Question about chimney after first cleaning

[DuaeGuttae]

My husband and I did the first cleaning of the chimney of our Blaze King Sirocco 30.2 this morning. We had quite a cold spell recently with snow on the ground for almost three solid weeks [quite unusual in our area of Virginia], but it warmed up this week to the point that we have not run the stove for a few days. We decided that it was a good opportunity to do a mid-season clean just so that we could evaluate how things were going. We use a sooteater and went from the bottom up inside the stove through the open bypass.

The good news is that we got dark brown and gray powder out of the chimney, nothing solid or shiny. I'm not sure on the total amount, perhaps a couple of cups or a little more. I did not measure it, but I was pleased that there wasn't a lot. There may have been some buildup on our chimney cap screen as it looked like small debris was flying off of it, but we were not having problems prior to this cleaning. It was just something we wanted to do as a mid-season check.

My husband operates the drill during the cleaning, and my role is to stand outside and watch the cap. We talk over the telephone in case something needs to be communicated. Everything went smoothly with that. When my husband had cleaned to the top, I came back inside because my role then switches to wiping each rod with damp cloths as he disassembles and stores them.

Here's the bad part. When I came inside, I immediately noticed an odor, and I saw that there was fine black soot on the stovetop surrounding the chimney pipe. I asked my husband if he had seen anything coming out, and he had not noticed anything other than the smell. I'm afraid I did not get any pictures but just cleaned it up immediately. The soot was in a circle around the pipe, and it seemed that it may have been pushed out of a joint.

Before we brought the sooteater down from the cap, I took two precautions. I covered the hole where I had removed the catalyst thermometer with a damp paper towel, and I put some painter's/masking tape on a joint of our stovepipe where I thought I had wiped up soot. When we finished cleaning, there was a bit more soot on the stovetop, though not as much as earlier. There was no evidence that any came out of the thermometer hole, but there was some on the masking tape. [The masking tape also removed paint from my pipe, about which I'm not very pleased.]

I tried searching to see if I came up with other stories about soot on the stovetop, but I only found threads about liquid creosote dripping, and that's not at all what's going on here. I'm attaching a couple of pictures, and I can take more if it helps, but I'm wondering if someone can tell me what's going on.

I've never had a freestanding stove with a pipe in my living area before. I've only cleaned stainless steel liners that went through chimneys, so I admit to being unfamiliar with these joints and pieces that I have. That's one reason we cleaned through the stove; I didn't want to mess with disassembling the stovepipe, but I'm not pleased about soot coming through joints as that seems like a problem to me. [I did, by the way, clean the soot off the shelf around the bypass and wiped that area clean with my hands after the chimney cleaning, since I didn't open up the pipe to clean from the top.]

The gray joint is the one I taped where I think the soot came out. It's possible that it came out another one, too. There's also a little screw hole at the bottom that is not closed, but there didn't seem to be more soot there. It was around the pipe in a circle and on the convection deck in back where there isn't a hole.


If you knowledgeable folks would be so kind as to explain to me what's going on and what I can do to remedy this situation, I'd be very grateful. Thanks for any insight and advice you can offer.

 

[stoveliker]

The smell may have been a separate thing from the soot leaking from the seams. If you had a slight downdraft while the soot eater was doing its thing (even if only when you opened the door...), you can smell it.

I have marked my last rod with a red sharpie (with my wife outside the first time letting me know when I was in the cap) so I know exactly how far up I should go.

The soot may indicate the seam is not perfectly air tight. Which is normal in my experience.

 

[Dieselhead]

I get some creosote out the double wall joints when sweeping as well.

 

[30WCF]

Are the male joints on your pipe intersections pointing up or down?

 

[Highbeam]

You were able to shove that sooteater through the 45 degree offset? That’s great.

You mentioned not taking apart the stovepipe. Did you clean all the sweepings from the cat chamber?

My double wall pipe doesn’t leak any debris during cleaning but I’m all vertical. That offset seems to increase the odds of junk falling out. I’d focus my attention there if you are interested in finding the “leak”.

 

[begreen]

You were able to shove that sooteater through the 45 degree offset? That’s great.

We have a 45º offset too. The Sooteater goes through it easily without a hitch. This is with the less flexible black rods.

 

[stoveliker]

I do think that at these angles there will be small patches that don't get cleaned, given the path of a semi flexible rod through such bends.

I see that in my 90 degree connection.
Not a big deal imo.

