Dripping noise in stove pipe - is it water?

[albertj03]

I loaded up the stove this morning like normal and as soon as the stove pipe started heating up I could hear something dripping inside the pipe. I looked in the back of the stove with a flashlight and could see that the back wall looked wet. I never noticed this before and it wasn't raining last night. It has been warm though for the last couple of days and hit 50 yesterday. With these warm temps and a lot of snow on the ground there has been a lot of moisture in the air.

Is it possible that moisture from the air got all the way down in the stove pipe in my basement and condensed in there? I was worried that it could be creosote so I kept a real close eye on it and the dripping stopped after a minute or two and everything is normal now. The chimney is clay lined going up through the middle of the house and single wall pipe from stove to stainless thimble in chimney. I have the chimney and pipe cleaned every year and have never had much creosote build up at all and my wood is well seasoned. Any ideas?

 

[Jags]

Sounds like you melted something. Moisture freeze at the top, maybe?? Some snow pack that got warmed up??

 

[corey21]

Frozen water on the cap or a little soot you did not know about.

 

[albertj03]

Sounds like you melted something. Moisture freeze at the top, maybe?? Some snow pack that got warmed up??

Could have been snow or ice from the chimney cap melted, dripped down the chimney and made it's way into the stove pipe. Where it was dripping sounded like it was dripping from the top of the horizontal run that goes into the chimney and hitting the bottom of that same pipe. I guess it makes sense that water running down the side of the chimney would condense in the top of the pipe. I guess the only way to know for sure what is going on in there is to take out the pipe and have a look. I usually avoid doing this myself because I can never seem to get the pipe back on right and line up the screw holes.