This page does not exist! How to clean the pipe in the bath: the methods of "mundane" and "sublime" The chimney of the bath is clogged what to do.

Complex furnace structures
Often in large private houses, instead of a modern heating boiler, complex configurations are often laid out.

Cleaning features:
• turns at an angle of 90 degrees - an insurmountable obstacle for ruffs, brushes and gaffs;
• find special cleaning holes (miniature doors) through which you can penetrate into hard-to-reach places;
• if a “walking” brick is installed instead of a door, it is best to invite a specialist who knows all the intricacies of oven masonry. It is very difficult to install a removable brick in place without special skills.

It is recommended to clean the chimney in early autumn, in calm weather, and here's why:
• in hot summer, the stove is not heated, so it is difficult to determine the degree of patency and effectiveness of the cleaning;
• in winter, the heating system should work properly, without any technical "breaks". In addition, there is snow on the roof, slippery and dangerous.

There is nothing better than conscientious prevention. It will protect the chimney from premature wear and prolong its service life. Regularly heat the stove for 2-3 days in a row with birch or aspen firewood, peeled from the bark. Do this at least 3-5 times a quarter, monitor the quality of traction.

As it turned out, in the yard of the relatives there was a bathhouse, which they had not used for a long time, since the chimney was clogged in the stove. Fortunately, I knew how to deal with this problem on my own, so I quickly got down to business and restored the oven to working order. As a reward, I took a steam bath in the steam room and collected very valuable information.

The result of all was the instruction for cleaning the chimneys, which I bring to your attention.

Why do you need clean smoke ducts

Many in childhood saw how their grandfathers and great-grandfathers cleaned the pipes from soot, but not everyone knows why this not very pleasant operation is necessary. Therefore, I will work a little as a lecturer, so that you have something to tell your children on long winter evenings, rocking in a rocking chair by the fireplace.

So, during the combustion of solid fuel, in addition to thermal energy and hot gases, soot is formed in the furnace. With the flow of rising thermal air, it rises up the chimney and gradually settles on the walls of the chimney.

As the heater operates, the soot layer becomes thicker. And in the end, all this can lead to very unpleasant consequences:

• the channel for the removal of gases formed during combustion is greatly narrowed, due to which the draft in the pipe decreases;
• soot adhering to the walls of the chimney damages the surface of the pipe and reduces the life of the device;
• the efficiency of the stove (thermal energy production) decreases, that is, to maintain the desired temperature in the room, you will have to use more firewood, coal, fuel briquettes or whatever you have;
• increases the likelihood of ignition of soot deposits inside the stove chimney.

Cleaning the smoke channel will help get rid of all the troubles. It is only important to determine exactly when you need to start this not the most pleasant procedure. That is what I will talk about next.

When you can no longer put off this unpleasant task

In principle, based on my own experience, I can tell you that if a fireplace or a wood-burning stove is built by an experienced craftsman and all the requirements are met, you will need to worry about how to clean the soot from the pipe no more than once every few years.

Especially if you use quality fuel. For example, if, in addition to firewood, you throw various garbage, plastic bottles, plastic bags and other plastic items into the firebox, you do not need to rely on a clean chimney.

I can also advise you not to use damp firewood for heating, especially pine or spruce wood.
Most of all, birch poles are suitable for the firebox, which have lain in your woodpile for at least 2 years from the moment of harvesting.

So, I’ll tell you about what signs indicate the need for urgent cleaning of the chimney:

1. Smoke color change. From a clean pipe comes clean, light and transparent smoke. If soot has accumulated there, it will change its color to a darker one. And the smoke itself will become denser.

1. Changing the shade of an open flame in the furnace. If the draft in the pipe is normal and the chimney is clean, the firewood burns with a bright orange flame. An orange-colored fire will indicate the need to clean the chimney.

Be that as it may, I advise you to perform preventive cleaning of the pipe once every 6 months: before the start of the cold season and after it ends. This allows not only to remove soot in time, but also to get rid of clogging of the smoke exhaust channel with cobwebs, bird nests, fallen leaves, and so on.

