Our Vermont Castings Dauntless gave a problem the other night. We've had it installed for one winter (last winter 24/25). Took a bit of learning to use properly with how much coal bed was enough, when to close damper, don't put too big of logs on when starting, etc. But a month or so into last winter it was working pretty good. Not great I would say but pretty good, so we did decide to add an outdoor air intake during this past fall. We do have a brand new, tightly built, well insulated home so we figured it would help. We couldn't find a stove/chimney company to install so we did it ourselves. The owner's manual does provide some guidance so we followed that. We literally just drilled a whole in our wall and put a straight pipe from the air intake at the back of the stove through the wall to the outside (with a screen/cap thing like a dryer vent). We did spray foam around the pipe in the wall. Just adding these details about the outdoor air intake in case it's important.
Main question - we have used it for a week or two this winter and with the outdoor air intake it's working much better. However, cut to a few night ago. We had let the fire go out for a couple days and were starting it back up. Well, we added a little newspaper, some kindling/small split and lite her up! Started normal for the first minute-ish and then smoke started pouring out of flue/chimney right near where it come into the top/back of the stove. The fire had just started (so bypass open, air full open). We closed the air and used our fire gloves (i.e. welding gloves) to "stomp" out the fire so to speak as we didn't want smoke pouring into our house obviously!
So why would smoke start pouring out?
My first reaction was there's something blocking in the chimney. But, we had it cleaned last spring (May 2025) after the winter season. The chimney sweep said it looked pretty good for a nearly full winter of burning. Plus, the stove had been going great for a couple weeks this winter and then bam - seemingly out of no where this happens.
The wood we use is seasoned (been cut, split, stacked for at least 2 years, moisture meter on freshly split split after sitting inside for 24 hours is 15% to 17%, clinks when banged together, the ends have nice splitting in them, bark falls off it easily - all things I've been told to look at/test to make sure wood is seasoned).
We thought maybe a birds nest (whole bird?) fell down inside or something like that? There's some wire at the top of chimney to prevent birds from getting in but maybe? So we used a boroscope to look at chimney - nothing in there and no creosote build up either - looking at from both the top and bottom.
We use the cat - and that looks great. It's not damaged or clogged.
Do we need to take the flue apart where it meets the stove to inspect? All the seams in the chimney/flue should be a tight seal right?
Did we have negative pressure built up in the house and the flue/chimney wasn't warm enough at first? We didn't have the kitchen hood nor bathroom fan nor dryer running at the time we were starting the fire but dryer was running for a bit (2 loads) right before we started.
Main question - we have used it for a week or two this winter and with the outdoor air intake it's working much better. However, cut to a few night ago. We had let the fire go out for a couple days and were starting it back up. Well, we added a little newspaper, some kindling/small split and lite her up! Started normal for the first minute-ish and then smoke started pouring out of flue/chimney right near where it come into the top/back of the stove. The fire had just started (so bypass open, air full open). We closed the air and used our fire gloves (i.e. welding gloves) to "stomp" out the fire so to speak as we didn't want smoke pouring into our house obviously!
So why would smoke start pouring out?
My first reaction was there's something blocking in the chimney. But, we had it cleaned last spring (May 2025) after the winter season. The chimney sweep said it looked pretty good for a nearly full winter of burning. Plus, the stove had been going great for a couple weeks this winter and then bam - seemingly out of no where this happens.
The wood we use is seasoned (been cut, split, stacked for at least 2 years, moisture meter on freshly split split after sitting inside for 24 hours is 15% to 17%, clinks when banged together, the ends have nice splitting in them, bark falls off it easily - all things I've been told to look at/test to make sure wood is seasoned).
We thought maybe a birds nest (whole bird?) fell down inside or something like that? There's some wire at the top of chimney to prevent birds from getting in but maybe? So we used a boroscope to look at chimney - nothing in there and no creosote build up either - looking at from both the top and bottom.
We use the cat - and that looks great. It's not damaged or clogged.
Do we need to take the flue apart where it meets the stove to inspect? All the seams in the chimney/flue should be a tight seal right?
Did we have negative pressure built up in the house and the flue/chimney wasn't warm enough at first? We didn't have the kitchen hood nor bathroom fan nor dryer running at the time we were starting the fire but dryer was running for a bit (2 loads) right before we started.
![[Hearth.com] Smoke from Pipe Just Above Stove](/talk/data/attachments/344/344420-a4d5b71da07a30c8f0fda691f5cfc190.jpg?hash=MUh4T5TQPg)
![[Hearth.com] Smoke from Pipe Just Above Stove](/talk/data/attachments/344/344421-0384a7df84af51ea93424f747c8a2a61.jpg?hash=KXvJF7g3Kw)
![[Hearth.com] Smoke from Pipe Just Above Stove](/talk/data/attachments/344/344427-621564a0a2b491a0dfcb3fe9acd7ff42.jpg?hash=us3cdN1aWj)
![[Hearth.com] Smoke from Pipe Just Above Stove](/talk/data/attachments/344/344428-fce485f9860cb5e9964b88f508b50431.jpg?hash=Ph8NktAN2x)
![[Hearth.com] Smoke from Pipe Just Above Stove](/talk/data/attachments/344/344430-71fbb39ba0fc20e28fef57bb7579da0e.jpg?hash=2X0HyMgqP5)
