When to clean my stove......Fire hazard?

[Brian512]

Hi everyone, I recently joined this site and have had one question answered that i was completely satisfied with. Now I have a huge question to ask. When should i clean my flue? I have had a stove for 2 years now and this is my second year burning. Some of the wood is seasoned and some is not due to poor stacking which will be fixed in the spring time. I am not a lazy person, so honest opinions are greatly appreciated and i will be cleaning my flue tomorrow if told to do so. I have burned around 2.5 cords of wood so far and i have noticed that the stove is burning at a lower temperature and the wood is taking much longer to burn than it usually does. I took some pictures to show how the flue looks on the inside around 6 feet from the actual stove itself. The stove is a heatilator ws22 with a 6" SS flue pipe. The buildup is coming out as cone shaped and not an even coating, I'm not sure if that is normal. Also, I have been reading that shiny buildup is very dangerous, and I have noticed that is starting to form as you can see in the pictures. The buildup is not 1/8" thick and i read that it should definitely be cleaned if there is 1/4" thick creosote in the pipes. Please check out the pictures and let me know if its time to clean it. I cleaned it once before from the top to the bottom and I will be cleaning from the bottom this time due to all of the snow on my roof. Thank you all in advance for the kind responses. The last thing I want to do is have an unnecessary fire in my flue and burn down my house and destroy my family's life. Thanks again for any input

 

[KindredSpiritzz]

well you can never clean to much to be safe. Personally i think you can go a few more weeks before you clean it but im going off experience with mine.
Heres a pic of mine when i clean it. Probably twice as thick as yours.

 

[firefighterjake]

Having a sense of deja vu here.
This thread seem vaguely familiar.

My answer stands . . .


My answer would be to clean the chimney if you get 1/4 inch of creosote build up. Personally, I inspect and sweep monthly . . . but I am admittedly going overboard as I would never hear the end of it due to my line of work if I ever had a chimney fire.

Most folks here generally sweep once to twice a year. Once at the start of the burning season and once halfway through.

I don't think the build up looks all that bad honestly.

By the way, posting pics as thumbnails is often easier . . . especially for those folks who still may be on dial up. Even those of us on DSL,thumbnails just makes it easier to scroll through the post.

Finally, welcome to hearth.com.

 

[HotCoals]

The stage 3 at the seems bothers me. I would clean it sooner then latter.

 

[Brian512]

I completely agree with the stage 3 buildup. I wonder why there is stage 3 without having too much creosote buildup everywhere? I also heard that stage 3 is a pain to get off. hopefully it comes off with just a poly brush. I have been using a poly brush because i was told that the ss brushes will damage my flue because it is SS itself. thanks for the info. Any other advise? I look forward to reading when other people clean their flues. thanks

 

[Fred Wright]

That's not a lot of accumulation but I'd suggest brushing your flue anyhow, just to sleep better.

 

[HotCoals]

I completely agree with the stage 3 buildup. I wonder why there is stage 3 without having too much creosote buildup everywhere? I also heard that stage 3 is a pain to get off. hopefully it comes off with just a poly brush. I have been using a poly brush because i was told that the ss brushes will damage my flue because it is SS itself. thanks for the info. Any other advise? I look forward to reading when other people clean their flues. thanks

I'm thinking the cooler room air infiltrates the seems and condenses the flue gasses easier in those locations. Probably another good reason for double wall.
Though I have yet to see that happen in my single.
Wood is suspect.

 

[Brian512]

I'm thinking the cooler room air infiltrates the seems and condenses the flue gasses easier in those locations. Probably another good reason for double wall.
Though I have yet to see that happen in my single.
Wood is suspect.

Hey, the flue is a double wall and i do agree with you that the air is probably getting in at the seems since thats the only place that I am getting the build up. The wood is most definitely the problem. I need better air circulation in my drying stacks. well, looks like I will be cleaning my fllue tomorrow. Hopefully i am able to get the stage 3 off with just the poly brush. I do not have any other means of removing it otherwise. thank you.

 

[HotCoals]

Hey, the flue is a double wall and i do agree with you that the air is probably getting in at the seems since thats the only place that I am getting the build up. The wood is most definitely the problem. I need better air circulation in my drying stacks. well, looks like I will be cleaning my fllue tomorrow. Hopefully i am able to get the stage 3 off with just the poly brush. I do not have any other means of removing it otherwise. thank you.

I didn't realize it was double wall. Yes get cleaning it.
If you take the pipes all apart I think you would be able to use a wire brush at the seems if need be?

