creosote question

As most of you know this is my first year burning in my stove. Many of you suggested I check my chimney half way through the season to inspect for creosote build up. I try to burn nice and hot 500-700 in my Lopi Freedom Bay. I have been using the creosote remover product twice per week to be safe. see the product I am using by using the link..http://www.amazon.com/Rutland-98-Lb...d=1359652340&sr=8-1&keywords=creosote remover

I went up on the roof today to inspect the chimney. I have no sweeping tools as of yet so this was an inspection only. The chimney had about 1/8 inch of a black very flaky powdery film around the liner. I used my finger to wipe some off the top, and it flaked off immediately right down to the liner. The croeosote was not hard like I had read it would be. I still get a very strong draft. If I had a chimney brush I think I could have cleaned it thouroghly in less than 5 minutes. Thats how powdery the creosote was. My question is...is this something that needs to be removed ASAP as in no more fires until cleaned. Or is this still within normal operating condition? I will be ordering the sweeping tools this week and they should arrive in the middle of next week. Am I alright to burn until then? Any thoughts would be great. Thanks again for all the help.

Sounds pretty normal to me. That light flaky stuff is also very normal and what you want to see if you are getting any accumulation at all. Since you'll normally get most of your creosote accumulation at the very top of the flue, you can be pretty confident that you have even less creosote lower down the flue.
And yes, had you had a chimney brush with you, you could have swept it out in 5 minutes or less.

Man I love this site. Answers to my quesiton in less than 10 minutes. I will be lighting up the stove in the next few minutes. This warm weather is not going to last all night

Get yourself a sweeping brush with the rods. You won't regret it and it will be much faster. On the creosote question I merely wanted to say that I get less than a one pound coffed can per season. Can't explain it but every few weeks I burn hot for about half an hour. Just let it rip. I use the brush but general I could take a ruler and just scrape the small stuff at the top which is generally hardly anything at all.

Save money and forget the powder. I used it for two years and this year I decided not to use it to see if it was worth it. I too burn in the 500-700 range and I checked my chimney half way through and guess what I looked the same. If your burning marginal to good wood and your burning it hot most of the bad stuff is ate up by your stove doing what it was designed to do. Not to mention (i dont have a tub of the stuff here with me) I believe the active ingredient is sodium and that is bad for an ss liner so I have been told. Burn hot, burn clean, burn good wood = saves money.

Same here with the powder, never seen a difference in the past.

Todd2

I'd rather buy a new chain for my saw. More bang for the buck. Don't believe in any of the chemicals, commercial logs, creosote fads, etc. Waste of $$$.