Stove burnt my carpet.

[Matthew]

I went to load my stove today, and as I was moving the coals around out jumped a pretty big coal and plop, down it went right onto my carpet. I have a grey carpet and managed to melt a hole about the size of a half dollar. I didn't burn it, just melted the carpet together into one piece in that area.

Does anybody know of a way to remedy this?

 

[North of 60]

How far does your hearth extend out the front of the stove/loading area. 18" should be your minimum . A hearth extention rug can be added to this and also cover up your BooBoo. As far as your carpet repair I cant help ya. Others will follow.

 

[Beanscoot]

The first burn in the carpet is the most upsetting, the next ones won't be quite so annoying and eventually you won't care much at all! At least that's what I've found. My other family members like to occasionally have the iron door open to look at the fire and embers will occasionally shoot out.

 

[colsmith]

Let me say first that my answer won't be especially helpful to you. ;-) We had a gray carpet in our living room prior to putting in the wood stove. We both thought carpet/wood/fire = bad combination. We ripped the carpet out, freecycled it, and I put down a nice vinyl tile that comes in squares. Our thinking is that if we burn a hole in one, we just replace that tile. We were pleasantly surprised to learn that one can briefly drop hot coals on it and it doesn't leave a mark if you fling water on it fairly quickly. (We keep vases of water by the stove for humidity, art, heat retention, and spill quenching.)

Carpet and wood burning don't mix well. Cover the carpet with something for a few feet in front of the hearth, or after you get tired of the current and future burns, put down some other kind of floor. How do you deal with carrying the firewood over it without making a horrible mess? We sweep all the time, just got one of those IRobot vacuums (we call it Robbie) and it is helping with that area plus the rest of the house.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

My hearth goes out ~3 1/2 feet in front of the stove and I've seen a few sparks make it to the hardwood floor.

Matt

 

[Matthew]

Something similar happened to be a long long time ago. What I did was take a pair of toe nail clippers and clip out all of the burned carpet leaving just a plain hole. Then I super glued in new strands one by one that I gathered from other less obvious spots in the carpet (from behind the couch, etc.). Believe it or not it looked good. Think of it as a hair transplant for a carpet.

I was actually going to do something quite similar to this. I have already located extra strands under heading ducts and around the ragged edges going up a set of stairs. Just curious, how does your repair hold up to vacuuming?

As for my hearth, it only extends about 10 inches beyond the door where I load wood into the stove. Not my stove, or my house, so I can't change the design. I have learned, though, that what I will need to do if I instal a wood burner in my own house. After heating this year with wood, I have found I really do like the benefits, and the extra work involved is minimal for what I get.

 

[Jfk4th]

Just go to Tractor Supply or even Target right now has Hearth rugs marked down, really cheap, cover up that Boo Boo :coolsmile:

 

[ControlFreak]

We had the dancing coal incident in a different house about 16 years ago. You really feel helpless as you watch a big red hot coal roll out of the stove, break into several smaller red hot coals, then jump off the hearth and sink into your nice clean carpeting. Are you about to thrust out your tender hands to catch those nasty little fiends? Not if your brain is working. No, you just watch the coals melt into the carpeting and wonder how long your wife will let you live when she sees this.

Just for kicks I called my insurance agent. He said "No problem, we'll send an adjuster out right away." I put down the phone, just dumbfounded. I never dreamed that they would cover this. The adjuster came out, and I figured he'd say "well, we'll replace the burned area by putting in a tile pad in front of the stove." But no, he said they would pay for replacement carpeting for the whole room. And because the living room where the stove was had the same carpeting as the hallway, and even the dining area of the kitchen, they'd have to replace that as well. I couldn't believe it, we hated the carpeting in the dining area and they even said that we could replace the kitchen carpeting with hardwood if the prices were comparable, which we did.

I bet they have exclusion clauses in policies now for dancing coals.

Dan

 

[Highbeam]

It has nothing to do with the installation clearances. Sparks and coal chunks can shoot out with such great speed that they can make it 4,5, or more feet into the room. I have new carpet around my oversized hearth. We had one good pop about 2 weeks ago that sent me chasing after the ember with my bare hands since I would rather burn my hand than my carpet. I knocked it around and onto the sacrificial adjacent rooms floor until it cooled and it left no carpet damage. I realize that there will be a burn mark at some point but I don't want to be the one who did it.

I kept several large remanants from when the carpet was installed for just this kind of thing. Carpet men are fantastic at repairing holes or damage so long as they have some material to work with.

Oh and it is not messy at all to have a stove room with carpet. The wood stack is in an adjacent room but could be on the porch. Only carry in that load and set it on the hearth for burning. I get bark and ash bits on the hearth but those sweep right up. The carpet stays pretty clean though there will be a worn in spot of high traffic between the woodstack and the loading door.

 

[billb3]

Sounds more like operator error that stove error to me.

I've swapped a section from under the couch. snip snip

 

[karl]

I going to be redoing my hearth protection this summer. I have a burnt spot in the carpet too. My problem is I don't have a lip from where the tile meets the carpet and I had a ember fall out and slide across the tile and hit the carpet. I'm going to be fixing that this summer.

Of course, I figure I had saved $800.00 dollars on the gas bill so far this year. I'm guessing the stove will have paid for itslef by the end of next year.

 

[swestall]

The cut and paste for the current burn is a good idea. To avoid future burns you can buy a fire floor hearth extension made from tile/steel/etc. Not too expensive and you can take it with you when you leave.

 

[tradergordo]

Maybe the owner has carpet scrap leftovers? I somehow managed to drop a red hot coal on the carpet when emptying ashes, it wasn't even very close to the stove, the coal just fell out or popped out somehow (its a good idea to cover your ash pan!). Anyway, I had scrap carpet, just cut out a matching little circle of carpet and cut out the burnt spot, glued the new piece in and you can't even tell where it was anymore. If you don't have any extra carpet scrap, I like the idea of carefully removing a small piece from around a vent or some other spot that is permanently covered by something.

 

[jpl1nh]

We were at a Yankee swap Christmas party year and a half ago. Don't remember what we ended up with but my wife (the irresistable negotiator) traded whatever it was with some poor hapless kid that ended up with a red fire proof glove. I think she though she was doing him a favor (which I'm sure she was) but that glove we got is friggin awesome. HOT coals, no prob, pick it up and put it back in. Flaming and coaled log out of position?, reach in grab it and place it wherever you need it. A really good fireproof mitt, even if it won't stop a bit of damage, allows you to minimize it anyway.

 

[grizzly2]

I have a few carpet burn holes too. I put a half-round wool hearth rug in front of the tile hearth. Embers that land on the wool do much less damage than the embers that have landed on the poly carpeting. Part of my livingroom floor is already oak. When I get time and ambition, it all will be oak.