Sorry to post here but, I cannot find the prep forum???????? I have purchased an old pot belly-type cast iron stove. Stand about 4 foot tall and has an opening on the top for the stove pipe. I have never installed stove pipe and need to know how to do it. I do not have the money to have it done professionally and I want to be safe. It ha a seven inch opening and I need to know a few things....

1. What kind of stove pipe do I buy? Insulated to the wall and then regular on the outside of the house?

2. How far above the top of the house do I need to go?

3. How do I "cap" it?

4. Where is the flu? Is it a piece that is close to the opeingin on the stove? Will it go before the elbow or after?

5. Can I use seven inch pipe at the connection to the stove and then downgrade to maybe, five or even smaller inch pipe to run up the house?

As you can see, I barely knwo what I am doing. I need some advice. Any help you can give would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Donna

-- Donna Messenger (Donnaeli@yahoo.com), November 09, 1999

Answers

Preparation Forum
http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a.tcl?topic=TimeBomb%202000%20%2 8Y2000%29%20Preparation%20Forum


-- spider (spider0@usa.net), November 09, 1999.

I'm NOT a certified stove person, however, I just installed my own wood cook stove, so here's what I did. First, and very important, if you have any bends in the pipe as it goes out the roof, you will need a drill so that you can screw the pieces of pipe together. Otherwise, it will never be solid. Second, the height of the pipe should be above the roof line, at least 2-3 feet. Third, try and use a heavier guage steel than the cheapo stuff. If the stove is free standing, it should be at least 3 feet from the wall, and you should mount some kind of insulation. I would visit you local wood stove dealer to get all the right materials. Its not cheap, but it will save you a lot of headaches.

-- stoveguy (smokey@the.bear), November 09, 1999.

Donna: I am also NOT a wood stove expert. That being said, we did have our woodstove professionally installed and here's what they did at our house with respect to your questions:

1. We purchased an 'airtight' model - A Lopi Liberty. It was installed in the basement on a concrete floor next to a concrete wall. The installers used double-insulated pipe from the stove to the wall. A special triple-insulate collar was used to go through the wall. Once outside the house, triple insulated chimney pipe was used all the way to the top of the chimney.

   Had we installed the stove anywhere else, a thermal floor pad and wall protector might have been required.

2. According to the installers, regulations in our area require that the top of the chimney be at least 4 feet above the roof at the point where it passes through the roof. Therefore, the top of our chimney is about 4.5 feet above the roof.

   The chimney was 'capped' with a screened cover known as a 'spark arrestor'. This cap comes on and off fairly easy - it must be removed to clean the chimney. Also, at the bottom of the chimney on the outside of the house is a triple-insulated T-connector pipe. The bottom cap on this T-connector is held on by wing-nuts. Thus the bottom cap comes off easy for cleaning the chimney.

   With regard to the 'flu', you may be thinking of a 'damper', a flap inside the chimney pipe that can be adjusted to restrict air- flow out of the chimney, thus controlling the 'burn rate'. Our stove has no damper in the pipe because airtight models such as the Lopi Liberty achieve the same effect in a different way. Note that air- quality regulations in some areas prohibit the use of the older, damper type stoves.

3. In general you want to minimize the number of elbows in a chimney. I'm not certain but believe you will want to avoid any 'downsizing' of the pipe. In other words, if the stove has a 6-inch chimney outlet, you'll probably want to go with 6-inch pipe all the way to the top of the house. I suspect that such a downsizing or restriction would be subject to higher than normal creosote buildup.

Please get some professional advice here. You wouldn't want your preps to become the source of a disaster. Woodstove are great but must be treated with all due respect. Safety first. Always.

FWIW, our chimney actually cost us more that the stove itself, but we are confident that it was properly installed according to regulations.

Keep in mind that none of the above may apply to your specific situation. Hope this helps

-- Arnie Rimmer (Arnie_Rimmer@usa.net), November 09, 1999.

italics off! off I say! er...sorry.

-- Arnie Rimmer (Arnie_Rimmer@usa.net), November 09, 1999.

Donna

You will have to watch your local zoning regulations as you will not be covered by insurance if you had a fire even if it didn't have anything to do with the wood stove. What you are suggesting to do in a house is risky, doubly so for someone that has never done this.

I would not recommend trying this with out some kind of "real advice" from someone that can see your house. A "pot bellied" stove doesn't sound airtight either, so depending on the area heated and the temps where you live the stove would have to burn hot to get a reasonable heating effect. This increases the risk.

What you may want to do is use the wood stove in another separate shed or something on your property, always remember it doesn't take much room to be comfortable.

-- Brian (imager@home.com), November 09, 1999.

Thanks everyone so much! I really appreciate the advice. My situation is I will be installing it inthe basement, on a concrete floor with the pipe going through a large piece of aluminm that fits into our basement window. My husband is going to install it. I am pretty sure he knows what he is doing but, just wanted to make sure that I understood everything in case, at some point, I might have to be in charge of the stove, replacement, etc. Thank you again.

Donna

-- Donna Messenger (Donnaeli@yahoo.com), November 09, 1999.

A neat trick is to turn your pipe upside-down so the creosote doesn't run down the outside of the pipe. Olde English trick, I believe...

-- Patrick (pmchenry@gradall.com), November 09, 1999.