Crazy bad smells and black smoke

[VC Encore new owner]

Hi everyone,
Running a new VC Encore, installed October.
Everything was burned off during break in fires.
Last week, however, the stove had horrible black pungent smoke coming out from stack, as well as stinking up the house. The dogs threw up. I had watery eyes, sinus issues, and horrible metallic taste in mouth, coughing like crazy.

Let the fire burn down and opened windows.

The following day, there was rust like ash inside the stove, with tiny metal flakes. The entire inside of the stove was/is coated with that discolored rust like soot with the metallic flakes.

So, did the catalyst react with a possible nail or piece of metal in the firewood?

After a thorough cleaning, soot eater thru the pipe, examined the catalyst, vacuum that area out also from soot falling while cleaning, put it back together.

Started a small fire the next day and instantly tasted the same thing, eyes watering.

At a loss, cannot use the wood stove. Looks like an expensive waste of money at this point.

Could the stove be “poisoned” now and do a complete tear down and clean everything on all inside stove components?

Thanks for any input on your experience if this happened to you and how it was resolved.

Awaiting the dealer to get back to me after contacting the manufacturer. Dealer has never heard of this before.

 

[Kevin Weis]

Right off would be questioning the wood that was being burned in the stove. The only wood that I can think of with that brown type ash was burning pressure treated wood. That would explain the other issues mentioned. Hope your not burning anything that was pressure treated. Contains copper arsenic, not good!

 

[VC Encore new owner]

Right off would be questioning the wood that was being burned in the stove. The only wood that I can think of with that brown type ash was burning pressure treated wood. That would explain the other issues mentioned. Hope your not burning anything that was pressure treated. Contains copper arsenic, not good!

Hi Kevin, never burned any pressure treated wood in it…

 

[Kevin Weis]

Is there a chance some of your wood got exposed to some chemical somewhere along the way? This is what seems likely to me. I don't believe it's from the stove. I think the brown ash is from the wood burned. Discolored ash I've found has been from wood that's been contaminated with something. What's your wood source?

 

[VC Encore new owner]

Is there a chance some of your wood got exposed to some chemical somewhere along the way? This is what seems likely to me. I don't believe it's from the stove. I think the brown ash is from the wood burned. Discolored ash I've found has been from wood that's been contaminated with something. What's your wood source?

Thanks for the info, it very well could have been a contaminated piece. I got the wood from a local supplier.