When you home already has an existing chimney, overtime the liner will wear out and need to be replaced. When the clay liner on your old chimney wears out you can replace it with a stainless steel chimney liner. Stainless steel liners offer the ability to last longer and provide a better chimney draft. You can also use stainless steel liners when you are building your home or install a brand new chimney.

Stainless Steel Chimney Liner and Chimneys

The chimney on your fireplace helps to create a burn effect where the cool air in the room is drawn inward into the fire and the warm air is released into the home. There are different pressure zones in the home using stainless steel chimney liner in your stainless steel chimney provides more efficient venting system than a traditional chimney with a clay liner. You can find stainless steel chimney materials available from Copperfield Chimney Supply Distributing , which offers quality hearth products for your entire home.

There are different types of chimney pipe available for different types of gas and wood burning fireplaces and stoves. Direct vent gas units use a smaller size of pipe and connections, which are generally not as long as wood burning chimneys. Regardless of what type of fireplace or stove you have in use, you will want to use the same brand of pipe for the entire length of the chimney and verify that the brand is compatible with your fireplace or stove.

Chimney Pipe for Installing Your New Chimney

When you need to install a new chimney in your home because you are adding a fireplace or stove, you can run the chimney along the outside wall. However while traditional brick and masonry chimneys do run along the exterior of the home, modern stainless steel chimneys can be ran through interior areas of the home. Running through the inside of your home helps keep the heat inside the chimney so that it can operate at maximum efficiency. You can find chimney pipe for installing your new chimney from Copperfield Chimney Supply .

To ensure a smooth ignition, when the valve first opens after turning on the main burner, no more than four (4) seconds should expire before the burner has completely lit off. Although problems with delayed ignition are most likely to occur with propane (because it is heavier than air), it can still affect natural gas appliances.

There are many other factors which may contribute to delayed ignition in the fireplace:

· Log placement ? logs may be out of position causing problems with flame carry over from the rear of the burner to the front burner.

· Too much ember material. Embers may block the flow of fuel and affect the flame carry over.

· Ember material or lava rock placed on the rear of the burner.

· Orifice out of alignment with the burner or dirt in the orifice.

· Pilot flame too low ? clean or adjust pilot for larger flame.

· Pilot out of alignment with burner ? adjust pilot bracket or hood so that the pilot assembly is parallel to the burner and the pilot flame hits the thermal generators and burns over main burner.

Strong downdrafts on naturally vented fireplaces can blow fuel away from the pilot light. Also ensure there is a pilot shield installed on the pilot assembly because down drafting can also cause the pilot light to be blown off of the main burner, causing delayed ignition. Short cycling of propane fireplaces can cause ignition problems that mimic delayed ignition. Unburnt fuel pools at the bottom of the firebox after the burner cycles off and, if the fireplace is turned back on before the fuel dissipates, the pooled fuel will light off rather loudly.

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Old and traditional wood-burning appliances are amongst the leading indoor pollutants that can cause asthma attacks, cancers, or other respiratory diseases. However, new alternatives have been developed to make wood burning appliances more eco-friendly. Through those efforts, multiple alternatives have been created to allow homeowners to take control of their indoor air quality.

Efficient Alternatives

Stoves, heaters, dryers, and fireplaces all play a significant role in the air quality in your home. Old wood burning appliances are inefficient and burn off carbon monoxide. But current models have been able to significantly reduce emissions while doing an even better job at warming you and your home. Older wood burning appliances can produce up to 30 grams of smoke per hour, with the EPA’s performance standard being 4.5 grams per hour. Electric appliances also offer eco-friendly benefits with traditional satisfaction. These appliances are easily installed and do not need a gas or vent line to work, while gel and biofuel stoves add another environmentally conscious option that also provide eco-benefits. From current efficient wood burning models to electric and biofuels, there are several alternatives to tackle your indoor air pollution.

Keep It Simple, Use Water

The presence of water can have a significant impact on the quality of air in your home. While humidity might not be the first guess for cutting into the presence of indoor pollutants, it might be the smartest. It is common for indoor air pollutants to hold a slight electric charge. A water source in the home such as a pond or fountain can trap these allergens and improve the air quality. These water sources can also humidify the room and change the air. Humidity levels play a large part in the air quality in your home with the ideal level staying around 45 percent . If this level rises above 60 percent, it can run the risk of forming mold or mildew in your home causing major health problems. If these levels dip under 30 percent, anything from skin irritation to a respiratory infection is possible. Simply taking care of your indoor humidity levels can go a long way.

