Any recommendations for a chimney sweep? (Monroe: home, to buy, contractors)

[fisheye]

Originally Posted by LI2PA

Actually, the floors look better now, I had them all refinisihed(big bucks) As far as the stonework goes...I believe the old owners had a gas heater there but had it removed...they had some whacko ideas with that stone work I tried my best to fill it in. I am having an inspector sent from the insurance company coming over tomorrow, I am sure they will have lots to say. That room is actually our living room.
And...thanks for the link

Perhaps you still need a pool table in your living room? Just kidding! My mother has a full size pool table that she was going to sell. But now I think she plans on letting it go when she sells her house? I was just looking for a strong back if she changed her mind! But you already stated that you had a bad back. Nothing ventured; nothing gained.

Have a great day and good luck with the inspector.

[thecoalman]

Originally Posted by fisheye

Perhaps you still need a pool table in your living room? Just kidding! My mother has a full size pool table that she was going to sell. But now I think she plans on letting it go when she sells her house?

The house we bought had the pool table included, it's in the basement and it most definitely was going to come out of there kicking and screaming if they tried to move it.

[fisheye]

Originally Posted by thecoalman

The house we bought had the pool table included, it's in the basement and it most definitely was going to come out of there kicking and screaming if they tried to move it.

Years ago I helped move a very old pool table. We did not move it in one piece. There were three pieces of one inch thick slate under the green felt. Each of those pieces of slate are extremely heavy (I was only about fourteen at the time we moved the table).

I did search and found this one YouTube video on how to disassemble your table:
how to disassemble a slate pool table video.mp4 - YouTube. I was surprised that they said that the felt could cost $500. I did not remember any special felt in the early 1960s. The people in that video also did not look like they had any difficulty with the slate - perhaps it is not as heavy as I remembered or they are stronger than a fourteen year old?

[LI2PA]

My wife wouldn't go for it..but I would love to have a pool table....maybe we can get rid of the dining room table and use it to serve viddles on

[LI2PA]

Well I got the chimney cleaned and good thing I did, the bucket was pretty filled with soot and the cap screening was also clogged. I did learn not to use too much wood as the temperature in the house was 92 degrees...we all put our summer clothes on LOL. Now for another question...I am in Bushkill and was wondering if anyone knows where to buy a cord of wood and also about how much does a cord of wood goes for?

[LI2PA]

Originally Posted by thecoalman

Dan from the Fireplace Gallery but I don't know if he services your area especially at this time of the year.

What model is the stove? Wood/coal stoves are rare, you can burn wood in a coal stove but you can't burn coal in a wood stove. They are set up differently. While burning wood in coal stove is possible generally they are not very efficient for that purpose.

Couple of notes, if you're using wood and switch to coal the coal will clean the chimney for you, that's a good thing in a sense but also a bad thing. It dries the creosote out and if you have a lot of creosote it could potentially come down in big chunks blocking the flue pipe.

If you're using the stove just for coal the chimney itself rarely needs to be cleaned. Usually a visual inspection to make sure there is no blockages is sufficient, take a small mirror and look up it from where the flue pipe enters. You might want to consider having someone clean it every 5 to 10 years if you want to be on the safe side.

Other than that you can perform the maintenance on it yourself, the big thing is the flue pipe needs to be fully disassembled every year for two reasons. Firstly fly ash builds up in any horizontal runs especially where it elbows up(*see tip below) and if you don't clean that out it will block it eventually. You'll also want to clean the bottom of the chimney or the cleanout if you have one. Secondly once you do shut it down in the spring that fly ash will absorb moisture and cause a lot of corrosion on the inside of the pipe.

Check the pipes to make sure they are still good, you'll have to replace these every five to 10 years if you are using coal unless you have boiler setup like mine that goes 24/7/365 in which case you might not have to replace them in 20 or 30 years. This is hard to describe but if there is any soft spots or any obvious holes replace all of them, don't replace single pipes becsue if one is bad the others are not that far behind. For coal a heavier gauge galvanized pipe is all that is needed, these are relatively cheap compared to most pipe.

Take each section outside, tap the ash into bucket. Then you can use a solution of water and baking soda to clean out the inside of the pipe. That will help neutralize the acids and prevent corrosion, you can do the same thing with the inside of your stove. Leave the doors open and leave it disassembled until the season starts again, store the flue pipes in dry place if possible until then.

For reassembly make sure you have at least three screws at every joint, also make sure that you have it supported with a metal strap attached to the ceiling especially if there is any long horizontal runs. For wood the male ends need to be going towards the stove, if cresote starts dripping it will run out of the joints if you don't. For coal it can either way but if you're just using coal preferably with the male ends pointing towards the chimney.

Last but not least if you using only coal you can replace the elbows with T's, cap the end you're not connecting the pipe too. e.g. You're going to have an elbow that goes up somewhere right after the pipe exits the the stove. If you replace that elbow with a T you can get easy access to it mid winter to check and clean the fly ash.

I just found out on the web, my stove is a Hitzer E-Z Flo Coal stove model 50-93. I thought it was very old but it seems they still sell them

[fisheye]

Originally Posted by LI2PA

Well I got the chimney cleaned and good thing I did, the bucket was pretty filled with soot and the cap screening was also clogged. I did learn not to use too much wood as the temperature in the house was 92 degrees...we all put our summer clothes on LOL. Now for another question...I am in Bushkill and was wondering if anyone knows where to buy a cord of wood and also about how much does a cord of wood goes for?

I left my Google do the walking and came up with this: http://www.yellowbook.com/yellow-pag...e+county%2C+pa.

As far as how much they charge; call and ask. My feeling is that it will cost about $150/cord or more. Also ask if that is cut and split, aged hardwood. Some places will sell lengths and you cut and split - lengths cost less; but you might get less. I presume that most of them will just dump the load where they can on your property - plan where you want it so you don't have to move it too far. I doubt if they will stack the wood for you.

[thecoalman]

While you can burn wood in it it's designed for coal. You should consider getting coal for it, those are really nice stoves and they aren't very cheap either. They are made by an Amish company in Indiana. You can get 24 hour burns out of them if you don't have it cranked up all the way. You fill it up all the way and unlike the wood you set the air low and that will control the burn rate. Generally people get on a 12 hour schedule of shaking and loading it every 12 hours. The only advantage to the wood is less ashes. That's upt 100K BTu and you can just about heat 2000 sq. ft. if you can adequately move the heat around.

You can buy the coal by the bag if you want to give it a try, ideally you buy it in bulk by the ton becsue it will be a lot cheaper. It can be stored anywhere including on the ground on a tarp. Water is irrelevant although it can pose problem if it freezes up so if you put it on the ground put a tarp under and over it. No coal bin outside?

The instruction manual is here: http://hitzer.com/documents/product/...structions.doc

You can learn anything you want either searching my forum or ask, there is lot of very happy Hitzer owners there: Anthracite Coal & Bituminous Coal Heating

[fisheye]

For somebody that hates spiders; you might be better off with the coalman's suggestion. One of coal's drawback is dust - not spiders.

PS thecoalman, does anybody have to worry about coal gas (carbon monoxide) with wood burner style coal burners? Just curious. We do not hear about as many fatalities as we did years ago. But people are not burning as much coal as they did half a century ago.

[LI2PA]

Coalman....Thanks I just may pick up a bag and give it a try.

Fisheye....I was up there last week and my son and I stuffed insulation around the garage door and in some gaps in the basement....there was not one spider sighting