How often should I have my stove serviced and flue swept?
Your stove should be serviced annually.
Your flue should be swept at least once a year. Most schools of thought are that if you are using your stove for 3 solid months, then you should be getting it swept at this point.
However, the actual amount of times it is swept within a year will depend on the following:
- What fuel you burn
- How you burn the fuel
- How often you use the stove
What fuel you burn
From our experience of sweeping countless flues and servicing stoves, we have found that the type of fuel you burn will help determine how much soot and ash will be produced in your stove and flue. Other waste products will also be produced. The amount of these products produced differs considerably from one fuel to another.
Well seasoned or kiln dried logs. The moisture content must be below 20%
Soot is more harmful and toxic than ash. For example, you can use ash to clean your glass and even your hands. However, you wouldn’t want to use soot for this purpose. Soot is more solid and black in appearance. If your wood has high water content, the water can bind with the soot and create a tar-like substance called creosote. This can be sticky and crystal-like. It sticks to flues and reduces the size of them making them a hazard. Furthermore, it can be very flammable. Thus, creosote building is a leading cause of chimney fires.
Burning a poor-quality smokeless fuel will produce an incredible amount of ash & soot. Even a good quality smokeless fuel can produce copious amounts of ash and soot. On the other hand, if you use wood as your only fuel and it is very well seasoned (under 15% water content) the amount of soot and ash will be far less.
The species of wood will also determine how much waste will be generated. For instance – if you burn kiln-dried ash, you will hardly notice any debris in the bottom of your stove.
Click on the links below for more “use-fuel” information;
How you burn the fuel
Learning how to burn fuel correctly will ensure you get the most out of it – thus generating more heat and less waste, improving air quality.
Smouldering a fire and/or banking it overnight is considered bad news and old school. Those days are gone. We have learnt there are two ways to release heat from the fuel. One way is to actually burn the fuel so that the solid fuel upon combustion releases heat. This accounts for about 20% of the actual heat generated.
The second way generates the majority of heat and is produced from burning the volatile gasses released from solid fuel. Modern stoves are manufactured in such a means whereby these gases are allowed to stay within the combustion chamber until they can be burnt and converted to heat. However, this process requires a flame.
Consequently, when your stove is in use, you should always have a flame present. This will help ensure that your fuel is fully combusted, the heat output is high, a good draw is created, waste products are kept to a minimum, and your stove and flue are maintained in the best possible condition.
Always have a flame to burn the volatile gasses
Don’t clog up your stove and flue – have a flame! Let the stove do its job, sit back and enjoy watching the flame dance away in your Blazing Burner.
Click on the links below for more useful information.
How often you use the stove
The more you use the stove, the more waste products you will produce. However as explained above, this will also depend on what fuel you use and how well you burn it.
A simple rule of thumb to follow would be if you have a fire 5 nights a week for approximately 4 hours, and this continues for 3 months – get the flue swept!