Sparks from the chimney....

[Dustin]

My osburn insert and my SS liner have been in for about two weeks now. Iv'e had about one fire a day so far, maybe less.

Anyway, I get home from graveyard this morning and fire her up. Put a bunch of Cedar Kindling inside, with a couple of larger splits of kindling.

It's cold, so the draft is good. Really good. The fire is raging and I can see most of the flames exiting the top vent..looking through the glass of course. "Older stove, kinda of a baffle...no secondary air..I think"


It's cookin, and my liner is making noise...ya know the tick tick tick tick, clunk..metal expanding noise. I decide to take a peak outside at the chimey and see if i'm getting any smoke.


I look outside and I see the occasional spark come out of the "spark arrestor" chimney cap. I stand outside and for every "pop" I hear from the cedar in the stove, I see a corresponding set of sparks fly out of the chimney cap.


Normal? should I worry?

Freaks me out a little. Gosh darn super dry 4 year old cedar. This stuff pops and cracks like crazy!

Thanks
D/F

 

[Dustin]

Okay stove still burnin....house not on fire. Guess sparks are normal?

 

[Backwoods Savage]

DF, any time I see sparks it makes me worry. Perhaps you should consider mixing that cedar with something else. Put the cedar on the bottom!

 

[fossil]

Spark arrestor screens, required in some jurisdictions, are very specifically described in NFPA 211. Among the requirements are: They must not interfere with the draft of the appliance, they must have a net free area not less than three times the area of the flue served, and they must not allow passage of a sphere larger than 1/2" diameter, nor restrict the passage of a sphere smaller than 3/8" diameter. So, a spark arrestor screen will obviously allow small sparks & embers to escape to daylight. I don't like sparks & embers coming out of my chimneys either, so I'm careful with "sparky" wood...like cedar and juniper. Rick

 

[Corey]

It will happen...every once in a while a log of hedge will erupt in sparks enough to put any 4th of July fountain to shame - with a corresponding light show coming out the flue. I agree with fossil, though...the 'spark arrestors' are mainly for actual embers that may set a roof on fire. A true 'spark' can and will fly right through one of those. Though I suppose there is some scientific reasoning that an ember less than 3/8" diameter is likely to burn out before it sets fire to any roof shingle.

 

[Cluttermagnet]

FWIW the mass of those small sparks is very slight. Probably most all of them either burn out or extinguish long before they can reach the ground or a combustible surface.t i