Play it Safe!

With the cold weather around the corner, and the wood burning stove about to be put into action, its time to get the stove ready to go. Being that our entire living space is heated with wood, our stove must be in tip top shape.

This is creosote, it is formed as the smoke exits through the chimney. Because the temperature of the chimney is cooler than the temperature of the stove, condensation occurs. As this condensation is occurring in your stove pipe, highly flammable creosote is gathering on your chimney liner. Creosote is mostly tar and is brown or black in color.

Even with optimum burning conditions,

• seasoned firewood
• Proper draft
• correct burning temperature
• air tight stove gaskets
• Clean flue
  this potentially deadly substance will collect in your stove and chimney.
  For this reason, the dirty job of removing creosote must be done at least once a year.

As with most jobs, if you can do it yourself you are going to save a considerable amount of

After removing the interior black pipe, this chimney brush will be used to remove creosote residue.

A couple of strokes with the chimney brush, and the black pipe will be as good as new.

As well as cleaning the interior black stove pipe, the triple wall, stainless steel chimney pipe must also be reamed out with the chimney brush.
That is the beauty of this brush system, no need to go to the roof. The brush comes with additional flexible extensions that screw right on.

To reach the top of the pipe, I had to add four, 4 foot extensions.

With all of the chimney pipe cleaned it is time to address the stove. To get at the interior workings of the stove, the stove top must be removed. This is rather simple, as there are only four bolts that need to be removed in order to remove the stove top.

With the damper handle in the way of getting the last bolt out, it is easily removed with an Allen wrench.

With the top removed, you can see the creosote build up which has collected in the catalytic converter like chamber of the stove.

With this now cleaned, you can see the converter as well as the damper.

The stove top will also require some cleaning.

Equally important is to check all of the stove gaskets. There are quite a few, and all of them need to be in good repair.
Loose or improperly seated gaskets are also dangerous, as a worn gasket may allow carbon dioxide to enter the living space.

These gaskets can be found on all of the stove doors, as well as the stove top.

Removing the flue may require moving the stove a bit.
Its a good idea to outline the two front stove feet. That way once you move the stove back into position, the pipe will again be totally plumb to the unit.

After cleaning up the stove itself, and spraying on a couple of layers of 1200 degree stove paint, we put the stove back into position.

We're looking ready for some tropical indoor temperatures, as winter is just around the corner.

PLAY IT SAFE MY FRIENDS, DO IT YOURSELF, OR COUGH UP SOME LOOT, ITS WELL WORTH THE INVESTMENT.