Carbon Monoxide Part 2

Ruh roh raggy

 

Accumulating blockage in a hurry can happen. Punch out your pipe and clean the cap. At least then you can take that off the list of potential issues. Hopefully you can easily access everything from up top for a good cleaning/inspection.

 

Do you remove the baffle to clean? If not, there could be a huge pile of soot/etc semi blocking off the flue connection...

 

Page 45 of the manual does show it has an outside air kit (OAK) available...

 

I do, I usually remove the secondary pipes along with the baffle then head up to the roof and clean top down and the soot just piles up in the FB.

Now knowing my soot eater isn't reaching I am going to try and clean bottom up asap make sure there is no blockage and see how much soot I get.

If I don't get much I'll be at a loss again! Hail Mary would be replacing the gasket (I ordered the correct size) and if need be look into an OAK kit, but with my setup that seems like it's going to be extremely difficult hoping it don't come to that and the reason why this is happening become evident.

Thanks again all!

 

Im guessing this is the issue and you're going to have a massive amount of debris. I know I've always accumulated the most debris in the first 5 feet of pipe. Go bottom up or order another couple rods.

 

I ordered 3 more rods for mine...27' chimney, but the bottom 4' is basically "drip leg" to the clean out

 

I stand corrected I have 8 3ft rods giving me a total of 24ft of pipe + the head.

So needless to say I cleaned it out this AM before work and nothing...........very very little soot if any.

I took a peek at everything inside since I decided not to run the stove overnight LN, and all looked ok from what I can see.

Forgot to do the dollar bill test while the stove wasn't running but I am 99% sure that sucker is so dam tight.

 

Darn, thought you were onto something there.

 

Same!! Back to square one!

Ran it last night overnight and it ran flawlessly, I don't get it.

I will say the air intake pic I shared prior was after I cleaned it a bit, all those mesh intakes were caked with pet hair, that could be a contributing factor.

I am still putting money on the door gasket I think something is up with it. I haven't be sealing it as tightly, it's tight and secure enough trust me but if you latch it all the way it's like a coffin.

 

I have thought a lot about the problem you’re having. This forum has some of best knowledge and wisdom about wood burning you will find. Some problems take many steps to figure out the true culprit to the issue. It seems that this issue is prevalent went your turning the stove way down which would make a situation of incomplete combustion producing co. Something I would try is get a fire going real good like you normally do when you do choke it down go to the farest room from we’re your stove is located and crack a window 2 to 3 inches. See how the fire behaves. And watch the co monitors. It’s worth trying that will rule out an oxygen deficiency in the home.

 

Good to see the pipe is clean. Assuming none of the venting components have slipped apart?
Does the cap have a screen? Have you been up to check it? They are a pia and can become restricted easily. Hard to believe its corrupted but.... Worth determining up close....

Sooo. Only confirmed change is the oversize door gasket?
Fix it.

See how that works out.

 

This seems like a longshot- but is there any chance that at the terminus of your stack, your stove is somehow drawing the exhausted CO back down the chimney? I can't tell exactly from the pictures but in one of them it looks like there's a gap around the liner and the collar it's in. You would know your system better than me what I'm looking at, but if you had to pull up the liner a bit to get it to fit better in the cap- is there any way possible that little bit of slack you pulled out opened up a straighter shot for the exhausted fumes to make their way back down the stack and into the house?
I know I'm Cpt. Hypothetical over here, but I'm trying to think of something that hasn't been said yet.

 

One more while I'm at it... I zoomed in as much as I could on a couple of photos. When these screws were put in, and maybe over the course of a few years taken out / put back in- do they pierce through the liner? Could you be getting any CO into the room through there?

 

Good stuff RGrant I appreciate it.

So that collar has been like that from installation. It looks like it's not seated all the way. I remember Eric VW mentioning that as possible concern.

With that said it's definitely possible it came a bit loose while trying to re-secure my liner for sure as I did pull up on it. I can check that a bit again make sure there is no gap between it and the top of the stove opening. I can also check those screws maybe this weekend as it's suppose to hit 60 degrees around here what the hec!!!!

Collar thing always bothered me as you can see the taper sticking out but it will not go any further into the top of the stove (unless it's suppose to go down into the stove??). I tried and tried and it just is hitting the top opening of the stove.

Would using some high temp caulk be a bad idea around that throat area to possibly seal up any leaks?

So the liner goes into the collar and secured at the top of the collar from my recollection it will not go all the way down into the collar, there is lip at the top preventing it and fastened at that point.

Ironically the stove has been running great, no PPM readings in two days. Only changes I've made was not choking the air off as much and also not latching the door fully (but secure enough trust me) until I get the correct sized gasket (should be here any day).

 

I'm with you-
Stating the obvious- the core problem is something is occurring now that hadn't been occurring previously. Evidently as the stove is burning low and slow you're getting a relatively cooler and weaker exhaust column that is easier to reverse or stall. If all things are equal you might have narrowed it down to the gasket sizing being the issue. I hesitate to weigh in on it one way or the other because I can't really wrap my mind around CO managing to leak out of the gasket while not experiencing air leaking in through the gasket and causing your stove to burn a little hotter.
A few other people have made mention of anything that could be depressurizing the house via bathroom fans / furnace kicking on / clothes dryer even... I think I remember a couple folks suggesting an OAK- and maybe it's a good idea.
Did you happen to add door sweeps / weather stripping or fit a new storm door on the house? Something that may have changed the envelope of the home?

Do you have CO detectors in other areas of the home?

 

Just a crazy thought but.
Have you left the stove cold for a number of days to be good and sure it's the culprit

I don't recall? Do you have a forced air gas furnace? Standing pilot light? Also vented somehow....

Gas water heater?

Boiler?

Random thoughts!

 

Pretty elusive nailing down the culprit for sure. LN, same thing no issues or PPM readings. I did not reload this AM as the new gasket kit came in and I wanted to try and install it tonight if I have time.

I did do the dollar bill test this AM and as suspected it was tight as can be in almost all areas, meaning if you pulled it the dollar would rip it was so tight. There was one part of the door if you pulled hard enough it would come out without tearing but it was very snug.

Nothing out of ordinary or done different with the bathroom fans, furnace, dryer etc... They are all the same appliances. No weather stripping added anywhere as well.

Yes, I've got 1 CO detectors in the basement (ceiling mount), 2 on the main floor (1 ceiling, 1 plug in) and, two upstairs in the hallway (1 ceiling, 1 plug in). I did check the basement during the height of the this CO issue and nothing down there.

As mentioned when this was happening and I got woken up at 4AM I could almost smell something coming from the stove like a smoldering back draft of sorts if that makes sense, not sure of the correct terminology.

I did check the collar this AM as well and took another pic. The two screws on the side are tight as can be. The one circled is loose and just spins when tightening it. I need to get a longer screw. I didn't get a chance to get in deep enough to check the liner to collar as that is where it might have loosened when re-adjusting the liner.

 

Is there any chance the blower can pull from the stove air intake when the draft slows?

Seems if the blower air intake is restricted with dust it will want to pull air from somewhere.

 

I am not sure but this along with the gasket is on the top of the list. I actually think this might be at the top. That intake was caked with pet hair (my cat sheds and is always in that room, he's smart, nice in warm in that room).

Thank you for the post...