My girlfriend burst into the bathroom as I was shaving this morning yelling that a lot of smoke was pouring into the house from the wood stove that I repacked about 15 minutes prior. This has happened before; the chimney sweep thought the problem was the smoke coming down a second flue that is in the same chimney. The difference this time was the bottom of the flue at the 90 degree junction of the T fitting was on fire!! I calmly put out the fire that I could see with a fire extinguisher and engaged the CAT in order to control the fire and cool down the smoke exiting the stove. It's now about 40 minutes later, and there is no more smoke coming out of the chimney, so everything is Ok. Naturally I'm not going to start it up again until I get it checked out.
Any ideas what could have happened? A completely new flue was installed just before this season, so it certainly should have been clean. I always use the CAT and monitor CAT temperatures as well as occasionally viewing the smoke coming out the chimney, and everything seems to be operating correctly. Could some debris have fallen down the chimney into the flue? I'm wondering this since there is no cap on the flue; there is a stone slab that sits about a foot or so above the flue which keeps rain from getting in.
By the way, the flue setup is as follows: An 8 inch round single wall pipe insulated with rock wool (or something similar) is used. There is about a foot horizontal run coming out of the stove which goes into a 90 degree T fitting, which then rises about 23 feet through a masonry and stone chimney, which is half and half interior/exterior. The draft is very good (actually a little too strong) ever since the flue was changed from a 6 to an 8 inch.
Thanks in advance.
Any ideas what could have happened? A completely new flue was installed just before this season, so it certainly should have been clean. I always use the CAT and monitor CAT temperatures as well as occasionally viewing the smoke coming out the chimney, and everything seems to be operating correctly. Could some debris have fallen down the chimney into the flue? I'm wondering this since there is no cap on the flue; there is a stone slab that sits about a foot or so above the flue which keeps rain from getting in.
By the way, the flue setup is as follows: An 8 inch round single wall pipe insulated with rock wool (or something similar) is used. There is about a foot horizontal run coming out of the stove which goes into a 90 degree T fitting, which then rises about 23 feet through a masonry and stone chimney, which is half and half interior/exterior. The draft is very good (actually a little too strong) ever since the flue was changed from a 6 to an 8 inch.
Thanks in advance.