Is it possible????

Do you think it would be possible for the smell coming from a wood stove to be brought into someone's house via the fresh air intake for a furnace? I know when driving in the country I pass by a house that burns wood and the smell comes into my vehicle through the air intake for the heater.

So, what does everyone think? yes, no , possible.

Is it windy out? Foggy?

I will get a wood burning smell coming into the house with a slight wind and a humid/foggy atmosphere. It highlights how drafty my house is.

Not to open a can of worms, but it is my neighbor that is telling me this. If the wind is out of the south blowing over his house he claims it makes his clothes in the house smell bad.

I guess that depends. If its a smokey fire I could imagine it would.

But a clean burning fire, probably not?

IMO anything is possible but I think unless you are real close or your burning dirty I think not. I do know some people are overly sensitive to smells. Sounds like someone is just being a busy body though but like I said I've came across many things that I think are impossible and become possible.

Yes, you are experiencing a down draft of some sort, could be caused by buildings, trees, terrain in certain conditions. One or all of your stoves could be culprits. You could try increasing the height of various flues, tough nut to crack do to intermittent nature.

any thing is possible but after 15 years of burning wood my next door neighbor had enough and went out and had a stove and liner installed cause he loved the smell so much. When ever he stopped in my house he was jealous how warm my house was and no gas furnace running all the time.
We have same size houses and now the 2 of us burn - burn - burn

Yes it is every couple of years we get a wild wind and it comes in through somewhere down stairs. We have not figured out where yet and it is so rare I don't care to much but it does give one pause when it occurs.

Pete

I think it's very possible even burning clean. A hot stainless insert on a clean burn has that kind of exhaust smell which to some people might be worse than wood.
As for it getting into his clothes? That's odd, is he drying them on the line outside in the middle of the winter?

I have roasted coffee for 19 years and no matter where you do it there is one person who wants to complain about the smell/smoke.
I owned a business in Boulder, Colorado and had a guy across the parking lot from me call the city (instead of walking across the parking lot and talking to me) and complain about the smell saying it was ruining his life (no exaggeration).

Turns out he had a failing business and needed an excuse to get out of a very expensive lease two years early....

Is this neighbor a renter?

Funny, i don't know anybody who doesn't like the smell of wood smoke (within reason, of course). Though I guess that says more about where I live and who I hang out with...

X2 on BrowningBars statement - every now and then with a funky wind or heavy air I get a slight smell in the house and blame it on my draftyness. Stove needs air so it sucks it in from somewhere and if the air has even the slightest smoke in it the smells come in. Happens rarely and I don't mind

That guy sounds like my neighbor! I really think the guy is a bit eccentric, he has tried twice to sue the city and the county fair due to excess flies messing up the paint on his house! He claimed to me he can tell the second I light my stove if the wind is out of the south. My stack outside is always burning clean, usually you can not even tell it is going. I am thinking maybe when the air is really heavy and it is not real cold the air may be down drafting around his house. Anyway due to the fact I know he is the way he is I do not use the stove with a south wind but was looking for input thought maybe someone else had this issue at one time. And he does own his house.

Yeah it is possible i think. But when the Mag is cranking it runs with very little to no smoke.

We get lots of downdraft here for some reason. Probably because of all the trees and how they are laid out. When putting new wood in the stove so we can see smoke it is quite normal to see smoke coming right down to the ground. Naturally if the wind happens to be wrong we will occasionally get a little smell in the house but not much since we tightened up this old crate.

Definitely yes possible. If the smoke from a woodstove can get to the intake, it will go into the intake. Conditions that ma y could this would be little or no wind and heavy air (ie smoke just hangs around and drifts).