Focusing on the above signs, you will determine exactly what you need to get started. And here's how to do it - we'll figure it out below.

Pipe cleaning methods

There are many ways to clean soot from a pipe. You can use both folk remedies and advice, as well as the achievements of the modern chemical industry. Yes, no one has canceled the mechanical method, that is, you can also work as a chimney sweep.

In my practice, I had to apply all the available methods, so I can safely tell you about each of them in more detail.

Method 1 - Using Grandma's Remedies

There is no need to philosophize here. Our grandparents have long known what to burn in a stove to get rid of soot. I will not say that these methods are very effective, but they have the right to exist.

Here are a few tools you can use:

1. Rock salt. Ordinary table salt should be sprinkled on burning wood or coal.

This method is quite common, but not particularly effective. My grandmother often poured salt into the stove, but she did this not so much to get rid of soot deposits in the smoke exhaust duct, but to prevent its accumulation. Therefore, I will not stop for a long time, I will tell you about another method.

1. Potato skins or potato tubers. The amount is determined by the size of the firebox in the furnace, but as a rule, about a bucket of such waste was enough for me. They need to be poured into an already burning fire.

The essence of the method is that when organics are burned, starch is released from potatoes, which tends to soften soot deposits on the chimney. After this, the waste deposits fall into the lower part of the pipe, from where they are removed through a specially made hole (it was provided even when laying the furnace).

1. Aspen firewood. There is not much to say about the technology itself. It is necessary to chop firewood from aspen logs, and then kindle a fire in the furnace.

Here's the thing. Aspen firewood burns at a very high temperature, so hot gases enter the chimney, which burn soot deposits. This method is quite dangerous, so I advise you to take some precautions:

• make sure that the material of the chimney can withstand high temperatures;
• check that the soot deposits in the channel are not large enough to ignite.

But in principle, no one bothers you to buy special chemicals for cleaning furnaces from soot. Their price is low, and the effectiveness is proven by practical experience. At least mine. Therefore, the story about them will go on.

Method 2 - Calling on Science

Modern industry produce quite a few products specifically designed to remove soot from the chimney. They can be supplied as:

• powders;
• liquids;
• fuel briquettes.

They are added to the furnace during fuel combustion. The chemical elements contained in the preparations do not harm human health, but have a destructive effect on soot deposits, causing it to collapse into the lower part of the chimney.

It is necessary to use additives as deposits accumulate or from time to time, as a prophylactic.

I described the most popular means for cleaning soot from chimneys in the table, which I suggest you familiarize yourself with.

Considering that most likely you will also use the “Chimney Sweep Log”, I will tell you how to clean the soot in the pipe with it:

1. First of all, you need to make sure that the smoke outlet is not completely clogged with soot, debris or foreign objects.
2. You can burn the fuel briquette itself both with the main fuel, and completely independently.
3. To achieve maximum efficiency, I burn wood in the fireplace, after which I put the briquette on hot charcoal (like a barbecue, but not on skewers).
4. Before use, you need to remove the packaging of the log, but not the wrapper itself, in which the substance is wrapped.
5. Usually the log flares up on its own, but if for some reason this does not happen, set fire to the wrapper on both sides yourself.

The chemical itself, which corrodes soot, continues to act for about 14 days. During all this time, it is possible for soot lumps to collapse from the pipe into the furnace or to the bottom of the smoke channel. It must be permanently removed from there.

In conclusion of this particular section, I want to mention one feature that not everyone knows about. "Log-chimney sweeper" when burned, forms gases with a temperature of over 1000 degrees Celsius, which can melt a steel chimney. Therefore, the substance can be used in furnaces with stone and ceramic pipes.

Method 3 - we climb the pipe ourselves

I think you all know the folk wisdom that you can do a good job only with your own hands. This is what I was guided by when I started cleaning the pipes in the bathhouse in the village. In this case, you get rid of not only soot accumulations, but also debris in the channel.

