1st cleaning - and riser add on

[DixieChick]

Hi -
We got our Enviro Milan insert in last year. It was late getting in and the riser skirt was not scheduled to come in for another 6 weeks at best. We decided to go ahead with the install and deal with the skirt later. We got it in Dec but opted to wait to install since it is just for looks. The skirt raises the stove a couple of inches to hide the opening left from the fireplace.
We cleaned the stove, pulled it out and installed the skirt. Now..
He had to take off the piece that connects the stove to the pipe so that we can cut 2" off and re-install. It is a T shape that looks to be designed to hold some dust in the bottom. It was almost full of dust and this thing is 6 inches deep. It only ran one season. Is this normal?
Putting it back together has been halted so that I can get the sealant that goes between the pipe and the T piece.
Sooo- my 2 questions:
Is that much dust normal? It seems that after a few more weeks of burning there would be no air circulation.
Anything else we might need to know about the sealant or putting the stove back together?

THANK YOU

 

[imacman]

.........Is that much dust normal? It seems that after a few more weeks of burning there would be no air circulation.......

Dixie, let me guess...you're talking about the "T" on the exhaust pipe, right? Well, I don't know how many tons of pellets you ran through the stove last winter, but if you never cleaned the "T", normally people clean it out after each ton burned (along with the rest of the stove).

I guess it could partially block off the exhaust, making the stove run poor, but I've never heard on this forum of anyone actually having a stove that had the "T" completely blocked.

 

[gutterboy2ca]

I ran 248 Bags on my last winter being my first winter,no elect heat at all.15 Gallon barrel was 3/4 full of ash from 248 bags, when cleaning stove and pipes couple weeks ago for fall start-up there was approx 1 inch of soot in the cleanout-T on my 4 inch Pipe, never touched it all winter.I'd say you better be looking for a low ash Pellet in your area, sounds as if its way to high for the consumption your using.

 

[jtakeman]

Most use a rule of thumb to brush the vent after every ton of usage.

Some are using the leaf blower trick.

jay