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Clean the chimney when you need to. You noticed a performance decrease so that sounds like you need to clean the chimney regardless of the buildup in there and which stage the creosote is. FWIW, the buildup doesn't look dangerous to me, but if burning is compromised than you need to fix the issue.

Matt

 

[stoveguy2esw]

I completely agree with the stage 3 buildup. I wonder why there is stage 3 without having too much creosote buildup everywhere? I also heard that stage 3 is a pain to get off. hopefully it comes off with just a poly brush. I have been using a poly brush because i was told that the ss brushes will damage my flue because it is SS itself. thanks for the info. Any other advise? I look forward to reading when other people clean their flues. thanks

seams are getting some air leakage I suspect, the slight bit of cool air is condensing the soot there , not much of a leak but I suspect its there. not a "danger" thing requiring immediate correction, but when the season is over you may want to visit that area and see if you have a loose locking band or a misfitting section in need of being reseated.

 

[stoveguy2esw]

but I am admittedly going overboard as I would never hear the end of it due to my line of work if I ever had a chimney fire.

I feel ya jake, I'm as anal as one can be mostly due to the job. nothing wrong with that, were everyone to be going overboard that way it might save you and your fellow smoke eaters some calls.

hope the winter season hasn't been a bad one for you and your house bro! I know from experience that hard winters produce busy times for firefighters

 

[Seanm]

When you get the feeling you should scrub then scrub, like a member above says it will help you sleep better. When I had my smoke dragon I would clean it three times a year and now that I have a epa stove I just cant break my habit and still clean three times a year even though I dont need to. I feel great about my families safety after spending the 45 minutes to clean even if the results prove that I didnt need to climb up on the roof. On a side not I noticed a neighbor across the street a couple of weeks ago have a chimney fire which just confirms for me the need to take care of my chimney and continue to be diligent about the moisture content of my wood (12%-18%)

 

[Jdog]

When you guys clean do you take the sections down or just run the brush down when everything is still connected? Im going to look see on mine today and mabe clean it fri. Ill post some pics of what i see.

 

[firefighterjake]

When you guys clean do you take the sections down or just run the brush down when everything is still connected? Im going to look see on mine today and mabe clean it fri. Ill post some pics of what i see.

No assembly . . . or disassembly . . . necessary. Everything stays connected with my install while cleaning.

 

[Jdog]

ok thx.... But if i have to take down the top section thats ok right? And is there anything i need besides the brush. I bought the polly brush and poles didnt know if there was a solvent needed or what. From what i see on my cap its just black flacky like ash stuff around the rim and in it does that sound normal?

 

[Brian512]

I cleaned my flue last night. I collected less than half a gallon of soot. I will just clean mid season every year to keep my head cool. I cleaned from the bottom up last night, so i did not clean the cap on the roof. I am pretty sure that the cap will be fine throughout the whole season. I will clean the cap and from the top down to the bottom when the season is over and the weather gets nice. My poly brush pretty much took care of the shiny creosote. I will use the creosote remover powder to dry up the rest of the shiny creosote so i can easily brush it out. thanks for all of the advise. I needed to clean my flue for my own head. great site......thanks again

 

[tsquini]

The minute you start thinking about cleaning the chimney that is a sign that you need to do it. There is no set rule for the amount of creosote to cleaning or chimney fire. For me all it took was reading a few recent posts about chimney fires. I couldn't stop thinking about it. I had to shut her down and give her a nice brushing. I am sleeping better now.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Brian, I do not think this is critical but I would still suggest cleaning with the brush. I would not be concerned yet about that little glaze and think you would be wasting time and money monkeying with that. Just do the regular cleaning and you should be fine. As others have stated, you can do some further checking in the spring or summer to tighten things up a bit.

On the wood stacking, yes, air circulation is the big thing. Do not try to stack for a pretty stack though; you need to stack it a bit loose which will allow for the better air circulation. If you are stacking for 3 or 4 years ahead, then you can go for the tight and pretty stacks. Make sure you stack off the ground. We simply use saplings cut to 8' or 10' lengths. Lay down two and stack on them. Here is how we do it:

You can see especially in the first picture the saplings that we lay down. The wood does not have to be high off the ground; just so the wood is not touching ground. We also stack to approximately 4 1/2' high. Stacking higher is possible but most folks who stack higher also have problems with the stacks falling over. I hate re-stacking. And for what it is worth, we typically split and stack in March/April. We top cover the wood usually around December 1 and then wait. We let Mother Nature do the drying and we try to stay 3 years or so ahead on our wood piles. The benefits of being that far ahead are numerous but the best parts is that the wood burns better and you'll burn less wood to get the needed heat. Well, it is also better than money in the bank as interest rates are not very high for sure and that wood pile won't even be taxed.