At the end of the work, you will see for yourself how efficient and smokeless the oven will work. And I won’t tell you how I took a steam bath in the bathhouse, otherwise you will become jealous.

I will only tell you about the scheme of work when cleaning the chimney from internal accumulations of soot. The sequence of actions is as follows:

1. First, we close the doors or lay bricks in the holes in the chimneys, which are specially designed to clean the stoves from soot accumulations. If this is not done, then you will be tormented by washing the interior of the bath (or whatever you have there) from the black unpleasant plaque.

If you are cleaning the fireplace with an open hearth, I advise you to curtain it with a damp cloth, in order, again, to avoid a park and economic day cleaning the living room.

1. Then we pretend to be Carlson and go up to the roof. Since you don’t have a motor, I advise you to come up with something as insurance so as not to break down in the midst of the process. Believe me, no one wants to take you to traumatology.

By the way, if it's raining, climbing to the roof is also best avoided. Either lightning strikes you or you slip on the roof. Both are unlikely to please you and your loved ones.

1. First of all, you need to inspect the pipe from above. If the accumulation of soot does not exceed 2 mm, there is no need to complicate your life. Go to the store, buy a pipe cleaner and light it in the oven. This will be more than enough.

You also need to see if a foreign object is blocking the pipe. Often it can be a bird's nest or fallen leaves. In this case, the plug must either be pulled up or pushed down to remove it through the door.

1. If there is a lot of soot, as in my case, we clean it with a special scraper. Then it can be replaced with a special brush, which is sold in a specialized store.

To achieve maximum efficiency, I recommend that you measure the diameter of the pipe in advance and purchase a tool whose diameter is slightly larger than the dimensions of the smoke outlet. You will get a kind of brush, similar to the one with which my mother washed milk bottles as a child.

1. One more moment. In the course of my work, it turned out that some kind of plug formed inside the pipe, which interfered with cleaning. In this case, you need to use a special weight on a chain that will break through the blockage and bring it down.

I do not advise in this case to use a sports kettlebell with a handle. She has a shifted center of gravity, so she can get stuck inside the pipe channel and you cannot pull her out of there. You will have to partially disassemble the smoke channel.

1. If you are not cleaning the stove, but, you can partially free the smoke channel from soot by working from the bottom up. For this, special brushes with a long and durable handle are sold. It grows in length, so you can get very deep inside the pipe.

1. At the end of the cleaning, it is necessary to remove the collapsed soot from the furnace and from the pipe through the doors specially provided for this. Do not forget to clean the blower, there is also a lot of soot pouring in that needs to be removed.

On this, the cleaning of the chimney could be considered finished. if not for one important stage - quality control of work. You can safely entrust it to your soulmate, unless, of course, she is not afraid to climb onto the roof.

Quality control of work

Upon completion of the work, it is necessary to check the quality of the work performed and, most importantly, the condition of the chimney itself. This can be done visually, but it is better to rent a special endoscope camera, with which you can see the pipe along its entire length.

If gaps or defects in the surface of the chimney are found within direct reach, they must be eliminated. You can do this in the following way:

• dilute clean clay with water and coat cracks and crevices with it;
• after this layer has dried, you need to make a clay-sand mortar and carefully wipe all other defects with it;
• the last stage is whitewashing the treated areas with lime or painting with a water-based emulsion.

If in some places you could not clean the chimney, you will have to resort to partial disassembly of the stove, since soot residues in the smoke exhaust duct can cause serious trouble.

Output

As you can see, there is nothing difficult in cleaning the pipe from soot. The main thing is to decide on the implementation of this dirty and unpleasant work. But in my case, the reward was waiting for me in the form of a pleasant pastime in the bathhouse. And I suggest you watch the video in this article, where there is a lot of information about the design and operation of furnaces.

And one moment. I would be very grateful if you shared your own secrets and tips on how best to clean the soot from the pipe in the comments to this material. Maybe next time I won't have to spend so much time getting the stove back up and running.

