We move into a mobile home that was built in 1964. The mobile home had a wood stove installed in it around 1980 (after market install). The wood stove I believe is a 1979 Fisher Baby Bear. It has a single vent in the front, flat top (not cathedral) door, 3 trees on the door, horizontal name, and no patent number on the door or location of manufacture. It has a 6" outlet. It has four bear feet. On the back of the stove attached to the flue opening is an appliance, I think it's some kind of iron offset. It's a square box with a Teed channel in it. One end of the T fits to the stove. The other end is 90' above this and goes vents to the stovepipe. The last part of the T has a barometric damper in it. In the T is a partial partition that separates the space in the box into two chambers below the stove pipe. Presumably to help channel cold air from the barometric damper up into into the stove pipe. The stove pipe when we moved in was single wall. It's about 6 feet in length in 3 2 foot sections. The diameter of the stove pipe is 6". The chimney is probably another 6-10' of pipe from the bottom of the ceiling support to the chimney cap. I'd say the whole venting system isn't more than 15-20ft being generous. Inside the house, there is a round ceiling support box. A section protrudes down from the ceiling. There is an opening facing the floor at the end of this protruding portion. On the inside of this opening (the opening is about 6.5" in diameter) is what appears to be insulated chimney pipe inset by about 2". Off the bottom of that insulated chimney pipe is a 6" in diamter, 1" long piece of single walled pipe (smooth, not crimped). Essentially the chimney pipe has a 1" single walled female end lip on its underside that the stove pipe is supposed to connect to. There does not appear to be coarse threads in there or anything but its hard to see. So picture a 6" in diameter female end of single walled pipe sticking off the bottom of insulated pipe by about an inch as an extension to the chimney pipe encased in a round trim on the ceiling and inset by about an inch in that trim,. The stove pipe inside the housed was installed upside down so the male or crimped end faced upwards toward the ceiling and the female or flat (smooth) end of the pipe faced down toward the stove. We were getting a lot of creosote falling down through the seams between sections of pipe.
Well, I set out to correct this problem in 5 minutes by turning the pipe to orient correctly. My first issue was I could not remove the pipe off the stove without removing the weird iron appliance off the back. It was too firmly pressed against the ceiling support box in the ceiling. So once I got the appliance off, I dropped the whole assembly and the pipe came easily out of the ceiling. I went to turn the pipe around but the male or crimped edge of the single walled pipe would not fit inside the outlet on the appliance. So That's one reason it was likely installed upside down. They could fit the female end of the stove pipe over the outlet so the effect was that the appliance created a male end off the stove. Therefore, I figured I could just remove the appliance, attach an elbow and then I could finally have the stove pipe oriented correctly.
We did some research and learned that mobile homes need double walled pipe. We bought an elbow and a telescoping straight (rigid) double walled pipe. My understanding is the male end of double walled pipe is crimped on the inside and the female end of double walled pipe is crimped on the outside. Additionally, there are stickers that indicate flow direction. We were able to install the elbow easily and it fit into the telescoping portion but when it came time to run the telescoping pipe to the ceiling support box, I ran into an issue that you may have seen coming, but I didn't, from my description above.
The long and the short of it is this: I'm running the female end of double walled pipe up to a 6" single walled female end and they don't want to come together. There's still a possibility of user error here but I've tried and tried any way I can to fit those ends together and it just won't
I don't see any brand or stamp of the ceiling support box and there are no screw holes. When I press up on the pipe in the ceiling support box it feels like i'm moving the entire chimney up. I can't twist anything out of there, it's pretty well fixed but resting on the ceiling support box.
I am thinking of getting a male to male coupler. It's available in single wall only online. Nobody around here has something like that. I'd have to fit the male end inside the female end of both the chimney and the double walled pipe. Therefore, I'd have a small 6" section of single wall pipe by the ceiling that would create a seam that is upside for some creosote to fall through. It wouldn't be strictly code and it wouldn't stop all of the creosote but it would solve 90% of the problem for $6 plus shipping I don't know the brand of the ceiling support box/pipe and I don't even know if they'd still be in business 40 years later. So I could run into compatibility issues.
I'm not willing to rip up the chimney and install something modern in a house from 1964.
I could put everything back together how it was or I could install the double walled pipe upside down.
I like that the barometric damper is removed. Based on my research it seems like it was doing more harm that good. its not adjusted properly anyways so a tech would need to come out.
I'll attach some pictures that probably aren't too clear.
What do you think I should do?
Well, I set out to correct this problem in 5 minutes by turning the pipe to orient correctly. My first issue was I could not remove the pipe off the stove without removing the weird iron appliance off the back. It was too firmly pressed against the ceiling support box in the ceiling. So once I got the appliance off, I dropped the whole assembly and the pipe came easily out of the ceiling. I went to turn the pipe around but the male or crimped edge of the single walled pipe would not fit inside the outlet on the appliance. So That's one reason it was likely installed upside down. They could fit the female end of the stove pipe over the outlet so the effect was that the appliance created a male end off the stove. Therefore, I figured I could just remove the appliance, attach an elbow and then I could finally have the stove pipe oriented correctly.
We did some research and learned that mobile homes need double walled pipe. We bought an elbow and a telescoping straight (rigid) double walled pipe. My understanding is the male end of double walled pipe is crimped on the inside and the female end of double walled pipe is crimped on the outside. Additionally, there are stickers that indicate flow direction. We were able to install the elbow easily and it fit into the telescoping portion but when it came time to run the telescoping pipe to the ceiling support box, I ran into an issue that you may have seen coming, but I didn't, from my description above.
The long and the short of it is this: I'm running the female end of double walled pipe up to a 6" single walled female end and they don't want to come together. There's still a possibility of user error here but I've tried and tried any way I can to fit those ends together and it just won't
I don't see any brand or stamp of the ceiling support box and there are no screw holes. When I press up on the pipe in the ceiling support box it feels like i'm moving the entire chimney up. I can't twist anything out of there, it's pretty well fixed but resting on the ceiling support box.
I am thinking of getting a male to male coupler. It's available in single wall only online. Nobody around here has something like that. I'd have to fit the male end inside the female end of both the chimney and the double walled pipe. Therefore, I'd have a small 6" section of single wall pipe by the ceiling that would create a seam that is upside for some creosote to fall through. It wouldn't be strictly code and it wouldn't stop all of the creosote but it would solve 90% of the problem for $6 plus shipping I don't know the brand of the ceiling support box/pipe and I don't even know if they'd still be in business 40 years later. So I could run into compatibility issues.
I'm not willing to rip up the chimney and install something modern in a house from 1964.
I could put everything back together how it was or I could install the double walled pipe upside down.
I like that the barometric damper is removed. Based on my research it seems like it was doing more harm that good. its not adjusted properly anyways so a tech would need to come out.
I'll attach some pictures that probably aren't too clear.
What do you think I should do?
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