Using a SS Chimney (Dura-Vent) With a Coal Stove

 
JohnB
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Post by JohnB » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 4:37 pm

Sunny Boy wrote:
JohnB wrote:I was quoted about $40,000 to reline my center chimney, multi fireplace chimney using the pour in system last summer. I promptly ordered the new stainless liner.
Wow, that's gone up. I was quoted about $1400.00 almost 40 foot chimney one large flue, with some repointing work up top too. But that was 20 years ago.

Paul
Remember that I have 5 fireplaces tying into several different chambers before merging up top. Materials alone were $10,000. The guy had done another old multi fireplace house here in Ct. with more fireplaces that ran $80,000.

As far as running a wood or coal stove into any unlined chimney in Ct. it's illegal from what I was told. Even if it wasn't there is no way in hell I'd try it with my old chimney which is surrounded by 250 year old planks & beams.

If my liner fails in 15 years I'll just be thrilled that I'm still breathing & here to see it happen.


 
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Sunny Boy
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Post by Sunny Boy » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 4:49 pm

Five - oh yeah, that's alot of work.

The girlfriend's family has an 18th century place in western Mass with two large fireplaces back-to-back in a central chimney and that's a massive flue to have to divide and fill up. Could probably put my whole chimney inside it ! :shock:

Paul

 
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SMITTY
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Post by SMITTY » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 4:58 pm

My chimney is about as rough as you can get. It's solid, but you can scrape the mortar out with your fingernail. It's also surrounded by 160 year old beams. It is unlined, and has 3 appliances in it - coal stove, oil boiler, and coal boiler.

Burning coal in it is no problem - the flue will never get anywhere close to hot enough to become issue. Burning wood in it worries me a bit, but I did just that all fall and the fall before that. House is still standing.

I'd tear the thing down and rebuild it myself before I ever throw a SS liner in there.

 
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Post by PJT » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 5:01 pm

JohnB

How long has it been illegal in CT to run wood/coal stoves into an unlined chimney? I had a neighbor (gone now)(no he didn't burn himself up) who used to run 3 wood stoves, (and sometimes a fourth in the cellar into the furnace flue) one was a catalytic northwest, into his 200 year old chimney....he did that for about 40 years....only one chimney fire that whole time :o :!:

 
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Sunny Boy
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Post by Sunny Boy » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 5:16 pm

Smitty

Having spent a lot of time around 150 + year old houses, something I first heard about years ago. If you burned wood, that looks like creosote seepage staining on the bricks.

Be careful, because even a slight chimney fire, the fire can follow the creosote layers between the bricks like a slow burning fuse into the wood framing.

My oldest daughters is an arson investigator with a major insurance company and has verified this ability of creosote fire travel with old unlined brick chimneys and loose mortar.

One more reason why I don't want to use a wood stove or the fireplace !

Paul

 
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SMITTY
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Post by SMITTY » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 5:24 pm

Actually all that black crap running down is roofing resaturant. Some of it might be creosote, but the majority of it is resaturant. There used to be a constant roof leak around the chimney. The previous owner dumped resaturant down there to stop it - could see the mess of it on the roof before we did the roof over, and also inside the chimney. We had been here a couple years before the leak came back on us. Took me forever to figure out it was coming from rainwater inside the chimney, due to the crap mortar, and that jog right before the roofline. I put a cap on, and no more leaks. Ceiling up there is still stained jet black though

In the 10 years I've been here, I've only burned wood for a total of 2 months I think. Not much more than that, I'm sure. Now that the boiler is up and running, I doubt I'll be burning wood in it again, unless the SHTF ...

 
JohnB
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Post by JohnB » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 5:30 pm

PJT wrote:JohnB

How long has it been illegal in CT to run wood/coal stoves into an unlined chimney? !:
Don't know but I was told that it is code. It would only come up if you were having a new installation inspected or if you were explaining to your insurance company how the house caught fire. Code or not I'd consider it to be too high a risk in an old home.