The Russian banya is associated with wet steam and a wood-burning stove. And where the stove is heated, there is always a chimney. Maintenance includes periodic cleaning. If this is not done, then the bath will be heated every year worse and worse. It will just reduce thrust, and this will reduce efficiency. How to clean the pipe in the bath, sooner or later, everyone thinks. We will show you how to clean effectively, without extra costs.

How to clean the pipe in the bath with a special ruff.

Not everyone thinks about what consequences, in addition to a violation of draft, blockages in the chimney of the bath can lead to. Meanwhile, a tenth of the fires occur for this reason. Cleaning the oven is only a small part of the whole prevention. And the chimney gets clogged much more often than the owners think.

There are several reasons for a clogged chimney, the most common are:

1. Soot and soot.
2. Condensate.
3. Various foreign objects.

Each of them causes trouble and requires its own cleaning methods.

Soot and soot in the pipe

Soot and soot accumulate inside the structure in a thick layer, for a year it can reach 1–2 cm. Such overgrowth depends on what kind of fuel is used for kindling. So, if the stove is heated with firewood, wood briquettes, coal, then the soot will be minimal. But in the sauna stove, not only firewood is burned, but also household waste, which emits a large amount of soot. Coniferous firewood also behaves, the resin during combustion forms soot in large quantities.

On sale there are special briquettes with chemicals that destroy soot when burned. They are simply kindled in the stove and after 1-2 days the dirt itself will fall into the furnace. From there it won't be too hard to clean it up. But it is not recommended to use such products in baths, as chemistry enters the premises and can adversely affect the health of bathers.

To clean the pipe of the bath from soot, it is easier to use a special ruff, brush. They are hung on a weight and lowered into a pipe. Craftsmen suggest using cut plastic bottles and other devices as cleaning. But you can use these if the pipe has a perfectly flat and smooth inner surface.

Condensate in the pipe

The resin in firewood contains a certain acidity. For each type of wood, the resin content is different. With the constant use of the bath, the condensate in the pipes has a small resinous precipitate, but with a rare one it can reach a thickness of 3 cm.

It can be difficult to remove such contaminants, because of the increased oiliness, the resinous condensate will simply be smeared on the inner surface during cleaning.

It is possible to clean such a blockage only with a special “chimney sweep log”.

It must be used once a month for prevention, especially if firewood with a high resin content (pine, spruce) is used. If birch is used for kindling, then once every 2-3 months.

Foreign objects in the tube

The ingress of a foreign object into the chimney is noticeable immediately. The smoke stops escaping and goes back into the bath. With such a firebox, you can easily get poisoned with carbon monoxide. A foreign object may be a brick from a pipe masonry, a bird's nest that has fallen down from the branches of a number of growing trees by the wind.

Getting rid of such a blockage is the most difficult. You can try using a long pole or stick to push the object inward. A nail hook is made at the end of the stick, so you can try to hook the object if it is not a brick.

Telescopic brushes are on sale, the handle extends to the entire length of the pipe. You can try to push the object to her. If none of the methods has brought results, the pipe will have to be dismantled.

Folk ways to clean the pipe

Problems with pipe cleaning arose not only in modern baths. Our grandfathers also fought blockages in their own ways. Some of them proved to be good and are still used today. Moreover, it is better to clean the pipes in the bath without chemicals. Choosing a method for yourself, you need to start from the following factors:

1. Metal or brick construction. Cleaning a simple metal sandwich pipe is easier because its inside is smooth and even. Brick is harder to clean.
2. Design, with bends or straight (a straight line is easy to clean with a brush, a chimney with bends is more difficult).
3. What a mess.
4. Pipe diameter.

How to know when it's time to clean

There are several ways to determine whether it is time to clean the pipe. The most common is to use a kettlebell. It is selected according to the diameter of the pipe. On a rope, lowering a weight into a pipe, they watch how it passes: freely or not. If the kettlebell gets stuck, then the time for cleaning is long overdue. In this way, by throwing and lifting the weight, you can clean the pipe from large contaminants.

