Anyone know why I am noticing thin shiny creosote on the inside of the ash clean out door? Inside the area that hold the pan and the pan are clean.
dutchwest 2461 creosote on ash door
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As a first year burner, I am burning oak which is not properly seasoned. I have been mixing it with cedar from a tree I tyook down and had been dead for several years
Yeah, if there is more shiney stuff on the door than the walls, that would point to the door gasket as the creo will build up faster on the door which has been cooled by incoming air.
Right. Gaskets are easy to replace but if you get some good fuel that will be even better.
btw, we are on our 6th year with our stove and not replaced the door gasket yet. On our old stove we went somewhere around 20 years before it needed replacing. Burning good fuel gives good results in many areas. Oak needs 3 years to dry after it has been split. Best to get something else for next winter, but then, you should already have next winter's wood stacked out in the wind drying right now!
btw, we are on our 6th year with our stove and not replaced the door gasket yet. On our old stove we went somewhere around 20 years before it needed replacing. Burning good fuel gives good results in many areas. Oak needs 3 years to dry after it has been split. Best to get something else for next winter, but then, you should already have next winter's wood stacked out in the wind drying right now!
How is the CAT temp ? In order for creosote to build up on the ash drawer door it must be coming in contact with smoke. Smoke doesn't belong down there. Do you have good draft?
Excellent draft...800-1200 for a cat temp. This morning is the first I had seen the creo. it is very glossy and flakes off if I touch it. I agree with the smoke not being there. Our season is about over here in georgia...eager to see what a good cleaning shows. The last load was all cedar and burned very hot, even with the air barely open. in fact, I sat up with it for 3 hours to make certain the flu didn't get to hot. It ran about 500 which was normal. When I had reloaded it in the night, I had cracked the ash pan door to increase the draft. I did this with the cat engaged and the cat temp was very low...maybe I just answered my own question...ya think?
I'm not familiar with burning cedar, but if there is enough creo on the door that it actually flakes off, that kinda tells me that this has been going on for some time. if the door gasket were bad, and smoke is present at the ash drawer wouldn't the house fill with smoke?? This is just too wierd. I just looked at mine and all I see is a little black soot. Do you suppose liquid creo is running down from the firebox? Do you see any shiny creo inside the firebox, esp. on the front doors??
Matt Ruggeri
New Member
I started seeing this too. We have the same stove (what a nightmare of a jigsaw puzzle in repairs! retiring it after this season), re-gasketed the ash pan door, and all the other ones while i was at it, and problem was solved! Don't know how long you've had this stove, but it is a complete nightmare if you're not burning properly seasoned wood..
err.....with 16 years of long winters with my DW 2460 I .....have never....got the fire going/revived with the cat damper closed AND the ash door opened a crack. My guess is that if this common practice for you that this is your creosote issue. 500
at the cat probe is the low side of normal for these stoves, mines spends most of its burning time with the cat probe temp between 800-1400 only seeing 500 on the way up or down.
Ashful
Minister of Fire
I'm in my second year burning a downdraft cat stove (actually, two downdraft cat stoves, now), and have also been dealing with less than optimum wood. I have also been mixing cedar in with 10-month to 1-year hardwoods, and if the wire mesh on my chimney cap means anything, I've managed to keep it completely clean. I was expecting at least 1 demerit from my chimney sweep last summer, after my first year of burning, but he reported my flue was very clean. Nothing abnormal.
Perhaps cat stoves do a better job at preventing creosote, even with less than ideal wood, as I remember one very ugly photo of begreen's chimney cap. I can almost guarantee his wood, even if stacked outdoors (like mine!) is better than mine.
The primary trouble here is achieving catalyst lite-off, although it sounds like you're not having trouble with that, likely due to your good draft. The F12 on my taller chimney lights off with very little trouble, but the one on the shorter chimney is often a struggle. I suspect your "500F" was a flue temp, not a cat probe temp, as Hardrockmaple had assumed. You clearly state "800-1200F for a cat temp."
Perhaps cat stoves do a better job at preventing creosote, even with less than ideal wood, as I remember one very ugly photo of begreen's chimney cap. I can almost guarantee his wood, even if stacked outdoors (like mine!) is better than mine.
The primary trouble here is achieving catalyst lite-off, although it sounds like you're not having trouble with that, likely due to your good draft. The F12 on my taller chimney lights off with very little trouble, but the one on the shorter chimney is often a struggle. I suspect your "500F" was a flue temp, not a cat probe temp, as Hardrockmaple had assumed. You clearly state "800-1200F for a cat temp."
I bought an infrared thermometer to measure various tempertures around the stove and I discovered the the CAT probe temperature is extremely inaccurate. I had the CAT glowing cherry red and my 1400err.....with 16 years of long winters with my DW 2460 I .....have never....got the fire going/revived with the cat damper closed AND the ash door opened a crack. My guess is that if this common practice for you that this is your creosote issue. 500
IR thermometer was off scale. While the probe indicated a max of 1275. When bringing a fire back up, the probe would say less than 500 when my IR said over 800 or more. The probe is NOT a good measure of CAT temperature. I use the probe only as a rough indication of the CAT's perfomance.
Ashful
Minister of Fire
The probe is measuring the air downstream of the cat, and the IR gun is measuring the surface of the cat. I'm not sure how much difference one would expect by that factor, but it could indeed be the difference between 1275 and 1400+, or 500 and 800. Trouble is... all of the cat and stove manufacturers are basing their recommended light-off, operating, and max temperatures by the probe, not an IR gun.
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