Hello everyone,

I've been thinking about this lately. Let's say it's worse case scenerio or near worse case. I will be depending on wood for my heat source. 2 wood stove's and a wood cook stove.

How can I be discreet with the smoke coming out of my chimney's?

-- R. Wright (blaklodg@hotmail.com), August 10, 1999

Answers

Hi R:

Living in a sometimes frosty Northern CA suburb, I too have been giving this security topic some serious consideration.

Since we have a regular open fireplace -- which is pretty much worthless for any real heating purposes -- I've built an emergency standby woodstove from a standard 30 gallon steel drum vented into the existing chimmney stack. While I'm certain this arrangement will produce far more heat and far less smoke than the fireplace alone, I still think the only way to minimize my visibility is to burn relatively small, very hot fires (dry wood & lotsa oxygen) and do so preferably only at night.

Since I expect any wide-scale unrest (mass looting, etc.) will be fairly short-lived, I've also purchased several 40 lb. propane tanks and two screw-on radiant heating heads for those times when any hint of life to the outside world may just be too risky.

Hope this helps.

-- Yan (no@no.no), August 11, 1999.

In the long run, insulation is cheaper, easier, and makes the home more comfortable than fuel. So, first priority is to make sure that the home is insulated and weatherstripped and sealed up the best you can manage given time, building and finances. It is better to have the home well-sealed against drafts and then open a small window partially for ventilation because you can then control the inflow of cold air. Controlling smoke: Dry wood is most important. Next, I think, is a good quality airtight stove that enables you to control the burning fire. I notice that our stove doesn't smoke much if the wood is good and dry, and small hot fires occassionally probably produce less smoke than a large fire that you are trying to keep buring at a slower rate.

-- Jim (jiminwis@yahoo.com), August 11, 1999.

--R.Wright I heat my home now with wood heat. I have an outside boiler that recirculates hot water along with a fire place in the house. I am not sure there is much you can do to hide it. The aroma of a wood fire travels as well as the smoke trail.

-- kevin (innxxs@yahoo.com), August 11, 1999.

there are catalitic(sic)converters that can be installed that will burn up almost all unburned gasses.I believe that ultimatly,it's always the gas that burns,not the wood.The wood just needs to get hot enough to release the flamable gas.

-- zoobie (zoobiezoob@yahoo.com), August 15, 1999.