 
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Post by nortcan » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 6:00 pm

One question runs in my head for a few time.
Would it be possible to use terracota flue clay tiles to line a St-St chimney?
Ex. having an existant 6" St-St and lining it with 4" I.D. clay tiles. Sealed joints with H.T. silicone.
The idea is to protect the chimney from the rust problems and make it last for a much longer time. An outside of the tiles H.T. insulation material could be used to avoid condensation between the tiles and the chimney.
The clay tiles could be lowered Inside of the chimney from the top with a special tool.
So ??????????????

 
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Post by PJT » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 6:34 pm

There are several 200+ year old houses in my neighborhood and its really a shame the old chimneys are so dangerous. The guy next door has a house built in 1760 that has the coolest fireplace with dutch oven....the dutch oven has its own separate flue that curves up about 6 feet and joins the main flue...when the house was sold a few years ago the new owners were advised against using the fireplaces so they installed a propane burner in the old kitchen fireplace :o The old lady down the street who has an even older fireplace used to burn wood in 2 stoves until she was warned about the creosote buildup...I looked up there a while back and its scary-as far as you can see up the flue its coated with brittle, black glassy gook which falls back into the fireplace from time to time....One of the local old timers used to tell me that back in the day they would clean the chimneys once a year with a small cedar tree used like a brush...

 
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Sunny Boy
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Post by Sunny Boy » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 7:04 pm

Your probably not too far from two I knew in Hebron, years back.

One was ex-in-laws, other a friend of theirs. Both houses built sometime in the 1700's. The friend's house had the big brick kitchen cook fireplace with the crane and the beehive oven like you mention. The in-laws, just had several fireplaces. And back in the 70's everybody had wood stoves stuck in every one of those old chimneys and burned wood without a care. The in-law used to get slab wood, which was half bark, from some saw mill just the west side of Hebron/Colchester area. Made more mess than heat.

But hey, it was the 70's. Who cared ? :D

Paul

 
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Post by JohnB » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 7:36 pm

Mine has the dutch oven also; right next to the master fireplace. Still in excellent condition, separate flue feeding into one of the main chambers up higher. One of the hinges for the pot crane is still in the master fireplace. All very typical for the 1700-1800 period. The house just down the road dates from the 1600s & has REALLY low ceilings. I'm glad that they had opened things up a bit by the time they built our home.
hitzer install 003.JPG
.JPG | 124.7KB | hitzer install 003.JPG
You can make out a little of the rounded back in this photo. It's like an igloo inside. Wood was stored in the opening under the oven.

 
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Sunny Boy
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Coal Size/Type: Nuts !
Other Heating: Oil &electric plenum furnace

Post by Sunny Boy » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 8:24 pm

Nice set up. Have you ever used the beehive oven ?

The one I've seen used was at Old Bethpage Village. The ladies who worked in that house said someone had to get there at five in the morning to build a wood fire in the oven and keep it going for a few hours. Once all the fire was burned out they scrapped out the ashes. They said that all that massive amount of brick released the heat back at a nice steady rate and they could bake for most of the day with just the heat from that few hours fire in the morning.

Paul

 
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Post by PJT » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 8:34 pm

About 1/2 hour away from Hebron......the bee hive oven next door is just like you mention, shaped just like a 3 foot igloo using these really small bricks...always thought it would make a great pizza oven......always wondered how hot they could get those ovens with one fireplace to the left of it and one smaller one behind it in the next room on the other face of the chimney...interestingly all the old fireplaces around here have small to large pieces of wood built right into the masonry....

 
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Post by JohnB » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 10:03 pm

The wood is there so they would have something to nail the wood paneling to that covered the brick work. Very little of the brick was left exposed originally.

 
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Post by PJT » Sat. Dec. 21, 2013 10:23 pm

JohnB wrote:The wood is there so they would have something to nail the wood paneling to that covered the brick work. Very little of the brick was left exposed originally.
Interesting......the older fireplaces around here are all built of fieldstone, no brickwork.....the sides are built of single slabs of granite about 3 feet long placed vertically with a granite lintel straddling them. Between the lintel and the upright slabs are thin pieces of wood which somehow have survived for 250 years.....also at various points around the chimney for the first 6 feet or so are larger timbers apparently randomly thrown in......the base of at least one of these chimneys about a half mile down the road is constructed as an archway rather than just flat on the ground...........pretty cool


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