes according to my IR gun. Any gas that is generated is confined to the inside of the can.I think that they are just ashes, not poop.
Click to expand...

You said any gas in confined to the inside of your can. Try this test the next time your pail is empty: Put about a gallon of water in it. Secure the lid. Take it outside and tip it over. If water comes out your can is not 'air tight'. If water comes out so can CO.
Click to expand...

I will let you know if it kills the canary Shari. :) Honest.
 
I have been a big proponent of CO safety on this forum, and I have contributed my share of info regarding this in the past. That said, I disagree 100% with the notion that a covered ash pail poses a CO threat. Even if an entire 5 gallon pail was filled with CO, the diffusion rate out of the covered container would be so slow that you would never reach a level that would even be detectable, never mind harmful.

The average 1200 sq.ft. home has a volume of 9600 cu.ft. If you were to release an entire 5 gallon pail full of 100% CO gas all at once into the average living space, you would have an immediate rise in CO gas to 350 PPM. That would cause symptoms to appear within 1-2 hours, and would not be a good situation to be in. Several additional hours of breathing the same concentration and you would be in the hospital in a hyperbaric chamber, fighting for your life. But...

The average extremely tight home has at least 8 complete air exchanges during the course of a 24 hour day. This means that even if you spilled 5 gallons of pure CO gas, most of it would be gone within several hours, even in the tightest of homes being built today. The average resting tidal volume for both men and women is about 0.5 liters. At 12 breaths/minute, that's 6 liters/min, or 360 liters/hr, or 8640 liters/day. A family of four would consume 34,560 liters of air each day. Without that steady air exchange, they'd be oxygen deprived in no time. Imagine what would happen with a house full of people dancing at a party? Air exchange in a home is just a very necessary fact of life.

But you don't have 5 gallons of CO gas in there anyway. A pail full of ashes is probably at least 80% solid matter, so that leaves only about a gallon left for gas in there, and not all of it can possibly be CO gas. Just the act of placing it carefully into the pail will introduce huge amounts of room air into the ash pail, diluting the CO in there even further. I would be willing to bet there is less than a liter of CO gas inside even the dirtiest pail of ashes. That liter, even if spilled out all at once, would only raise the CO level in the home to about 18 PPM - well below the accepted risk level. You'll breathe a lot more CO looking for a parking spot in a busy parking garage.

But what about any charcoal in there? Well, if you're doing it right, you won't have much in there to begin with, but any further evolvement of CO gas would have to come from the combustion of that charcoal by exposure to O2. O2 has to diffuse through the dense ash to combine with any charcoal that isn't sitting at the very top of the ashes. If this occurred at any perceivable rate, the ash pail would have to get hotter over time. I have never seen an ash pail that felt anything but cool to the touch after an hour or so sitting on the hearth. Yes, there are still hot coals in there, but if they were burning they would not be there days later, correct. The ashes insulate them and keep them hot, but they aren't producing much CO because they aren't burning in there. They would need O2 in there, and that will diffuse into the pail just as slowly as the CO can diffuse out of the pail.

Further proof? Empty that pail after a week and see if the charcoal is all gone. I'll bet a case of good beer that it will all still be in there when you do. I have never emptied a pail that once contained bits of charcoal and found that they had burned away just sitting in the closed pail.

As for the water analogy? Try closing your stove tight and filling it with water and see how tight those gaskets really are. Get a mop and bucket ready. Your stove sits waiting to greet you every morning with not just ashes, but a whole bed of coals. Draft is usually minimal at that point, so any negative pressure situation could conceivably pull copious amounts of CO gas into the room, but no one ever seems to worry about that. It does happen, and it has been reported here on the forum...even today as I write this.


I firmly believe in the ALARA (As Low As Reasonably Achievable) principle when it comes to CO, but there are far greater CO risks that come with wood burning than the trace amounts of CO that might evolve from a covered ash pail. I have personally had my CO detector show a 20 PPM spike after just 5 minutes of working on my opened stove with the top load door accidentally left open, so that is one risk I am aware of, I'm sure there are many others. But I have never seen any activity on the detector at any time just by leaving ashes in the pail.
 
Battenkiller & others,

Nice description of your thoughts - thanks to all who participated here - all contributions have been appreciated.

Personally, my ash pan will be continue to be emptied into my ash pail/stored outside and I'd rather depend on a couple of CO monitors than a canary or two.

Thanks again for all the contributions to the thread I started. :)
 
Battenkiller said:
I firmly believe in the ALARA (As Low As Reasonably Achievable) principle when it comes to CO, but there are far greater CO risks that come with wood burning than the trace amounts of CO that might evolve from a covered ash pail. I have personally had my CO detector show a 20 PPM spike after just 5 minutes of working on my opened stove with the top load door accidentally left open, so that is one risk I am aware of, I'm sure there are many others. But I have never seen any activity on the detector at any time just by leaving ashes in the pail.
Click to expand...

Geez, there you go being rational and scientific again and spoiling all the alarmists' fun. I've been reading this thread with utter astonishment, so thanks for putting a lid on it, so to speak.
 
I am sure my ash pan is not air tight. It closes well, but for sure not air tight. I have left it sitting on the hearth with fresh ash and some coals in it. When sitting at the edge of the hearth is is no more than 24" from a CO monitor. That monitor has NEVER shown anything but a "zero" on it's own. Ever. It sits there now actually, the pan has about 6-7 hearth shovel fulls in it since this morning.. zero CO.
 
Well... what I am calling an ash pail is just that - for ashes. If you'd like to enter into the discussion of someone who posted (not in this thread) about pulling out excess coals and putting them in their ash pail, stirring it around to get more BTU's, not covering on the pail and letting it sit on their hearth - then we could always go into that discussion. (PS That is NOT a safe practice, by the way!) :)

The reason I even posted this topic is that, as many firefighters on this list have stated, more home fires are caused by ash disposal. My train of thinking is once the ashes are out of my stove they are stored, safely, outside. If anyone wants to practise another method, fine with me.
 
Shari said:
Well... what I am calling an ash pail is just that - for ashes. If you'd like to enter into the discussion of someone who posted (not in this thread) about pulling out excess coals and putting them in their ash pail, stirring it around to get more BTU's, not covering on the pail and letting it sit on their hearth - then we could always go into that discussion. (PS That is NOT a safe practice, by the way!) :)

The reason I even posted this topic is that, as many firefighters on this list have stated, more home fires are caused by ash disposal. My train of thinking is once the ashes are out of my stove they are stored, safely, outside. If anyone wants to practise another method, fine with me.
Click to expand...

Oh, I am sorry.

I thought this was an open discussion. Sorry for entering. I only was posting an observation within my experience I thought was relative to the discussion.

I also neither advocated or do I attempt to heat with my ash pan. I mentioned coals in there, because sometimes some small ones get in there.

http://www.northlineexpress.com/item/5WZ-AH/Ash-Holder-with-Lid-Matte-Black
 
Sounds like we all need to check our CO detectors. That, or cabin fever is definitely setting in.

To be fair to Sheri, she did start this thread with fire as her foremost concern. I can see many situations, particularly for those with kids (or worse yet, four-legged hairy kids), where a covered can full of hot ashes could lead to injury or a horrible death. We all need to be reminded of this from time to time. It's easy to get complacent after years of doing this. It all becomes so routine that we stop thinking about the odd circumstance that can be a life changer... or a life ender.

Didn't mean to trivialize your concerns, Sheri. New burners bring more to the table than a lot of us seasoned guys sometimes care to admit. Good thread. :)
 
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