BK - king cleaning from bottom up, sooteater?

[Dustin]

Is it okay to clean this thing from the bottom up, from within the stove? Or, do I need to pull the pipe to avoid gunk on the cat?

Thanks!

 

[stoveliker]

It is okay.
However, you may have to vacuum behind the cat. You will have to clean the gasket of the bypass door.

I find that all to be easier if the pipe is off.

But for the cleaning, it's possibly cleaner (dust) if you do it thru the stove.

 

[Highbeam]

Is it okay to clean this thing from the bottom up, from within the stove? Or, do I need to pull the pipe to avoid gunk on the cat?

Thanks!

I do it every year. Don't forget to remove your probe meter if you have one in the pipe. After a thorough sweeping from through the firebox door I put away the sooteater and then pop the pipe off the stove to vacuum out the dome. That is the chamber behind the cat and above the bypass. After I clean all of that out I lube up the bypass ramp and put it back together.

In a pinch, if you're flexible and have a smallish shopvac hose, you can get almost every bit of the swept debris sucked out of the dome without removing the pipe. You'll need to be able to grab onto the open bypass plate and lift it up towards the stove top to get vacuum access to the back of the cat.

The stuff that falls into the stove from sweeping won't be "gunk" but it should be black or brown flakes of dry light stuff. No goo. Super easy to vacuum. The cat is almost vertical so the debris will fall to the base of the cat. Most of the debris will fall straight down through the open bypass into the firebox.