How Often Should You Check You Stove Pipe

 
memco man
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Post by memco man » Sat. Mar. 14, 2015 11:01 pm

Good evening every one, the other day I was giving my boiler the once over like I do everyday and I noticed ash steaks coming from one of the elbows in my stove pipe so I thought that the pipe was filling up with ash well it warmed up enough for me to let my boiler go out today and I took the pipe apart thinking that it would be pluged or at least half off to my suprize it was not to bad. I have burning sence the first of Oct. nonstop and never gave the pipe a second thought until I saw the elbow and it gave me a scare luckly it was not as bad as I thought it was so that brings up the question how often should you service you stove pipe I am sure that this has been a topic before but I have not seen anything on it
I am thinking that I am going to put a tee in where that elbow is and put a cap on it so I can check it at lease once a month just to make sure that it dose not plug up.
I was also wondering if I should be using a solid elbow instead of the adjustable ones if any one has any input on this I would apreceate it
Thank you
M.M.

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SWPaDon
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Post by SWPaDon » Sat. Mar. 14, 2015 11:05 pm

Once a month is about how often I check mine, and a T in your system with a cap is a great way to do it. I use 1 adjustable elbow on my flue pipe.

 
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McGiever
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Post by McGiever » Sat. Mar. 14, 2015 11:31 pm

I'm thinking fly ash doesn't streak without a little help from a liquid.
Maybe I'm alone on this thinking though.???

Perhaps that needs look into as well as the cleaning???

 
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SWPaDon
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Post by SWPaDon » Sat. Mar. 14, 2015 11:37 pm

McGiever wrote:I'm thinking fly ash doesn't streak without a little help from a liquid.
Maybe I'm alone on this thinking though.???

Perhaps that needs look into as well as the cleaning???
Good point.

 
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freetown fred
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Post by freetown fred » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 6:36 am

T's a good idea. You got a cap on your chimney?

 
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Sunny Boy
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Post by Sunny Boy » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 6:51 am

McGiever wrote:I'm thinking fly ash doesn't streak without a little help from a liquid.
Maybe I'm alone on this thinking though.???

Perhaps that needs look into as well as the cleaning???
Nope Mac, your not alone. I was just thinking the same as soon as I saw the picture of those streaks.

With my first stove I had the same streaks on inside pipes because I had some of the pipe joints reversed. Rain water was getting into the metal chimney outside and running down the pipe. Reversing those joints fixed that.

Paul

 
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Post by titleist1 » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 7:39 am

If you haven't yet worked out a schedule for cleaning the stove and flue pipe on your install I would suggest checking it after each ton of coal to see how bad it is.

You can then decide if a cleaning every other ton or every third ton is sufficient. If you have a T in place on the flue pipe it makes it very easy to check and also very easy to slip a vac wand in there to give it a quick 30 second cleaning. I do this about once per month on a day the stove is mostly in idle mode so pipe temps are low since it is so quick & easy, there's never more than a 1/2" of ash in the pipe.

You may want your boiler cleaning on a more frequent schedule to maximize heat transfer to the water. I remember noticing a few on here mentioned they did a boiler cleaning a couple days before the real cold snap was forecast back in Jan.


 
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Post by franco b » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 10:18 am

A boiler with forced combustion air will tend to blow more fly ash into the pipes than one with natural draft for combustion. Probably once a year is enough for the latter. Opening the loading door when shaking will lower the draft or pull through the coal bed and less fly ash will rise into the smoke pipe. Shine a light in there while shaking to judge how much ash is floating up.

I agree that those ash streaks are from water. the chimney should have a recess at the bottom below where the smoke pipe enters to accommodate any deposits falling from the chimney walls and even some rain coming down the chimney. I would devise a rain cap for the chimney because the smoke pipe will rot out when cold if allowed to be wet regardless of which way it is pointed.

 
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Post by joeq » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 11:10 am

franco b wrote: Opening the loading door when shaking will lower the draft or pull through the coal bed and less fly ash will rise into the smoke pipe. Shine a light in there while shaking to judge how much ash is floating up.
I remember FB giving me this same recommendation a couple years back, and I can see how this does make a difference.

 
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Post by memco man » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 10:15 pm

Thank you for your reply's what I was wondering is could the moisture be coming for the coal itself I had four or five tons of lose coal that I had taken out of a basement last spring and had no problems I ran out in the middle of Jan. and had to go back to Santa coal and it has been really wet I have been trying to dry it out before I put it into the boiler but when it gets really cold I could not keep ahead of it . do you think that I could have created enough steam from the coal to make the streaks?

 
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Post by freetown fred » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 10:18 pm

Doubtful. Again---do you have a cap on your chimney?

 
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Post by freetown fred » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 10:22 pm

Just looked at pix again, how often are you cleaning those pipes now. They look terrible!

 
memco man
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Location: vermont
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Hand Fed Coal Stove: jotul NR 507, crane coal cooker 44, crane 404, chubby w/blower, chubby w/out blower, franco blege 10-475 Montgomery ward laundry stove Moore's Brother seventeen circulator stove
Coal Size/Type: nut/anthracite/pea
Other Heating: harman p68, elmtree,harthstone,new mack

Post by memco man » Sun. Mar. 15, 2015 10:41 pm

No I don't have a chimney cap but buy the sounds of it I will be putting one on sooner then later and I will be checking and cleaning at lease once a month if not more
Thank you for your help
M.M.

 
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Post by freetown fred » Mon. Mar. 16, 2015 7:46 am

Sounds good MM. No guarantees but those fix's will determine whether you need to go into panic mode or not. :)

 
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Post by Sunny Boy » Mon. Mar. 16, 2015 9:25 am

Even if you were putting dripping wet coal in, I think your stove pipe would have to be quite a lot cooler than it is to condense enough moisture to make streaks like that. I'd be looking for where rain, or snow melt water is getting into the stove pipe and chimney somehow.

Paul


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