Horrible smell, turning into quite a huge ordeal..........

[woodsie8]

As many of you know, I am getting a Hampton HI1300. My oil bill was over $2500 this year.
I have been in this house for about 10 years and about twice a year, I get a horrible smell coming through the heating ducts and fireplace, heatilator. Lasts a couple weeks and goes away.
Well, now that I am putting in the insert and trying to figure out the liner situation, I decided to investigate the existing (internal middle of livingroom) chimney better. I looked outside and saw two caps on the top of the chimney. New to this, I thought, dang it............ do I have to put two liners in. I called someone. They said I probably had another furnace or something go into a second flue at one time. I remembered the previous owner telling me the old furnace was in the crawl space (new one located outside in a closet attached to house) So then I got worried and thought, I wonder if that second flue was ever closed under the house. I wonder if that is why the horrible smell. I wonder if there is a clean out under the house. I looked into the crawl space. I can't even see the chimney cuz all the ducts are laying on the ground, no longer strapped up. I am too scared to go under the house, cuz I may come face to face with possums or raccoons. I called a contractor handyman and he said "no way!"
Any thoughts............. Hot air still comes into the house from the ducts, so I am not sure that they have holes in them. What about the two flues....?
Heck, any help and thoughts would be great. I don't even know who will go under there, without charging me a arm and leg, to just look around and tell me what is going on with the chimney, the duct work and if there is anything under there. My wood insert will be my primary heat, now. I do have a problem with mice but could they smell that bad? I don't see anywhere that a critter could get into the crawl space.

 

[burntime]

Take a deep breath, wrap your head in tin foil ;~) and get a big flashlight Really, put a boom box in there very loud for about an hour, grab a light and head in. Coons and Possums do not like loud noises. If there is something in there you want them out anyway! Should not be that tough. Good luck, and don't forget the tin foil ;~)

 

[woodsie8]

I thought of ringing a bell on the way in, but worried they would charge me The boombox is a great idea! Down under, this weekend Thanks! Oh, I will wrap the hair in tinfoil

 

[webbie]

Do you have a CO2 detector?
You could be endangering your health, as the furnace may be somehow leaking or backing up into the ductwork.

 

[Ncountry]

Tinfoil ???. I do not know the purpose of the tinfoil. But , I have a real funny visual of the coon hiding in the corner witnessing an alien invasion !!

 

[Jay H]

As many of you know, I am getting a Hampton HI1300. My oil bill was over $2500 this year.
I have been in this house for about 10 years and about twice a year, I get a horrible smell coming through the heating ducts and fireplace, heatilator.

Predictable time of year? Start of winter or something?

I've had mice problems before and I've read where mice can get inside your walls and if killed by poison, may die and stink up the place for a bit. But usually it's wintertime where the mice try to find someplace warm to live and food so they start checking out basements, houses, etc. If the horrible smell comes twice a year at a predictable schedule, that might help folks here with guessing what it could be.

Jay

 

[begreen]

Sounds like you need a professional to go in and assess the damage, repair the ductwork and whatever else has been compromised. This could be costing a fair amount in wasted heat. There is also a risk of disease if their feces is in the ductwork and being blown into the house. Then you need to get the crawl space area complete rodent and varmit proofed. As long as they are getting in there, there will be problems. There is a risk of them chewing on wiring, plastic plumbing and as noted, they love duct insulation. I know, we had all the above. Two years now of no rodents has been bliss.

 

[fossil]

During the course of doing away with our old conversation pit in preparation for the new hearth & woodstove, our building contractor said he found mouse droppings in a heating duct we had to modify. We have an electric forced air furnace down in the crawl space, with all the attendant ductwork. On his recommendation we brought someone in to thoroughly clean the ducts. It's a routine part of their job to go down into crawl spaces, no matter how ugly, cramped, or scary, and he did. He found ducts that were no longer connected on one end or the other...so we were either sucking massive quanitites of frigid crawl space air or blowing heated air into the crawl space whenever that unit was operated. He reconnected everything he found, and that furnace now functions just fine as our (rarely used) backup. So, my recommendation would be to spring for the couple hundred or so to have your ducts professionally cleaned. Rick

 

[woodsie8]

I have had someone come and clean them out, several years ago. I did think of calling them and seeing what they sucked up I am sure it is something dead.... yuk. I have found dead stinky mice before and it smells like one big mouse. I will give the duct people a call and see it they will really get under there and look around. This spring, (if it ever warms up) I think I am really gonna have to venture and see where they are getting in at. It could be anything, bats, mice, coons, possums, squirrels, etc. i will just scream then puke, if I come across a dead something, other than a mouse. Thanks for the help!