 

[DuaeGuttae]

The smell may have been a separate thing from the soot leaking from the seams. If you had a slight downdraft while the soot eater was doing its thing (even if only when you opened the door...), you can smell it.

I have marked my last rod with a red sharpie (with my wife outside the first time letting me know when I was in the cap) so I know exactly how far up I should go.

The soot may indicate the seam is not perfectly air tight. Which is normal in my experience.

It sounds as though we have a similar system for first time cleanings. This was our first time cleaning in this house, though we've used this Sooteater in two other houses previously. Now that we know how many rods our chimney takes, it will be easier. I'll still probably watch from outside, though, as I like to see what the cap looks like to the best of my ability.

I don't know if the smell was connected to the soot on the stovetop or not. It was just a stronger smell than I've ever had before when cleaning, and it's the first time I've had escaping soot.

 

[DuaeGuttae]

I get some creosote out the double wall joints when sweeping as well.

That makes me feel better to know that I'm not the only person ever to have experienced this. I read here a lot and really couldn't remember hearing about it. Thanks.

 

[begreen]

I do think that at these angles there will be small patches that don't get cleaned, given the path of a semi flexible rod through such bends.

I see that in my 90 degree connection.
Not a big deal imo.

It's possible. I haven't taken the offset apart to examine. Our flue runs quite clean so I suspect it would be a non issue.

 

[DuaeGuttae]

Are the male joints on your pipe intersections pointing up or down?

I have to admit that I'm not totally sure how to answer this since it's double-wall pipe. The outside looks like female is pointing down, which would imply male inside is pointing up, but that's the outer wall view. It was installed by a professional who has been used by our builder for decades. The two labels that are still on the pipe have arrows that are pointing up as they should be, so I assume everything is in the proper orientation, but part of why I'm posting here is to double check since I was surprised by soot.

 

[DuaeGuttae]

You were able to shove that sooteater through the 45 degree offset? That’s great.

You mentioned not taking apart the stovepipe. Did you clean all the sweepings from the cat chamber?

My double wall pipe doesn’t leak any debris during cleaning but I’m all vertical. That offset seems to increase the odds of junk falling out. I’d focus my attention there if you are interested in finding the “leak”.

Yes, the Sooteater had no trouble with the offsets. The hardest part was getting the head through the bypass opening while getting the rod through the stiff cardboard I had taped over the stove door. After that there was no difficulty.

I did clean the sweepings from around the bypass including behind it toward the cat. My husband held the bypass in a position that gave me a little more room to get my hand back there to sweep everything off. I did not pull the cat as we don't have replacement interam gasket on hand at this point. We plan to get some, but this cleaning was mostly inspired by the warm weather in the latter half of the week that had us with a cold stove and a sunny Saturday.

If I'm going to have soot coming out of my stovepipe during cleanings, I may have to bite the bullet and learn to disassemble the stove pipe. I was frankly intimidated by the idea of that, I will admit, and I didn't want to deal with scratched paint. Now with my painter's tape, I managed to damage it anyway.

I got up on a stepstool and wiped the offsets with a damp rag after the cleaning and didn't find black soot up there. It did seem to be located near the collar, but I'm not really sure about the whole thing at this point.

 

[BKVP]

You might try a double wall slip joint section of pipe. This telescoping section allows the end connected to the flue collar to be lifted from the flue collar.

I use a 5 gallon bucket with a small hole in the bottom. I place the cleaning rod through the hole, into the bucket and attach the brush. My wife holds the bucket up against the bottom of the pipe and I run the rod/drill. My wife hold a rag where rod enters bucket but we still get some particles on the stove.

We do this because our roof is to steep to climb. Also, we do not want creosote deposits to fall behind the combustor (which happens when you go through the bypass). We don't want to remove the combustor either.

But let's no lose sight of the fact you're obviously doing a great job operating your stove and burning dry fuel correctly. If you do experience a draft issue, it will likely be due to the spark arrester screen you mentioned.

Last but not least, we keep black paint handy to touch up our pipe. It needs as a result of our slip joint sections scratching one another.

Good job.

BKVP

 

[Dieselhead]

Last but not least, we keep black paint handy to touch up our pipe. It needs as a result of our slip joint sections scratching one another.

Good job.

BKVP

Quick tip, if it’s the same issue I had in the past it’s from the self tap screw piercing the outer layer it leaves a metal burr between the inner and outer wall which in turn scratches the inner when the telescopic is slid up.

During the off season disassemble your pipes inner/outer section and smooth out that burr with a rounded file and your issue should go away. It worked for me.