We were supposed to get freezing rain last night, changing to rain this morning. We got a inch and a half of snow and it is raining now.

Danger, Danger....
 

After a high of 62 yesterday...
The morning greeted me with the carbon monoxide alarm.:timeout:

Shut down heat source!:dead:

What are you heating with? Coal as I recall?

Yes, good old petrified carbon anthracite.:up:

Side effect: My stove operates off a thermostat. If the air isn't cold enough outside, along with solar heating of the house, the stove goes to a low burn and the chimney stops drafting or it back drafts from the wind.:huh:
Hence the functioning carbon monoxide detector.:dead:

How did you fix it?

Nice, another storm :/\\!!

Hopefully the last one ....

Simple, flipped the switch to the off position and reverted to electric baseboard heat for these chilly spring nights.:D

My woodstove doesn't do that very often, but when it does we just cut the intake air damper down a bit and eventually she will draw again. Sometimes a handful of wadded up newspaper stuffed in the chimney and lit will work. Other times corrugated cardboard. I don't have a damper in my chimney. She's straight up.

So is mine. There is a barometric damper in the exhaust pipe leading into the chimney though.
I hope that the heating season is over until fall.:up:

Do you need to sweep your chimney every heating season?

Nope! :D
Anthracite doesn't produce creosote. The fly ash stays mainly in the pipes. I disassemble the pipe system in the spring and wash them out with baking soda and water to cut back on the rust. I'm considering going with double walled piping that has the stainless steel inner sleeve before heating season begins again this fall.

That double wall pipe is about $100.oo a 2' section up here. EXPENSIVE! I've got a 6"diameter chimney in the kitchen 15' long and a 7" in the basement 23' long and they both must be swept every summer without fail. As the oil furnace gets cleaned every year as well. I sweep my own wood chimneys and hire the furnace out. Every 5 years I get a pro in to sweep the wood chimneys and do an inspection on them as well.

We must endeavor to maintain.:up:

Our chimney got an inspection not too long ago after the lightning strike/fire.:huh: Tech told us it could stand to go up a couple more blocks but, was serviceable as is.

A 4 ' section of double wall pipe runs @ $76.00

That $100.oo a piece is double wall insulated. And that is only the 6" stuff. The 7" is about 110.$ each.

Winter is over, I tells ya. I have the AC running now :)