Smoke everywhere, wind gusts, worst night...

[MagdalenaP]

Last night was fun, not!
Loaded a fire around 4:00. At 9:00, our carbon monoxide went off, I knew it mean it was back drafting (our chimney is about 16ft outside/ stainless triple). Easy fix right? Load it up more, more paper, fire it out...to turn the draft around. Nope. Did not work this time. We were loading it and still smoking billowing out. We started adding 2x4s we had on hand, and for about 15 min it was going fine. Hot fire, open air. Then a gust came and blew it out, smoke filled again...more paper, cardboard, etc. After that a couple times you could see the flames get super slow, so every time we opened the air a bit and it fixed itself.

Was up till 2am.
How can we prevent this in the future? Make sure the fire is REALLY going/hot before major wind?
I think the direction of the wind and the fact we have a large peak on the roof about 20ft away, does not help.

Ideas?
And also, other than airing out the house, and placing vinegar everywhere....how else can we get the smoke smell out?

Thanks in advance.

 

[stoveliker]

This is insulated triple.wall, not air cooled, right? If not, replace by insulated chimney pipe.

And indeed a taller stack, for more draft.and less.issues with wind blowing down on it due to other peaks.

 

[bcrtops]

Replace cap with wind directional "rooster-tail" cap. Have seen this problem many times on the WA/OR coast.

 

[saberbass]

Do you have an air exchanger? Maybe you had negative pressure in the house, an open window close to the stove might help reverse the down draft.

 

[MagdalenaP]

Do you have an air exchanger? Maybe you had negative pressure in the house, an open window close to the stove might help reverse the down draft.

No air exchanger. The only thing on was our dishwasher, which is near the stove. And a table top small fan in the basement for growing vegetable seedlings.
I wonder about the fan in the basement because I had ran down there during all this and brought the cat carrier out, so I could put the cat in the detached garage. And the basement had smoke in it.

 

[saberbass]

Sounds like negative pressure. My stove is in the basement and one time my co2 detector went off. It was windy outside and one smoldering log at the back of the stove caused the back draft. I make sure i rake all the coal to the front of the stove and leave the air open at the end of my burns to help keep the draft going till everything burns out. The Stove running and any bathroom fans will cause a negative pressure in the house , you might have to crack a window to balance the pressure.

 

[Woody Stover]

And indeed a taller stack, for more draft.and less.issues with wind blowing down on it due to other peaks.

Yeah, if adding a 4' section to the top would get you above the downdraft effect of the roof peak, that would be great...if you are OK with the look of that.

the basement had smoke in it.

Could it have just migrated down there when you smoked out the upstairs?

 

[begreen]

I think we knew that the side porch? location would have issues at times. It does sound like the downdraft was creating positive pressure around the chimney forcing smoke downward. We just got a report that the Excel chimney cap with a wind band solved the high wind issue for them, but in this case, it might not.