Take Matters Into Your Own Hands

Maintaining a high standard indoor air quality is important to the health of any homeowner. With efficient wood burning appliances, you can enjoy their traditional benefits while working to reduce the pollutants in your home. Electric, gel, and biofuel appliances provide alternatives with the same comfort of traditional models. By enjoying these appliances responsibly as well as maintaining an acceptable humidity level, your indoor air quality will improve drastically.

Cassandra Pearson

As energy prices rise, and the full environmental impact of fossil fuel use comes into focus, more and more Canadians are looking to wood as a sustainable, affordable source of heat. This makes sense given the landscape that surrounds many of us, and while firewood can be burned in a freestanding stove, a masonry heater or a basement furnace, outdoor wood furnaces are a little-known option that’s worth looking at. Just before Christmas, I fired up an outdoor furnace I installed at my own place, and it addresses the kind of energy issues that more and more Canadians are concerned about.

All outdoor wood furnaces look like a metal garden shed with a short chimney. Feed wood into the firebox behind a door on one end, and the fire heats water in an insulated tank that’s also inside the structure. Pipe this hot water to a building through insulated underground pipes, extract the heat, then use it for space heating and to heat domestic hot water. This is the outdoor wood furnace proposition in a nutshell, and it offers unique advantages. By moving the fire outside, you sidestep the work of bringing firewood inside, the potential hazards of burning it there and the work of hauling ash back out.

Canada is at the leading edge of this technology, and as I’m discovering for myself, this heating option offers a range of benefits.

Outdoor boilers make wood cutting and splitting more efficient, because the work can happen right next to the place where the wood will be burned. The best setups include a wood storage shelter near the furnace, creating an all-weather place to keep wood as dry as possible over winter. Some users even have their wood splitter permanently parked in the shelter. Splitting and stacking happens all in one place, minimizing the chore of handling wood.

The fireboxes on most wood boilers are larger than you’ll find on even the largest indoor woodstoves. The smallest outdoor models can accommodate wood 20 inches long, but many larger boilers burn wood twice that long. Bigger wood makes for much less cutting time and more efficient use of your wood splitter. The bigger your wood, the less time it takes to prepare it.

Heat output is another unique feature of outdoor wood boilers, and this offers another efficiency. Even the smallest models are capable of heating a full-size home, with larger units capable of heating multiple buildings as well as heating domestic water, all from a single location. The work of tending one centrally-located fire is safer and easier than maintaining two or three fires, and makes it practical to handle more of your overall energy needs with wood.

Outdoor wood furnaces aren’t for everyone, but they do have a growing place in the rural and semi-rural Canadian heating scene. They make direct use of an energy resource that’s abundant and renewable across a large part of Canada, and the fact that it’s likely to stay that way may be the best benefit of all.

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Posted on Oct 19 2011 by Tristan Roberts

Nobody speaks of this contest but everybody knows who’s winning. It’s how we get out the competitive impulse in rural Vermont: we race to have the neatest woodpile. Admit it: even as you’re reading this, saying “that’s not me,” you’re mentally comparing your woodpile with the neighbor’s.

There is no question about who is the winner in my neighborhood — the toymaker — and he flaunts it, building these perfect stacks in the middle of his lawn, near the road. After Hurricane Irene, I had a conversation in passing with someone I had never talked to before, from a different part of town. I was inquiring if the toymaker’s house, situated on the river, was okay. Yes, he said — even the woodpile is untouched. We understood each other perfectly.

If you heat with wood, you’re a competitor, like it or not. I am in this game, and I do poorly. I cut a lot of top wood that others would leave behind, and it doesn’t make for neat stacking. That’s fine with me — I put my extra effort into keeping my wood off the ground and well covered. Dry wood wins my game.

Why wood heat remains popular

It’s the season to look at the popular practice of heating with wood. I heat with wood and have for my whole life. I like it for several reasons. I can cut and split my own wood, keeping my costs to a minimum, and giving me a sense of control over my family’s heat source. I’m not subject to the fluctuations of heating fuel prices, and I won’t have any problems from power outages or mechanical problems.

