Advice About a Sleeve Type Interface at the Ceiling Support Box

[Fractal20]

Hi All,

I was hoping to ask two questions. As I'm sure will be come clear quickly, I'm pretty ignorant and would welcome any advice. The first one is quick, I have a damper in the first single wall chimney pipe above my stove that I am planning on removing. I was wondering if the two small holes left in the pipe will be an issue? If so, would you just suggest patching it with stove cement or something like that? Or to replace the section?

The second one is more about seeking advice about the interface where the stove pipe goes through the ceiling and into the ceiling support box and appears to be of the old sleeve variety. I've attached a picture below if helpful. When I sweep the chimney, I get a dusting of soot/creosote that falls out from that interface. From doing some Googling, it sounds like that can suggest a safety hazard, but I wasn't sure if that is considered okay as long as there is a decent overlap up into the sleeve. Most of what I read seemed to be more concerned about if there was very little overlap or if it could slip out.

I was also wondering if this older type of interface affects the draft. My stove is a quadrafire 4300 and I have felt like the dampers don't have a noticeable affect. Would the this sleeve interface affect that?

 

[stoveliker]

You can fill the holes with two bolts.

I'm not sure about the rest. The (flue?) damper not doing much is odd.
How tall is the flue from stove top to chimney cap?

Leaks decrease draft.

 

[Murray01]

If you’re getting soot falling when sweeping you can probably assume cold air is being sucked in when burning, cooling down the flue gases.

It appears from my untrained eye you have a decorative collar hiding the actual connection of the stove pipe to the ceiling support box. If so remove the decorative collar and see how the stove pipe is connected to the support box.

As stated above bolts work, I prefer sheet metal screws with half the screw cut off and painted black.

 

[Eman85]

What direction is the pipe installed? Soot shouldn't be able to escape the pipe.

 

[Fractal20]

If you’re getting soot falling when sweeping you can probably assume cold air is being sucked in when burning, cooling down the flue gases.

It appears from my untrained eye you have a decorative collar hiding the actual connection of the stove pipe to the ceiling support box. If so remove the decorative collar and see how the stove pipe is connected to the support box.

As stated above bolts work, I prefer sheet metal screws with half the screw cut off and painted black.

There is a decorative collar, and I'll plan on taking it off to double check, but the sleeve comes down below the collar, and that is where the soot comes out when I sweep the chimney.

 

[Fractal20]

You can fill the holes with two bolts.

I'm not sure about the rest. The (flue?) damper not doing much is odd.
How tall is the flue from stove top to chimney cap?

Leaks decrease draft.

I'll have to measure to be sure, but it's about 2.5 lengths of the screw together chimney sweep. I'm guessing those are 8 feet long? So that would suggest 20 feet total or so. When I write that it seems too short, I'll measure it.

 

[stoveliker]

ok. At 20 ft I'd leave the damper in.
You're more likely to have too much draft (than not enough), possibly mitigated by leaking flue pipe, so you don't experience it - but that should be fixed, if it leaks, at which point you may benefit from the flue damper.

 

[Fractal20]

ok. At 20 ft I'd leave the damper in.
You're more likely to have too much draft (than not enough), possibly mitigated by leaking flue pipe, so you don't experience it - but that should be fixed, if it leaks, at which point you may benefit from the flue damper.

If I can ask a follow up with that, my interest in removing the flue damper was that I currently am not sweeping the foot or so of stove pipe from the top of the stove to the damper. Is that a concern at all?

 

[stoveliker]

Yes, that should be swept (too).
You can't sweep it from the bottom up? (I don't know the innards of your insert, but from the pics it seems to be possible.)
Many here (incl. me) use a flexible rod rotary sweeping kit. Like a weedwhacker on flexible rods.
SootEater is one brand.

Another way would be to just take off the stove pipe with the damper (I presume you have a telescoping section?) and take it outside to sweep there.
I do that every time I sweep.

 

[Fractal20]

Yes, that should be swept (too).
You can't sweep it from the bottom up? (I don't know the innards of your insert, but from the pics it seems to be possible.)
Many here (incl. me) use a flexible rod rotary sweeping kit. Like a weedwhacker on flexible rods.
SootEater is one brand.

Another way would be to just take off the stove pipe with the damper (I presume you have a telescoping section?) and take it outside to sweep there.
I do that every time I sweep.

Those are all reasonable options. I've just been lazy. I can get a flexible one to go from the bottom or just take out the section each time.