smoking house

[jamesarmstrong1]

Guys,

Any advice please?

I have a lined chimney and a multi fuel burner, both new a year ago. The pot has a cowel on it. For 12 months the set up has worked well, but recently it has started smoking badly, immediately pushing all the smoke out of the burners doors when I open them. When I light the fire, smoke comes out of the pointing to the rear of the flue and the upstairs fills with fumes. I have a sweep coming next week, but my question is; if the chimney is blocked how does smoke escape the liner and seep through the origial flue walls?

The installers assure me that the liner is fixed -top and bottom- and the stack is then 3/4 full of vermiculite.

Cheers guys, any advice appreciated.

James.

 

[Burnerman]

It seems very likely that the flue liner isn't connected at the wood burner end, no matter what they say....how else could smoke escape? Unless the liner is perforated, of course. It looks like there could be some heavy soot deposits within the liner, too.
John

 

[jamesarmstrong1]

Cheers for replying John,
I am a little doubtful about the installation. Whats the chance of me removing the board -without losing loads of vermiculite- and checking?

James

 

[Burnerman]

As your flue is lined, the stainless steel liner should be joined to the wood burner chimney at the register plate which should be secured within the chimney recess. If this plate is dropped you should be able to see if the lining is connected correctly - but unfortunately a fall of vermiculite is likely!
It seems a bit premature for the chimney to require sweeping so soon - unless it has been in continuous use. I wonder if the cowl on top is recommended for solid fuel use?
If the liner is intact and properly connected, I can't see how smoke is coming out anywhere other than the wood burner doors - which it would be if the chimney was blocked or heavily restricted.
John

 

[davey5678]

Does it smoke all the time or just some of the time? There may be some atmospheric wierdness going on.

For example my chimney does have an anti down draft cowl installed and 364 days of the year it is fine. The other two days of the year the smoke comes out the wrong way - this is tied roughly to the wrong wind travelling in the wrong direction in the wrong sort of temporature.

Could it be the smoke is going up and then being drawn back down again into another recess somewhere near the cowl?

 

[Nige F]

Does it smoke all the time or just some of the time? There may be some atmospheric wierdness going on.

For example my chimney does have an anti down draft cowl installed and 364 days of the year it is fine. The other two daysl?

That`d be a Leap Year then

 

[davey5678]

Oh yes sorry lol