The second folk way to watch the smoke during kindling. If it is colorless or whitish, then the chimney is clean. The appearance of clouds of soot and black smoke should alert the owner and cause the start of cleaning actions.

Of course, with the exception of raw and pine firewood, since when the resin is burned, the smoke also has a dark color.

For kindling a bath, it is generally better to use dry chocks that have lain under a canopy for at least 1-2 months. Linden and birch firewood is preferable, since there is practically no soot from them.

Cleaning with water

If the structure is iron, with a small diameter, then in winter you can put a lump of snow 9-10 cm in diameter into it. It will melt and wash the pipe, and gradually sliding down, scrape off the digging with sharp ice floes. But after that, the stove must be heated, so the pipe dries out and does not freeze from the inside. And on metal, without drying, rust can form inside, this will shorten its service life.

In the same way, 1-2 liters of warm water are poured into the pipe before kindling. Do it gradually along the walls. With such a cleaning, black smoke clouds of soot will appear from the chimney during the furnace.

In factory expensive models of the furnace there is a special overlapping system. Snow should not be thrown into such a design, but it will be easier to spill water. A container is placed inside the furnace furnace where digging and soot will drain and fall down, only then they spill water.

Cleaning with aspen

Our grandfathers noticed that during the combustion of aspen firewood, pieces of soot and soot appear in the furnace that have fallen off the chimney. This phenomenon was later explained by the composition of aspen smoke, which can break down deposits on pipes. After such cleaning, a layer of dirt will crumble inside the stove in small pieces for 1-2 days.

Perform cleaning as follows:

The stove is kindled as for a regular sink, and at the very end, aspen firewood is thrown 1-2 times. They will not give a special heat, but they will clean the pipe. Later, the procedure can be repeated as a prophylaxis 1-2 times a month.

Before cleaning, a special device is attached to the top - a spark catcher. You can make it from an old tin can: the walls are cut out and rolled up in the form of a cone. The cone is attached to the pipe at a distance of 5–7 cm from above. Sparks during combustion will enter the device and the possibility of ignition is reduced.

Sellers often offer chemical Kominichek or Stumpfyre as cleaners. But the use of compounds in the bath is unacceptable!

Whether or not to clean the pipe of the bath is not a question. Cleaning is necessary and systematic. Once a month, do prophylaxis with the help of a "chimney-sweep" or aspen firewood. Only in this way the bath will serve its owner for a long time, and the chimney will not burn out ahead of time. In addition to all of the above, it will be difficult to burn in a properly functioning bath. And the proposed video in this article will help you choose a convenient cleaning method.

As the connoisseurs of human souls said, in the old days the profession of a chimney sweep was the most emotional and controversial. On the one hand, he constantly looked down on the city and its inhabitants and was surrounded by the romance of roofs, space and light, on the other hand, he was constantly busy in dirty, dusty, not prestigious work. That is why so many chimney sweeps have been beaten to death. Who knows, maybe this is not a banal non-observance of safety precautions at work at height, but an elementary torment of the soul and settling scores with life. But let's not talk about sad things. Our task is how to clean the chimney quickly, safely, efficiently and without any lyrics and tragedy. Reading.

The smoke exhaust system is an indispensable element of any sauna stove, with the exception of perhaps an electric one. The combustion of any fuel is accompanied by the generation of thermal energy and the formation of flue and flue gases that have an elevated temperature, a certain rate of outflow and contain combustion products, solid and gaseous.

The design of the chimney is different. It can be straight-through, moreover, a slide gate can serve to regulate the draft, or it can be absent as a structural element. A straight-through chimney, especially if its channel has a minimum of turns, is distinguished by high draft and, as a result, the speed of smoke passing through it. As a result, the combustion products do not have time to sufficiently fix on its walls, and do not reduce its initial cross section. Seems like the perfect choice? Not really. This option, from the point of view of heat engineering, is not very rational and not economical.