 

[woodsie8]

Well, I called the duct guy. They don't even go under the house. They hook up the big vacuum, and charge $175 to hook up and then $10 a vent. They said call a heating company.............. Message on the heating company voicemail........... My priority was taxes this weekend............ laughing outloud..........

 

[Carl]

I don't know anyone who hasn't had mice problems in their house. They do smell very badly when they decay somewhere that you can't find them. My garage has always had a mice problem but this year I bought a bunch of mouse traps and set them about the garage and workshop. I lost count of how many mice I caught but plenty for about a month when they were looking for a warmer place to live. No smell in there this year so very happy with that. No way I could seal it up to keep them completely out. They don't require a very large hole to get in.

I doubt you have anything but mice. A coon or possum would need a very large hole to get in and you would easily see that.

Your ductwork should be looked at and repaired. It doesn't take much to hook them together again and furnace tape the joints to keep them together. Maybe the duct cleaners of past had something to do with their present condition. If they weren't fastened well they could have knocked them off with their cleaning equipment. Some just run hoses down the ductwork and vacumn up what they can get.

Good luck with your quest and hope it warms up for you soon. We are warming up a little and most of our snow is melted.

Now about the tinfoil...... :lol:

 

[woodsie8]

I really hope you are right. I don't see how anything big could get in, so it probably is mice or maybe a squirrel that has went in at the roof and down the walls to the ducts.
Depending on the foil style I choose, I may have a photo shoot and post them

 

[fossil]

We always knew there was something living in the crawl space, because we could hear it...and sometimes up into some of the walls and upstairs ceilings. When we were doing the floor modifications in the living room, there were a few days when the living room wasn't completely sealed off from the crawl space under the house. One morning about 4:00 AM, we heard a noise that woke us both...one of our cats had caught a Bushy Tailed Wood Rat (commonly called a Pack Rat...yeah, it's a rat, but it's actually sort of a nice looking little animal). It wasn't quite dead, but I got it away from the cat and went outside on the deck and gave it a first class one-way air ticket to Coyote Breakfast territory. Two days later, I found that he had killed another one just like it outright. These rats are pretty solitary, so the two of them are likely all there were. I know where they were getting into the crawl space, and it's no longer accessible. We had mice aplenty in the garage and under the house, and probably up in the walls...not in the house, thank goodness (house was unoccupied for a year before we moved in), got some little Victor plastic traps, loaded 'em up with peanut butter, set them out in the garage, and got maybe 14-16 mice, haven't seen another in some months now. So...check to make sure your crawl space is secure from rodent entry, get a cat for the house (I highly recommend a stray alley cat that you can befriend, get neutered, checked and immunized...they really know how to hunt!), and get some Victor plastic mouse traps for the garage or other spaces attached to the house, and you'll be all set. Rick

 

[Jay H]

Mice also like to chew so if you start hearing chewing noises behind the walls and scurrying at night, it's probably mice.

Usually in November/December I'll catch like 1 or sometimes 2 mice every week in a reliable spot where I have one of those Victor Quick Set mousetraps with peanut butter and it'll catch them all the time. But I think the mice get in via small gaps in my sill plate that I have yet to find. They never really make it into the living area but sometimes crawl up my unfinished basement walls into the attic and that's where they make a racket and that's where i originally heard them. When I redid the insulation in my attack I found mouse droppings and I put some traps in the attic but I also guessed that they were coming in from my basement. Ever since I layed out some trapps along the top of my foundation, I haven't heard them in the attic anymore.

The traps are good because when they are dead, you can simply throw them out. If you resort to poison bait, that's where I've heard stories of dead mice in drywall that you can't really get at but you can surely smell.

Jay