Wood Stove Pipe Size

  • Active since 1995, Hearth.com is THE place on the internet for free information and advice about wood stoves, pellet stoves and other energy saving equipment.

    We strive to provide opinions, articles, discussions and history related to Hearth Products and in a more general sense, energy issues.

    We promote the EFFICIENT, RESPONSIBLE, CLEAN and SAFE use of all fuels, whether renewable or fossil.
Status
Not open for further replies.

deak

New Member
Nov 28, 2005
1
I'm a new guy to this forum and have a question. I have looked everywhere for an answer to this, to no avail.

I bought a used wood stove which has an outlet of 8". I would like to install a 6" metal chimney, to reduce cost. I keep thinking this would also help the draft. Is this true or not? What other possible positive or negatives would result from this reduction? Thanks
 
While it's ok to shop around on a good price on stovepipe, this is not a good way to save money. Do the installation with the proper type of 8" pipe. The stove is designed to work with this size pipe and a smaller pipe size will reduce draft. That stove will put out a lot of heat, so do the stove pipe carefully, correctly to spec and safely.
 
Couple thoughts here: Back in the 70's some stoves were manufactured and listed to be able to reduce the flue collar from 8"
to 6". Todays code prohibits flue collar reduction, unless your appliance has been tested and listed for it to do so. If your used stove is unlisted as were most stoves manufactured prior to 1979. It can not legally be installed. To find out whether is listed there will be a manufactures tag usually located on the back, Listing the UL listing. EVen Modern box stoves manufactured by Volzang are stated not UL approved. They cannot be installed in a residence. They can be installed in a shed, but the shed cannot be attached to the occupied dwelling. Many older stoves were not enviormently friendly. They are smoke belching poluting beast, no where near as effecient as today's EPA approved stoves. Many never had the loading doors gasketed and easilly overfired. Without gasketing, there was no way to be able to fully control the air feed. It simply bi passed the controls and filtered around less than air tight doors.

We have already recorded one such fire, where the older stove got going to Cherry red touching off the Mantel and near by ensuing combustiables. So far this year, I have had to condemn 4 Un listed stoves and demanded their removals. I would check with your local inspection Dept., to see if they allow the installation of unlisted stoves, or whether they would allow flue reductions. It's a lot cheaper now, know ahead of time, than to see that comdemned stove sitting out by the curbside
 
Status
Not open for further replies.