Outgoing flue gases have a significant potential for thermal energy and it would be reasonable to “squeeze” them as much as possible in this regard. Therefore, more complex designs of furnaces appeared in practice, equipped with labyrinth chimneys, which had many turns and counter-flows, however, the length of such channels was several times higher, relative to direct-flow, and they almost completely took away heat energy from smoke. Difficult but economical. How to clean the chimney in such a furnace is a separate song. More than others, the Dutch succeeded in the construction of complex furnaces; in the everyday life of the old time, even such a term appeared - a Dutch oven. And, of course, the Dutch stove-makers and chimney sweeps were the most advanced.

What is harmful soot

Let's define concepts. Soot is a collection of various deposits on the inner wall of the smoke channel and chimney, which exist in solid form, of different structure and consistency, and which consist of combustion products that, for various reasons, could not be discharged into the atmosphere by the smoke exhaust system of the furnace. How wicked is she?

1. For the most part, soot is flammable and its ignition in the channel can lead to a number of negative consequences, from the destruction of the integrity of the chimney, up to a fire.
2. Soot deposits reduce the nominal section of the chimney, thereby changing the design characteristics of the stove, both in terms of heating efficiency and fuel efficiency results.
3. If the furnace has a labyrinth smoke exhaust system, then soot deposits reduce the thermal conductivity of the contact surfaces, making heat transfer less effective.
4. The uncontrolled release of soot from the chimney creates uncomfortable conditions in the surrounding area, from drying washed clothes to evening promenades in light-colored clothes.
5. Finally, the presence of a large amount of soot in the chimney, in principle, can change the nature of the combustion of fuel in the furnace, initiating the phenomena of reverse draft, overturning of the air jet, up to the formation of carbon monoxide - a terrible and insidious enemy.

Therefore, the question of how to clean the chimney in a sauna stove should arise periodically, at least once a year.

It is obvious that the initial fuel directly affects the amount of formation of volatile substances in flue gases. It is especially worth paying attention to raw materials from the so-called "risk group". Its use provokes the formation of soot deposits by several orders of magnitude, relative to normal standard fuel, namely:

• Raw firewood, that is, wood with a moisture content of over 21%;
• Wooden parts, used structures, with applied layers of protective compounds, resins, varnishes, paints, waxes;
• Firewood of coniferous highly resinous tree species, in particular European pine and spruce;
• Burning in the furnace of garbage, especially containing polymer plastic inclusions, in the form of disposable tableware, plastic bottles and other things. In the conditions of an actively functioning bath, with an extensive rest room, this is very important. Especially in the winter, right?

A word from Experienced! In fairness, it is worth saying that even when burning conditionally conditioned fuel, the chimney may have a tendency to retain volatile substances. It depends on the material of the chimney. Brick, especially poor-quality workmanship, has a very significant surface roughness. In this regard, metal chimneys have good properties, especially those made of heat-resistant stainless steel with a polished surface of the inner section. The only factor that can provoke the capture of smoke by the contact wall is the formation of condensate. The antidote is the insulation of the pipe channel of this type with heat-resistant insulators, in order to prevent the formation of a conditional "dew point" even for a short time.

It is worth pointing out the external signs by which the furnace system lets you know that the question of how to clean the chimney from soot is already on the way:

1. The fuel in the furnace furnace during combustion has flame rims painted in a reddish-violet color. This fact suggests that there is not enough oxygen to oxidize the fuel, as a result of insufficient traction, so carbon is oxidized to monoxide, and not to dioxide.
2. Saturated smoke comes out of the chimney, painted in a dark color, while involuntary "soot emissions" are sometimes recorded.
3. There is a drop in the calorific power and efficiency of the furnace, which affects the speed and quality of heating the bath room.

Methods for removing soot deposits

Cleaning the pipe from soot can be carried out by various methods and methods, which, conditionally, can be divided into several key ones: mechanical, thermal, chemical. Let's consider them in more detail.

Mechanical cleaning of the chimney

Here we will consider the possibilities of how to clean the pipe in the bath, using direct mechanical action on its channel. Perhaps this method is one of the oldest and probably the most effective. The famous image of a chimney sweep, with a long rope brush on his shoulder, is from here.

