When I got off shift this morning I came home and found the stove cold (wife didn't load it past 6pm last night). So I reached in and used a 10mm wrench to loosen the top plate and removed it. Took about 5 mins. I then got up on the roof and removed the chimney cap. The cap had some fine black soot on it as well as the pipe about 3 feet down. Using a flashlight I could see all the way down and there wasn't much soot past three feet down the pipe. I ran the brush down and up three times, replaced the cap and went in to the stove. There was about a cup of fine black dust in the back of the stove. I used a shop vac to suck it out and clean the ash off the mat. I replaced the oval plate and screwed it back down. Took about 30mins total. Really easy to do.
