Small Chimney Fire last night, now what?

[ABMax24]

Our wood stove and chimney is new, installed this fall. I last swept it a month ago (I'm really scared with 32ft of chimney the amount of cresoste it could hold), and inspected a week ago to find a very small amount of build up. Last night the stove was taking a while to relight after reloading with pine, I went upstairs for about 10mins and my girlfriend smelled something hot so ran downstairs to find the woodstove going full blast with a tinging sound from the chimney. She immediately shut the damper. I know bad practice leaving it on high unattended, and also know that the tinging sound meant there was a chimney fire. I let it cool down a bit and looked inside the cleanout cap to find only traces of ash on the inside and the exterior of the double wall Duravent very warm to the touch. The small traces of creosote I had seen before were gone, obviously burnt.

So now what, what am I looking for for damage? The main vertical run looks fine to me, no bulges, deformation or discoloration in the stainless inner wall. And I will be bringing home a borescope camera from work to inspect the inside that I can't see and will remove the pipe if I see anything obvious.

Is there anything else I should do? Other than the obvious of not overfiring the stove again to cause this.

 

[jetsam]

It was clean a week ago, you were burning pine on high... you maybe had flames roaring straight up the flue and getting it hotter than it should be, but if there was no fuel being burned inside the pipe it wasn't a chimney fire.

That's not to say that you didn't have a small chimney fire (your boroscope inspection will answer that), but I am guessing you didn't.

If you see creosote accumulation gradually getting worse all the way up as you get closer to the top, there wasn't a fire. If the pipe is burned clean for part or all of it, there probably was. But just because the bottom is clean doesn't mean there was a fire- that is the part that stays the warmest and therefore accumulates the least in the first place.

 

[ABMax24]

I'm not 100% sure there was a chimney fire. But usually I have a small amount of creosote buildup at the cleanout tee, last night it was gone, just grey ash left. It definitely does look like it was burned clean.

There wasn't much there a week ago, but even that is gone.

 

[Rickb]

Sounds like it was a little over fired but not a chimney fire.

 

[ABMax24]

I'm going to agree with both of you that this was an overfire and not a chimney fire. I just finished sweeping my chimney and hit small amounts of creosote halfway up all the way to the cap. I might have got 2 cups out of the whole thing. It definitely got hot, and if I had large creosote deposits this may have been a different story. I also got the chance to borescope what I couldn't see and it all looks good. Some discoloration to the stainless inner wall in one part of the horizontal section, but it just looks like creosote staining.

I guess this did remind me not to fill the stove full of wood and walk away with it on high. And I will also continue to sweep the chimney often, I think I will go with once a month for now. I've never heard of a house fire from an overswept chimney.

 

[begreen]

I'm going to agree with both of you that this was an overfire and not a chimney fire. I just finished sweeping my chimney and hit small amounts of creosote halfway up all the way to the cap. I might have got 2 cups out of the whole thing. It definitely got hot, and if I had large creosote deposits this may have been a different story. I also got the chance to borescope what I couldn't see and it all looks good. Some discoloration to the stainless inner wall in one part of the horizontal section, but it just looks like creosote staining.

I guess this did remind me not to fill the stove full of wood and walk away with it on high. And I will also continue to sweep the chimney often, I think I will go with once a month for now. I've never heard of a house fire from an overswept chimney.

Set a kitchen timer or your cellphone timer to remind you to get back to the stove in a few minutes.

 

[ABMax24]

Set a kitchen timer or your cellphone timer to remind you to get back to the stove in a few minutes.

That would work. For now I just won't walk away from it, and if I'm really that busy it doesn't need to run, natural gas is still cheap.