Chimneys with a direct-flow pipe are well exposed to such cleaning. The cleaning operation starts from the bottom, and after the cleaning is completed, the available ones. in this way, the plots go up to the roof, where work continues, only in the opposite direction. And if from below, we used long brushes or kwachas, fixed rigidly on the holder, then from above you can use a long, flexible, durable synthetic cord, at the end of which a brush with a weighting agent is fixed. The whole operation comes down to pulling the tool along the entire length of the channel, knocking down soot buildup.

Attention! All work at height must be carried out in accordance with all high-altitude rules, with the use of safety equipment and the involvement of an assistant.

At the end of the operation, all debris is removed from the drive at the lowest point. It is obvious that such work is most effective on direct-flow systems, but how to clean the chimney from soot in a furnace with labyrinth channels? Here you can also use the good old brush. However, the furnace system must be equipped with special inspection windows, which are closed during the interservice period with a refractory door with locking fittings. Naturally, such openings must be tightly closed in order to prevent smoke leaks and “draft leaks”. If the design of the furnace is so complex or it was not equipped with revision windows at one time, then the task of how to clean the chimney in the bath becomes somewhat more complicated, although there are no impossible tasks.

Thermal cleaning

Its essence boils down to several things:

1. Bringing the operation of the furnace to the maximum power mode with the maximum fuel loading and opening the gate valves and the blower to the maximum flow area. The rapid outflow of highly heated flue gases will loosen and detach the soot cakes, and carry them out into the atmosphere or fall out at the mouth of the soot collector.
2. The use of fuel that gives an even, long, hot flame. The maximum draft drags its tongues into the smoke channels, where the soot either burns out or undergoes destructuring and falls into the soot collector.

It is reasonable that in this case a dilemma arises, so how to clean the pipe in the bath, what to use as a suitable fuel?

The old bathing practice shows that in the Russian North, and in Finland, where resinous European spruce was used in large volumes as firewood, it is imperative that after every 4-5 fireboxes of the bath, spruce chocks used firewood with aspen logs. Moreover, the logs were chosen as long as possible, which meant a deep "overlap" of the flame into the smoke channel.

In the steppe south, where aspen was not to be found, and the chimneys still needed to be cleaned, the problem of how to clean the pipe in the bath from soot was solved somewhat differently. Here, dried sunflower and corn stalks were used as long-flame fuel. Sometimes a different approach was used. The fuel was not long-flame, but high-calorie. In our case, walnut shells were good, or, in the absence of such, dry husks of seeds, which were collected at the nearest rural oil mill. Of course, they did not expect a long flame from such fuel, but it guaranteed a high temperature and flue gas flow rate.

Describing the thermal approach in solving the problem of how to clean the chimney from soot, it is worth mentioning one more, rather barbaric and unsafe. It appeared in the second half of the 1950s of the last century and quickly spread throughout the territory of the former Soviet Union. The stove of the bath was melted and portions of diesel fuel were poured into the chimney from above, trying to supply it so that it sufficiently wetted the walls of the chimney. The use of diesel fuel in solving the problem of how to clean the chimney in a bath from soot can be explained by its availability, good wettability and lower explosiveness compared to gasoline.

Firstly, we immediately warn you that in the question of how to clean the pipe in the bath from soot with folk remedies, this is not our method and approach. It is known that in relation to gasoline, that in relation to diesel fuel, it is not the liquid fraction itself that explodes, but its vapors, and getting a sufficient concentration in such a funny way is easy. Secondly, if the integrity of the smoke channel is in question, then the burning liquid can easily find a small passage in the brick seam and start burning not the soot, but the under-roof space. In general, if there is a craving for extreme sports in the blood, and an indestructible desire in the soul to become famous for centuries, through U-Tube, then you can, of course, try it, but our editors personally would not recommend it.

