Soot Eater for two-story cleaning above insert?

[twd000]

I am looking at the Soot Eater - Amazon is selling it for $32:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0010H5JXA/?tag=hearthamazon-20
It says it comes with 6x 3' sections - is this enough to clean Blaze King Princess Insert from below on a "standard" 2-story Colonial?

I see on the installation invoice they charged me for 25' of insulated 6" liner, but I'm not sure how much they used.

The liner goes up through two stories of my house, plus attic and brick chimney.

Do I need to purchase some extensions?

 

[jatoxico]

My set up looks quite a bit like yours and I had to buy extra rod set but I have a nearly stand up attic. Measure your ceilings and estimate the rest even if you have to count bricks.

 

[ddddddden]

Extra rods are a bit pricey @ $17.49 a pair. If you think you need more, I would get a whole second kit for $32. Then you'll have six extra rods, all the length you need + spares in case you break or lose one + spare brush head + spare rod that attaches to the brush head, which is different, more flexible than the other rods.

That said, 1 kit will reach everything but the first 6' or so coming off of the stove, which typically stays pretty warm and doesn't get much creosote build-up compared to the cooler upper end of the flue. I got a 2nd kit, but I haven't used it. I do the 18' from the top, then do 6' from the bottom, and I don't get much from the bottom 6'. Dunno how easy it is to access the flue from the bottom with a Princess, but you will have to access it to empty out the creosote you scrub loose.

 

[yooper08]

The following is a bunch of assumptions:
Pipe starts at 4' off the ground
Ceiling height is 8'
So that's 12' just in the two floors
6' of attic
3' of chimney above the roof
1' between floors

That puts you roughly at 22-23'.

For me, I have a basement install in a ranch with an attic, essentially your 2 story install, and my flue run was between 26-27'.

18' would be good for a one story install, generally speaking, as the minimum flue run recommended is typically 15'.

 

[double-d]

The picture of the Soot Eater shows Black rods, the newer kits are White and much easier to use and are more flexible.
I purchased from Rockford and they have 18' 21' 24'...every 3' increment size kits.

 

[ddddddden]

My kit from a few years ago has 1 white rod, which is solid, more flexible and beefy than the black rods, which I think are hollow. Haven't broken one yet, but yeah, if you can get the length you need with a kit of white rods from Rockford for less than the $64 for 2 kits from Amazon. . .

 

[Supersurvey]

Was wondering the same thing, So are the white rods preferred?

 

[ddddddden]

Well, I guess it depends on how flexible you need the rig to be. If your chimney is pretty straight, I don't think it matters much. If you are trying to run it around corners, white rods would probably work better, but my kit has only 1 white rod, so I can't say for sure.

 

[jatoxico]

I have the black rod set and the thinner whites. The whites go on first and the blacks at the end since they support the weight of the whole apparatus better.

 

[twd000]

thanks for the feedback and the tip about the white rods

so as I'm cleaning from the bottom, how do I know I've reached the top of my chimney? just by feeling the brush stuck up against the inside of the cap?

 

[black smoke signals]

The rod assembly will stop! Binoculars will confirm sooteater has reached its destination

 

[3fordasho]

Well, I guess it depends on how flexible you need the rig to be. If your chimney is pretty straight, I don't think it matters much. If you are trying to run it around corners, white rods would probably work better, but my kit has only 1 white rod, so I can't say for sure.

I have the black rods and was concerned about cleaning the connector pipe from my wood furnace (basement install). The connector pipe starts with a 90 elbow at the back of the furnace, goes up about 18" to a 45, then a 6' run, another 45 and connects to a 3' horizontal section of class A, out through the basement wall to a class A tee. I definitely did not want to disassemble that connector pipe for cleaning from inside so I removed the bottom cap from the class A tee (outside)and ran the soot eater right down to the 90 on the very back of the furnace. Could not believe how well it worked - I thought the black rods worked fine.