End of Season Insert Cleaning

[jadm]

Burning season is coming to an end here. My old insert had a fire box completely covered with fire bricks that didn't need to be cleaned at the end of a burning season.

This year I have an insert that has a firebox that is 3/4ths covered with fire bricks. The rest is steel and is covered with black sooty like 'dust'. Don't know if I can just leave it as it isn't a danger to anything or if it should be brushed out. Seems like brushing it out would get rid of it but it would be back as soon as I build another fire....

 

[karl]

Hmm. I think I would leave the soot on. If you brush it off then you expose the metal to moisture. I'm considering taking all my brick out and giving it a real good cleaning and then painting it.

Just a thought.

 

[burntime]

I thought I had read that some people put a little baking soda down the liner and in the insert to deoderize AND nuetralize the ash? I do not know myself. Hopefully someone will enlighten both of us.

 

[derwood]

I've read about baking soda and I don't have any idea why that would be a good thing to do. Ash is a base--you add water and get lye. Baking soda is also a base, it increases pH. Adding baking soda will neutralize an acid, it won't neutralize a base like ash.

 

[burntime]

Makes sense, kinda what I thought but not sure. Maybe it was strickly a deoderizer?

 

[jadm]

I guess we are all in the same boat. I really can't see that it is hurting anything - just my sense of cleanliness and my desire to put things in order at the end of the season. For now I will just leave it and see what happens over time.

Thanks for the replies.