Shared cleanout?

[Burn-1]

As I may have mentioned before, I am getting back into woodburning which is something I haven't done since EPA II stoves have proliferated but this site has been a great resource.

After sizing up the stove pipe assembly for my Hearthstone Phoenix, I was patching some of the refractory mortar around my thimble when I dropped my putty knife into the chimney. This is a double flue chimney, (basement location), next to my oil boiler. I need to fish the knife out so I look for the cleanout thinking it would be below the thimble but I only saw a cleanout door by the oil burner flue. There is a brick wall which runs down the middle of my basement and I was thinking that the cleanout may have been bricked over but found no evidence so I grabbed a flashlight and find that the cleanout is shared by both flues.

So with two flues and two appliances,(each on their own flue), am I SOL?? I have Oil FHW,(seriously considering Elk's suggestion to glycol the system) and will use wood to supplement the heat but I can see where the boiler might fire and draw a slow burning wood fire's smoke back down through.

I have a mason coming to look at this to see if it would be feasible to seal the area between the flues and cut in a new cleanout.

Ideas, comments, and suggestions are welcomed.

 

[elkimmeg]

Unfortunately this was another coner cut and common to find no partition wall between flues and no separation in the cleanout area

Thjis happens at my house I can smell smoke near my burner when the wind goes a certaint direction. My chimney has 4 flues. The oil burner and wood stoves are the are separated by the two middle flues. Mind you I only noticed the smell of smoke never seen any visiable signs in 30 years. It is my theory that by the time the smoke is drawn down the burner flue is is greatly diluted it hast to travel 5' in open air to get to the burner flue. There is another way to reduce this occurance, Ash cleanout doors are not air tight and more than one occasion they effect the stove draft drawing in outside air cooling down the draft and weaking it. since not heat is near the cleanouts I use common caulking compound and seal the doors tight. This really improved stove preformance. plus sealing them prevents down draft leakage. If there is no place for the decending air to escape eventually it stops. Sealing the ash doors will prevent this air passage escape route and less the occurance.
Code does not address the need for separation distance and outlet locations in masonary chimneys. It you extended the wood stove flue up 1' that too would lessen the chance of down drafting smoke in the loi burner flue. Smelling it is one thing seeing it tells you this situation needs attention could be as simple as adding 1' clay liner above the chimney.


then again all climates and locations react differently, this may never be a problem for you. You will have to wait and see.

On the gylcol, I should have done that years ago. such a simple solution and a piece of mind. Many people using wood stoves have found out the hard way.