BK Princess with sizzling and smells in chimney -

[fireplacenoob]

My second year burning with blaze king princess. I clean chimney before season start. I notice when my stove had a long burn but is inactive and i add fuel i start getting a little popping sizzling sound in chimney. When i get to active and close the flue handle the real sizzling sound starts and chemical like burn smell where i have to open windows. I'm scared I'm going to have a chimney fire, it sounds and smells intimidating.

Should i do a chimney high temp burn, my v question with that is do i do that with the bypass open or closed and should i be concerned with all the sound happening in the chimney?

 

[Sprinter]

I'm only here to encourage you not to do anything until you hear from one of our Blaze King or chimney sweep experts. If your whole flue is really clean, there probably is no threat of a chimney fire, and I wouldn't do any kind of high temp burn in any case.

Chemical smell on a new-ish stove is usually just the special paint curing, but the sizzling would concern me. Maybe having to do with the cat? Or just the flue reacting to the temperature change? Just about any stove and flue can snap, crackle, and pop as it heats up, but if this is the second season for you, you should have experienced that before.

It's getting late now, so hang in there until morning if necessary. Normally, I'd say it was all normal stuff, but since this is your second year and it's all new, I don't know.

 

[jetsam]

A loud sizzling noise and strong chemical smell is not a good sign of anything, but the good news is that a hollow 6" tube isn't a complex system.

I'd start by letting the stove go out, inspecting the flue, sweeping it, and inspecting it again. Should get rid of whatever's in there in about 15 minutes!

If it is a free standing stove, put something under the pipe before you disconnect it, must be water or black goo in there if it's sizzling and smelling chemically. (I'd say that a bird or squirrel is possible, but that wouldn't be a chemical smell.)

Once you get that sorted, figure out how that stuff got in your flue (do you still have a cap on your flue, or has it blown merrily off into the treeline?).

I wouldn't advise burning the stove until you get things resolved; could be creosote, and a chimney fire can ruin your day in a hurry.

 

[begreen]

Is there a thermometer on the stovepipe? If not, has the stovepipe changed color?

 

[kennyp2339]

Sizzling sound could just be the metal chimney pipe heating up and expanding, during my reloading it sounds like something it falling into the stove, like creosote or something, but really there's nothing in there its just the metal heating up slowly since these stoves have low flue temps compared to other stoves.
Chemical smell.. could be a number of things, if this is a new setup it could be the paint curing again since the chimney temps don't get that high, it really hasn't gotten a chance to cure.
Every once in a while if I burn a hot load of oak and get the stove cruising real good then turn it down and go outside I get a metal burning smell, it doesn't usually last more than a couple minutes but I suspect its the cat burning at a high temp and with the draft slowing down due to the t-stat being turned down the smell just kind of oozes out, again I'm not remotely worried about it, this is my 4th season and my cat is still good and stays active.

 

[fireplacenoob]

I can burn at very high temps and not have this problem, it happens when i open the bypass load wood let it get back into active and shut the bypass. Its like i choked something out and get sizzling and popping.

Also people say to burn hot every few fires, is that with the bypass open or closed? Is the purpose to burn all the creosote build up and if so I would think it means bypass open to get all that heat directly into the flue instead of the catalytic?

 

[kennyp2339]

You burn hot with the bypass closed, try to burn hot once a week for atleast 30 min, T stat all the way open
As far as the smells occurring with the by-pass open, perhaps your getting the load to hot before closing the by-pass, with the by-pass open your allowing direct flames to go up your flue, high heat like that will cause the sounds and smells your describing. This maybe a quick fix, take your cat probe out and clean it off with a wire brush or light sand paper.
The cat probe tells the story about temps about 10 -15 min after the fact, that just maybe enough time to be causing your issues with hotter flue temps.

 

[tarzan]

Just to emphasize, Always close the bypass once cat thermometer shows active. Burning hot with the bypass open has the potential of wrecking your stove.

Since your into your second season with this stove and this seems to be something that just started happening recently I would shut down to do an inspection. If cleaning the flue is not to terribly difficult I would just have my cleaning tools ready when I shut it down. If nothing else, you'll have peace of mind of knowing for sure the flue is clean and what was in it.

 

[fireplacenoob]

This happened my first year running as well but I just thought it was part of the curing process

Also on rare occasion before turning the bypass 2 closed we will have smoke come through the seams of the flue and Puff Smoke back into the room I don't know if this happens particularly on Windy days or not sorry for a grammar I'm on mobile

 

[Highbeam]

Any "hot" burn with the BK must be done with the bypass closed, which means cat engaged. You can leave the stat at full throttle for the full load if you want. The manual says 20-30 minutes with every load and BK recommends a full hour weekly if you've been burning a lot on low.

I don't know that doing this will remove accumulations from a dirty flue or not. I would rather sweep a dirty chimney than try to burn it out. The purpose of the high burn on a BK is to burn the gooey tar out of the firebox and burn the water out of that fuel load.

 

[BKVP]

Any "hot" burn with the BK must be done with the bypass closed, which means cat engaged. You can leave the stat at full throttle for the full load if you want. The manual says 20-30 minutes with every load and BK recommends a full hour weekly if you've been burning a lot on low.

I don't know that doing this will remove accumulations from a dirty flue or not. I would rather sweep a dirty chimney than try to burn it out. The purpose of the high burn on a BK is to burn the gooey tar out of the firebox and burn the water out of that fuel load.

If the chimney was cleaned without disconnecting the black pipe at the top of the stove, you may have a large pile of creosote in the top of the stove. This would definitely have the potential to put off a acrid smells.

 

[fireplacenoob]

I disconnected it all and clean out the upper chamber of the stove where there was accumulation and clean out the entire chimney.

 

[BKVP]

I disconnected it all and clean out the upper chamber of the stove where there was accumulation and clean out the entire chimney.

Ok...

 

[fireplacenoob]

Ok...

Sorry, what i mean to say with this is, after the entire cleaning before burn season, I dont think its the build up in the upper stove region that would be smelling, but I just burned at 3 and went high temp for an entire burn I will update with results.

 

[tarzan]

When i get to active and close the flue handle the real sizzling sound starts and chemical like burn smell where i have to open windows. I'm scared I'm going to have a chimney fire, it sounds and smells intimidating.

What part of this made you decide you should burn hotter?

 

[fireplacenoob]

The

What part of this made you decide you should burn hotter?

The fact that i know that i clean and inspected the stove and flue 2 months ago and it was pretty clean, i could see all the steel, so my thought was build up could not be that critical right now. Im wondering now if build up is happening at my 45 degree connector before going to the ceiling.

Still probably not the smartest idea.

 

[tarzan]

The


The fact that i know that i clean and inspected the stove and flue 2 months ago and it was pretty clean, i could see all the steel, so my thought was build up could not be that critical right now. Im wondering now if build up is happening at my 45 degree connector before going to the ceiling.

Still probably not the smartest idea.

Well, your braver than I am lol.

Did the hot burn change things?