A thoughtful reader may ask the question: “Comrades, how much starch is needed for the reaction to proceed? And if the hostess is the standard of frugality, and in her cleanings not only there is no starch left, but through them you can read a newspaper? And if potatoes, in general, starch itself contains in small quantities? In general, the principle of operation of this method can be safely attributed to thermal, the more cleanings, the thinner and drier they are, the higher the flame and effect. And no chemistry.

However, without chemistry, sometimes, you still can not do.

Chemical cleaning

About how to clean the chimney pipe, through certain chemical reactions.

Actually, in our articles we have repeatedly said that the bath is a stronghold of naturalness, environmental friendliness and sanitary cleanliness, however, no one has thought of how to clean the chimney, in especially difficult cases, without the use of modern cleaning products.

Let's start with a chemical, but it does not pose any danger in principle. From ordinary water. If you or your predecessors have heated the stove to such a state that the smoke channel is completely blocked by soot, then you can try the “steam cake” cleaning method. The stove is heated until the smoke channel, at least in its lower part, reaches a temperature sufficient for the sure evaporation of water.

Further, 2.5 - 3 liters of clean water are simultaneously poured into the heated chimney, which, having evaporated, squeezes out all the soot with a voluminous steam cloud, God forbid, if only not together with bricks. The method is also quite barbaric and, frankly, the method is quite controversial. But some fans like it, perhaps not so much because of its effectiveness, but because of its spectacle, sometimes the whole street is going to watch such an attraction. About whether it suits you as a practical solution to the problem of how to clean the pipe in the bath - decide for yourself.

Important! This method causes a very severe alternating thermal load on the pipe body. If it is metal, then this is one thing, and if the chimney is brick, then it is possible to provoke the destruction of the seams, and even the brick itself from thermal shock.

Similar to the previous expectations, a method can guarantee how to clean the pipe in the bath from soot using naphthalene. 25 - 30 grams of naphthalene are added at a time to a well-flamed fuel bookmark. In this case, it is imperative to check the smoke channel for integrity, the absence of falls and cracks. The second condition should be considered strict observance of the bookmark norm. Search leads to an outbreak, albeit non-nuclear, but still.

The chemical method, by some stretch, can be attributed to the use of such a common household reagent as table salt. How to clean the chimney in the bath, with its help? To do this, it is necessary to periodically add salt during the heating of the bath, scattering it evenly, in the amount of 15 - 25 grams over the entire volume of loaded fuel. So to speak. This method is more likely not a panacea for how to clean the pipe in the bath from soot, but a preventive measure to prevent the formation of soot deposits. And it's not about the mythical ability of "salt molecules to react with something, with something", but an applied and effective way to reduce the moisture content of burned wood. And wet firewood, as we know, is the enemy of a clean chimney.

Application of innovative means

In this section, we will talk about how to clean the pipe from soot in the bath, not using antediluvian means, but to take the achievements of modern industry as an assistant.

The most successful in this were the Germans, Austrians and Czechs. And, if the cost of developing the first two, let's say, is expensive, then Czech products are quite affordable for purchase. There are several such tools:

• cleaning pellets;
• Cleaning logs and briquettes;
• Cleansing powders.

Regarding powders, it is difficult to say what exactly is included in their recipe, since well-guarded trade secrets are the key to the prosperity and well-being of an enterprise. But the ability of pellets, briquettes and logs is based on a special pre-treatment of products, which guarantees: low humidity, high caloric content, or in other words - calorific value, and as a result, the generation of outgoing gases with a high speed of passage of smoke channels and, moreover, a certain a composition that is able to react with a soot plug, loosen it and destroy it to the maximum extent. These qualities underlie the mechanism of such an action as cleaning the chimney in the bath.

Conclusion

A clean chimney is the key to a long and trouble-free operation not only of the stove system, but of the bathhouse as a whole. In this material, we outlined the main methods and ways of dealing with soot deposits, and how to clean the chimney in the bath specifically, you should choose. Based on their own capabilities and circumstances. The main thing is to quickly, efficiently and cleanly.