Dirty Job

One more job to cross off my summer to do list. Cleaning the wood stove and chimney.  Our Jotul stove is either 5 or 6 years old and it was also time for service. The gaskets in the top, front door were getting very compressed where they would allow air to leak in and harm the efficiency of the stove. So all gaskets were replaced and the inside of the stove was vacuumed out wire brushed and cleaned for every speck of soot and creosote. Over the years it must have been moved slightly so we also leveled it up.

We ran a chimney brush up the chimney and managed to get it cleaned without making a mess. Checked the chimney wind cap and it didn't look bad enough to climb up there to swap it with a clean one so left that for next year. Total cleaning time was just three hours plus which included a power outage of 2 hours sandwiched in the middle of the project. The power never goes out at a convenient time and this time went out with soot all over the hearth. No way were we ready to clean the chimney with the power out so we had to wait so we could catch the creosote and soot with the shop vac.

We are ready now for another winter and have our firewood already done and dried out  enough to get us through the winter. As I look through my summer job list I'm already down to just a couple more tasks and the list will be complete. Cleaning the wood stove and chimney are never one of our favorite jobs and to have that done is refreshing for us. The stove will go almost continuously for 8 months so our window is narrow to get it cleaned.

It always worries me when we are able to get our job list done early like this. Not sure what may come our way but we will deal with it if it happens.