I also like the fact that I harvest firewood from the healthy, managed forest around my house — so at least in theory, there are no net carbon emissions (or minimal, when counting the chainsaw and some minimal transportation).

Downsides to wood heat include the labor involved and the fact that most homes need a backup system if you expect to be away for a few days in the middle of winter. Another downside is the problem of air particulates.

Don’t move firewood

Before getting into some of the safety details of stoves, let’s touch on a key item of ecosystem health: invasive insect species. Yes, I like eating insects, as discussed recently, but this is an area where I don’t mess around with them.

As the website DontMoveFirewood.org reports, “Tree-killing insects and diseases can lurk in firewood. These insects and diseases can't move far on their own, but when people move firewood they can jump hundreds of miles. New infestations destroy our forests, property values, and cost huge sums of money to control.” Those insects include the emerald ash borer and the Asian longhorn beetle—feared pests that threaten economically and ecologically important hardwood forests in Eastern North America.

The recommendation is to use firewood from the most local source possible—under 10 miles is ideal, and over 50 miles is probably too far.

Watch out for hazardous air pollutants (HAPs)

Smoke resulting from incompletely burned wood contains hazardous air pollutants or HAPs (which may cause cancer), fine particle pollution, and volatile organic compounds (VOC). Particle pollution in smoke can damage lung tissue and lead to serious respiratory problems when breathed in high concentrations.

In low concentrations, particle pollution in wood smoke can harm the health of children, the elderly, and those with existing respiratory diseases. Burning seasoned wood in an EPA-certified wood stove minimizes this risk, but doesn’t eliminate it: where there’s fire, there’s smoke.

New wood stoves are worth the cost

I bought my first two wood stoves with the goal of saving money: they were relatively inexpensive, reconditioned units. Only last year did I give in and buy an EPA-certified wood stove, and I am glad I did.

EPA-certified wood stoves have to meet a limit of 4.1 grams per hour of particulate emissions for a catalytic stove, and 7.5 grams per minute for a noncatalytic stove. On average, this amounts to at least 50% less pollution, and possibly depending on how old and inefficient your particular model of stove is. Minimum efficiency rates are 63% for “noncat” and 78% for “cat,” although some stoves boast higher efficiency. Given the health risks of wood smoke, those reduced emissions numbers really make a difference. And the effort saved in a more efficient stove helps pay the cost difference.

Stoves built before 1989—less efficient, more polluting

Any wood stove built before 1989 is not EPA certified, and is likely to be much less efficient and much more polluting then a stove built since then. While older wood stoves tend to rely on pretty basic baffles to burn as cleanly as possible, newer stoves do this better with insulated fireboxes that keep the fire hot, and more sophisticated after-burn systems. And they are laboratory-tested, so we know they work as designed, unlike older stoves that rely on someone’s half-baked idea of how wood smoke “ought” to travel.
I can say from experience that the new models work a lot better, and the $300 federal tax credit can help pay for them. When you install it, have a professional do it to make sure it’s done safely.

Dry firewood, and professional cleaning are key

Burning only clean, dry, and seasoned hardwood that has been split and dried for at least six months is also essential for clean, efficient burning. Properly seasoned wood is darker, has cracks in the end grain, and sounds hollow when smacked against another piece of wood.

Another step that I have been less-than-religious about in the past, is to have a professional chimney sweep inspect my wood stove and chimney on an annual basis. Here again, I have learned my lesson: wondering why I couldn’t get a fire going this fall, I called my local chimney sweep, who promptly removed the creosote blockage from my cap and chimney. Chimney sweeping is a pretty easy DIY job for many homes, but it's only a DIY job done if you actually DIY... if not, time to call the pros, who do a great job.

Hot gases from the fire condense on the chimney to form creosote, particularly in cold locations like the cap. Keeping your chimney clean may not be as visible an effort as keeping that wood pile neat, but it can help prevent a dangerous chimney fire or an unpleasant back draft. Oh yes, it’s common sense, but worth saying: when removing ashes, deposit them in a closed metal container. Stay warm, and stay safe!