Help! We have drips of goo on double wall

[RCNIELSONRANCH]

Help! We have drips of goo running down both sides now, on outside of the double wall pipe where it then piles up in a hard bubble (I had scraped off just prior to pict) onto Blaze King stove. It smell & looks like creosote. Some background & info: The stove (we have the King model for 3200 sf home) & double wall pipe going from stove to ceiling are only about 2 years old. Everything from the double wall up: the triple wall pipe, ceiling box etc, were all installed in 2006. Only issue we had when putting in the new stove & double walled pipe was finding the adapter between the double & triple wall (during Covid). Dealer gave us a very small section of single wall that slips inside & adapts the double wall to the triple wall pipe. Once it is slid inside those, only about an inch of the single wall can be seen from the outside. Everything seems to vent & work well. We are very careful to clean our pipes twice a year & maintain the woodstove regularly as is suggested by manufacturer. We usually burn dried (fresh cut each year but, taken off our logdeck of logs that we had delivered & stacked on our property a few years ago now) redfir, tamarack & mixed with some locust we cut around our property (grows like mad around here) & give time to dry out prior to burning. Because it is about 15' from from stove to ceiling box, we were told by Blaze King dealer that it was a good idea to open up the stove & let it burn hotter for about half hour each day to help warm up the pipe to keep creosote from building up so fast in the pipes, which we do. We are disaapointed & worried qhen we started seeing some creosote goo running down the outside of the pipes. Hoping you guys may have an idea of what may be causing the dripping we are seeing so we can fix it. I included pictures of our set up to help. Note: the chimney on roof stand alot taller but, I was taling that picture from the ground. Any ideas you have to help us fix this issue qould be greatly appreciated!

 

[BKVP]

When installed properly and there are no screw holes or other leaks, the creosote should run back down and into the stove for destruction. For every level of moisture content in a fuel load, there is a minimum burn rate at which the stove can be operated in order to deal with combustion moisture.

Yes, you should operate the appliance on high periodically, but not with the bypass open. Instead, the high burn recommendation is to reduce accumulation within the firebox.

When you load the stove, you should perhaps run it on a higher burn rate each time for 30 minutes, dealing with whatever level of moisture in the fuel at higher operating temperatures. If you go to bed at 9:00 pm. do not load the stove at 8:50, turn it down and go off to bed. Instead load it full at 8:00 p.m., turn the stove up to a higher burn rate for 30+ minutes. Then at 9:00 p.m., when you are ready for bed, turn the stove down.

BKVP

 

[begreen]

The cap looks odd. Was the triple-wall chimney pre-existing or new DuraPlus chimney? If the chimney pipe is old, air-cooled triple wall it is not code and no longer allowed for wood stove use.

Can't see from the chimney picture, but I suspect something was done wrong up there. The storm collar sealing is a suspect.

 

[Highbeam]

If done properly, no liquid smoke will leave the pipe. You have a pipefitting problem and that odd piece of single wall that you mention along with mismatched parts from different decades and maybe different brands makes me think the transition from new double wall to your old ceiling box is the most likely place.

This is not normal, you shouldn't have to tolerate it. What a mess all over your expensive 15' interior run.

 

[Evane]

Did you get this figured out? I had the same problem last year and the year before with my new blaze king princess.

I had the dealer talking to blaze king, and neither of them could figure out why I was having the problem.

I went though a huge amount of my own sleuthing trying to isolate every possible cause. I never found a satisfactory explanation on this site. The dealer said I was burning wet wood (I knew I wasn’t. I tested it, and it had been stored under roof for 4 years) It was simple in the end, and I figured it out myself.

I had installed the double wall pipe directly on the wood stove without an adapter/transition piece. For some reason the dealer didn’t sell me one, so I didn’t know they were a thing. I suspect that the outside wall of the double wall pipe fit tightly over the outside of the wood stove flange piece, but there must have been a slight gap on the inside. I suspect flue gas was going up the chimney in between the double walls and even sneaking 4 sections up the chimney in between the walls, since even the crimps are not perfectly air sealed, and the crimps slide in between the walls of the next section of pipe. Since the flue gasses were travelling in between the walls, with nowhere to go, all kinds of creosote was forming in between the walls, and oozing out of the pipe joints. This was happening to me up to five sections above the wood stove.

I then got the adapter (it is a small transition piece to go in between the wood stove and the double wall pipe. And the creosote oozing down the outside of the double wall black pipe stopped.

Im glad I figured out the problem, but I will say that this problem ruined the look of my pipe. I have 20 feet of exposed double wall black pipe inside my house that is covered in burnt oozing creosote coming from the joints and leaking down the chimney. I would like to buy all new pipe, but it’s expensive.

Also after I fixed the problem, some creosote would still ooze out occasionally, for a bit because, I suspect, there was still liquid creosote in between the walls that would start to run when it got heated.

I haven’t seen this problem diagnosed on this site yet, so hopefully blaze king can learn from this post, if they haven’t figured it out yet.

 

[BKVP]

You might look under venting issues. Combustion moisture can vary depending upon moisture content of fuel and complicating it, the burn rate set by the user. For every degree of moisture content, there is a degree at which the stove must be operated.

It is very common for installers to use flue adapters. Your installer should have discussed with you as an option.

BKVP

 

[Murray01]

Check for air leaks. I once had an abnormal creosote build up due to a clean out cap not being tight and allowing cold outside air into the chimney.