I have a Fireview 205 – absolutely love it, it came with the cabin when we bought it, and this is now our third winter here. Fairly certain the chimney had never been cleaned before we moved in because there was a LOT of build up in there the first time I cleaned it out. I make sure to clean and inspect at the start and end of the season. Prior to moving up here I had no experience with burning wood, but I've tried to do a lot of research and have spent a fair amount of time reading threads here in the past to make sure I'm (hopefully) doing things right.
Last night we had a “small” chimney fire – concentrated just above the 90 degree elbow that comes out of the back of the stove. I was able to put it out by cutting off the airflow through the stove and a quick extinguisher shot into the elbow itself by lifting the top lid (I know, I know, opening the lid gave it a nice burst of air to feed off of, but I wasn’t sure what else to do).
Obviously did not rekindle a fire in the stove and luckily the cabin is insulated enough that the temperature indoors stayed tolerable through the night. Took the elbow off today for inspection of it and the stove pipe, there was some of the flaky creosote piled up in the elbow as if it had fallen down from further up and collected there, and the inside of the stove pipe seems to have a nice glaze of the shiny type creosote.
For peace of mind, I am going to replace the elbow and section of stove pipe directly above it that is single walled. There doesn’t appear to be any warping or visible damage, but the pipe did glow hot during the fire and I’m not sure about what sort of chemical reaction there might be from the extinguisher being discharged in there.
I cleaned out the upper part of the stove pipe that is double walled (goes through the second story of the cabin) with the Soot Eater. There appears to be a thin layer of that shiny glaze creosote there as well though. Am I going to have to replace that portion as well? Or would it be possible to clean it up with a more aggressive cleaning tool and/or would something like Cre-Away help loosen it up for removal?
What else do I need to know/do?
We are burning what I thought to be very nice, dry wood. Last season we unfortunately had to burn some greener wood out of necessity. Aside from the clunking two pieces of wood together to gauge ‘dryness’ by sound and weight, how do you judge this?
It may be worth mentioning that the CAT on this stove has one foot in the grave – we have had one on order from Woodstock Soapstone Company for awhile now, but they were out of stock when I first inquired about a replacement, and the most recent email from them has no estimated time of when they think they will get more in. We have continued to use the stove though as it is our only source of heat here. Not sure if that is a contributing factor at all.
Thanks in advance for your advice and input!
Last night we had a “small” chimney fire – concentrated just above the 90 degree elbow that comes out of the back of the stove. I was able to put it out by cutting off the airflow through the stove and a quick extinguisher shot into the elbow itself by lifting the top lid (I know, I know, opening the lid gave it a nice burst of air to feed off of, but I wasn’t sure what else to do).
Obviously did not rekindle a fire in the stove and luckily the cabin is insulated enough that the temperature indoors stayed tolerable through the night. Took the elbow off today for inspection of it and the stove pipe, there was some of the flaky creosote piled up in the elbow as if it had fallen down from further up and collected there, and the inside of the stove pipe seems to have a nice glaze of the shiny type creosote.
For peace of mind, I am going to replace the elbow and section of stove pipe directly above it that is single walled. There doesn’t appear to be any warping or visible damage, but the pipe did glow hot during the fire and I’m not sure about what sort of chemical reaction there might be from the extinguisher being discharged in there.
I cleaned out the upper part of the stove pipe that is double walled (goes through the second story of the cabin) with the Soot Eater. There appears to be a thin layer of that shiny glaze creosote there as well though. Am I going to have to replace that portion as well? Or would it be possible to clean it up with a more aggressive cleaning tool and/or would something like Cre-Away help loosen it up for removal?
What else do I need to know/do?
We are burning what I thought to be very nice, dry wood. Last season we unfortunately had to burn some greener wood out of necessity. Aside from the clunking two pieces of wood together to gauge ‘dryness’ by sound and weight, how do you judge this?
It may be worth mentioning that the CAT on this stove has one foot in the grave – we have had one on order from Woodstock Soapstone Company for awhile now, but they were out of stock when I first inquired about a replacement, and the most recent email from them has no estimated time of when they think they will get more in. We have continued to use the stove though as it is our only source of heat here. Not sure if that is a contributing factor at all.
Thanks in advance for your advice and input!
