SootEater dilemma...

[Mr. Kelly]

Hi all...

I finally got my act in gear and bought a SootEater... in an effort to clean the inside portion of my wood stove pipe... Summit Classic...

I have a wire cleaner that I used to do the outside portion which is straight up… but the inside portion has a twist up about 4 feet up from the stove that leads horizontally about 2 feet to the outside.

I made the mistake of not asking you guys about this before I bought this for theater, given that everyone says it's very flexible.

Here is the dilemma… The instructions suggest not to bend the rods at much of an angle, but to get the head of the sooeater in through the stove and up the pipe, it's going to be a fairly sharp angle, which the booklet strongly says to avoid. I guess I could just hook it up to the drill and try it to see what happens, but I figured I would ask you guys if this is what you do before I actually go ahead and do it… It's a deep stove, so the rods would have to go about a foot into the stove, and then bend fairly sharply upward.

So, just to get a feel for how it would work, I put the first rod on the head and hand-navigated it up into the pipe, and that alone got a ton of the larger stuff off the inside of the pipe. However, upon visual inspection, I still see that the inside of the pipe is lined with a thin layer of creosote. It is certainly not very thick, but you can see the gummy stuff on the side. Do you feel that this layer would be a detrimental situation, or, is the important part that I got the chunky stuff off the pipe... in other words... how clean is clean?

I took the whole pipe off about 5 years ago to clean it, but it was a real bear to reassemble... an all afternoon kind of thing...

I'll try to attach photos so you can see what I'm dealing with...

Thoughts of how to approach?

Thanks for any input you'd like to offer!!

 

[bholler]

With a horizontal run of pipe you need to pull it down otherwise there is no way to clean the debris out of that run.

 

[Mr. Kelly]

With a horizontal run of pipe you need to pull it down otherwise there is no way to clean the debris out of that run.

TY...

Well... outside, there is a "T" connector... which forms the 90 degree turn upward... The bottom of that piece has the usual cap, but to access the pipe inward to that inside horizontal run, there's about a 4-6" lip... which is going to force a bend with the sooteater. I scraped the pipe as far as I could with my hand, and got the chunky stuff off, but there's still the light gummy surface junk... what to do with that?

Does that gummy stuff concern you? What stuff gives the most chance of flammability...

 

[Highbeam]

Gummy stuff shouldn’t be there. Fuel quality or operational methods should be changed to prevent it and it should be removed from the system.

I would not push a sooteater through that interior pipe. I’ve broken one rod already in the much gentler bend getting through the firebox to my vertical flue.

 

[Squisher]

If you are having problems with creosote and build up in the pipe you should change to non-ventilated double wall connecting pipe. Ventilated double wall has the greatest heat loss of connecting pipe. More than single wall. Somewhere in my literature I have lab testing results which show this to be true and it is a point that has stuck with me from my courses. It causes the most heat loss period, due to the convection of air movement in the bottom and out the top vents. Reduced clearances and reduced performance.

I can't comment on the sooteater performance, never used one. My pro rotary system would have its way with that system forwards, backwards, inside and out, standing on your head.

What is above your pipe in the corner on the ceiling?

 

[Highbeam]

If you are having problems with creosote and build up in the pipe you should change to non-ventilated double wall connecting pipe. Ventilated double wall has the greatest heat loss of connecting pipe. More than single wall. Somewhere in my literature I have lab testing results which show this to be true and it is a point that has stuck with me from my courses. It causes the most heat loss period, due to the convection of air movement in the bottom and out the top vents. Reduced clearances and reduced performance.

I can't comment on the sooteater performance, never used one. My pro rotary system would have its way with that system forwards, backwards, inside and out, standing on your head.

What is above your pipe in the corner on the ceiling?

For the op’s benefit, doesn’t the pro rotary system use a drive shaft (rod) that is much thinner and flexible? More like a sewer cleaning snake?

The sooteater rods are very thick. I have to wonder why they didn’t use a thinner and more flexible rod.

 

[Squisher]

No my pro rods are thick and flexible. 1/2" can go through up to two 90's. I use the AW Perkins medusa head with their 'slick rods'. You could hire a chimney sweep many many times over for what a full setup would cost. Major overkill for a home owner.

To clean that out properly and effectively I'd be removing the pipe too as bholler said. To long of a horizontal to mess around cleaning up through the stove. Sheet up, good vacuum, undo the pipe and get one end into a bag, cover the other end, out through the nearest door and rotary it outside.

Doing it that way you wouldn't have to remove the baffle from the stove at all. I tape on a piece of smaller diameter heater hose to the end of my vacuum hose and vacuum off all above the baffle area and then the gasket that joins the baffle to the secondary air supply wouldn't need to be disturbed either.

I don't see getting away from removing the pipe. If you have a hard time getting the pipe back on, put a few marks on it where it attaches before removing to aid in lining everything back up.

 

[Squisher]

For the op’s benefit, doesn’t the pro rotary system use a drive shaft (rod) that is much thinner and flexible? More like a sewer cleaning snake?

The sooteater rods are very thick. I have to wonder why they didn’t use a thinner and more flexible rod.

You are thinking of the viper rotary systems or similar I think. The system I have chosen and use is different. 3' rods, buttonlock and a drill adapter. While my rods are very flexible and strong I prefer to keep things as straight as possible, forcing through bends can often mean chewing up expensive rods.

 

[bholler]

You are thinking of the viper rotary systems or similar I think. The system I have chosen and use is different. 3' rods, buttonlock and a drill adapter. While my rods are very flexible and strong I prefer to keep things as straight as possible, forcing through bends can often mean chewing up expensive rods.

That is the same stuff we use. I love it we have the 1/2" and the 5/8" rods.

 

[Squisher]

I have both sizes too. I use the 5/8"s on straight shots and to run chains. Glad to read with your vast experience that you see them as a worthwhile choice.

 

[Mr. Kelly]

Thanks everyone. I appreciate the input.

I'm including a pic I just took, looking up the pipe from the stove...

It looks worse in this pic... than with the eye...

What's your take? Does this look like a concern?

 

[Squisher]

That to me looks like you are running to cool. Also looking at your stove door glass I'd say you have either not full cured wood or run to cool. I have a summit pedestal b series and my glass never gets dark build up on it and the build up in my pipe is light and fluffy, not hard and glassy and stuck on.

That looks like it still needs a good aggressive cleaning to get the pipe clean.

Looks like somebody drilled/set self tapping fasteners and have distorted the inner pipe.

 

[Mr. Kelly]

Interestingly, the coating on the side is quite hard to remove. Even my tough fringernail couldn't really scrape the stuff off. How in the world would a sooteater get that stuff off?

Still wondering how imperative it is to get this stuff off...

 

[bholler]

Interestingly, the coating on the side is quite hard to remove. Even my tough fringernail couldn't really scrape the stuff off. How in the world would a sooteater get that stuff off?

Still trying to wonder how imperative it is to get this stuff off...

Yes you need to get it off it is flamable. And it also says you need to chsnge something. Either you are not running hot enough or your wood is wet or some combination of the 2

 

[Squisher]

Interestingly, the coating on the side is quite hard to remove. Even my tough fringernail couldn't really scrape the stuff off. How in the world would a sooteater get that stuff off?

Still trying to wonder how imperative it is to get this stuff off...

If you can't whip it off try reaching it with a wire brush or a screwdriver to scrape it off. If you can't get to it, disassemble it to get at it. You should really check out the rest of your chimney too.