How often do you clean your outdoor wood boiler?

[jrider]

I recently bought a Portage and Main OWB - the Optimizer 250 gasification boiler. It has the heat tubes in it that you are supposed to clean with a wire brush. How often do people clean theirs out ? How about how often do you empty the ashes at the bottom of the unit?

 

[Peacock]

Rake the coals to the back and shovel out the ashes about every week when burning a lot. Maybe once a month in the summer. Add a couple scoops of lime/ashtrol every few days.

Mine has burn in constant use since May of '09. CB5036.

 

[1harlowr]

I have a Hardy and how often I shovel out the ash depends on 1. type of wood and 2. how cold it has been. Some wood I have to shovel out once a week and others I have to shovel every couple weeks, even when the temps outdoors are the same.
Summer times I don't shovel but maybe once a month.

 

[gwiley]

I actually climbed into my CL5036 and scraped the fire box out with steel putty knives....ONCE!

"cleaning" the OWB for me means shoveling ash out once every 2-3 months.

 

[beerman6]

"cleaning" the OWB for me means shoveling ash out once every 2-3 months.

yep.

 

[jrider]

Does anyone have a gasification unit? Or more specifically the Portage and Main?

 

[VTWoodchuck]

yep.

Same here.

 

[kemer]

Does anyone have a gasification unit? Or more specifically the Portage and Main?

My brother has one I'll tell him to chime in.

 

[jrider]

How many ashes do you get in a 2-3 month time period? Must be a lot?

 

[russhd1997]

How many ashes do you get in a 2-3 month time period? Must be a lot?

About a 15 gallon barrel full.

 

[Circle B MN]

I actually climbed into my CL5036 and scraped the fire box out with steel putty knives....ONCE!

"cleaning" the OWB for me means shoveling ash out once every 2-3 months.

I take a half dozen shovel fulls out of the CB every couple of weeks, and brush the stack once a year.

 

[Dogsout]

Rake the coals to the back and shovel out the ashes about every week when burning a lot. Maybe once a month in the summer. Add a couple scoops of lime/ashtrol every few days.

Mine has burn in constant use since May of '09. CB5036.

Might be a stupid question, but what is the lime for?

 

[benp]

I recently bought a Portage and Main OWB - the Optimizer 250 gasification boiler. It has the heat tubes in it that you are supposed to clean with a wire brush. How often do people clean theirs out ? How about how often do you empty the ashes at the bottom of the unit?

I clean out 2-3 five gallon buckets a weeks of ashes on average. Once every other week or so the "orange cone of cleaning" gets utilized. Get the stove seriously ramped up where there is a 1-1.5 foot orange cone flame coming out of the top of the chimney. Let that go for a few minutes and then shut her down. Works well.

Might be a stupid question, but what is the lime for?

I have always used a cup of pulverized lime for creosote control. Keeps everything flakey and dry for the most part as opposed to the tar. Just my experiences with it.

 

[Iska3]

I take out a pail or two of ashes every other week and once they cool I pour them along my road ditch to kill the brush. I try to keep my ashes down to a min. Seem to get more heat that way.

Lime will neutralize the ash and stop the rust on the inside.

 

[J.W Younger]

Intresting thread (on the ash removal) cause the colder it is the less ash it makes. Gotta be going somewhere,out the stack is my guess. May not be the sharpest tool in the shed but I have been heatin with it over 2 decades and the temps have a lot more to do with the ashes made than the wood types. I've burned a cord without removing any ashes and have filled a 5 gallon bucket from 1 loading.
This is with a hardy h2 and the ash door has to be opened before opening the loading door (if you wanna keep the hair on yer face and body) so the ashes are checked each loading.
By far the most ashes removed per wood burned are during the summer mos.

 

[J1m]

Does anyone have a gasification unit? Or more specifically the Portage and Main?

Yes - I have the P&M 250.

We started burning it in the 3rd week of September - and although there was a much steeper learning curve than we thought there would be, we couldn't be happier with it.

In terms of cleaning it out, I know P&M suggests every two weeks. And with the exception of one time I let it go for about three weeks, I've kept up with it pretty religiously. The amount of ash I get during clean outs is about one small galvanized pail full. Most of that ash is from the heat exchanger tubes that you have to brush out - but it's just fine black stuff which doesn't really amount to much.

I was cleaning the ash/coals out of the secondary burn chamber every few days, but then I realized that most of that was still active coals. Since I didn't want to lose the heat potential from unburnt wood - I've now decided to clean out the bottom only once every two weeks when I clean the rest of the unit.

As far as the rest of the feedback you've been getting - I can only attribute those thoughts/comments to the fact that gassification units are a lot different than conventional OWB's. This thought of getting 15 gallons of ash, scooping ash/coals out with a shovel, ash/flame coming out the stack just simply does not happen with the P&M.

Let me know if you have any more questions!

 

[karlk]

I have a P&M optimizer 250, I clean it every 2 weeks. I made a new rod for the smaller tube brush out of 1/4" round stock steel and use the factory supplied rod for the 6 vertical tubes. I burn year round for domestic hot water.I went a month between cleaning a few times with no problems. It doesnt take long to clean, about 15 min.

 

[hoogie]

I have any empyer pro200 gasser, I clean the tubes every 2 weeks, and I clean out the secondary every 3 days...I've noticed on my secondary if i go longer then it dosent gassify as well...I think empyer says to clean it out ever other day or so...Hoogie...

 

[John R]

"cleaning" the OWB for me means shoveling ash out once every 2-3 months.

That's all I do.

 

[jrider]

Ok, so dumb question - how can you tell if its gassifying properly or not?