"Dave Martindale" wrote in message
...
"Frank" writes:

To add to thread, I just got through with an inspection of my fireplace
this morning. My chimney takes a 90 deg bend and he was recommending a
draw fan on the roof to assure draft and keep down cresote buildup.
This would certainly solve the op and others' problems with down draft.

Yeah, in my case it would likely only need to run for a minute or two in
order to start the chimney drawing hot gases from the fire. Once the
vent gets warmed up, the natural draft is fine.

I suppose I could mount a small compressed-air jet in the entrance to
the vent. That would probably get the draft going in the right
direction for long enough to start warming the vent. Unfortunately, I
don't have compressed air on tap.


We decided to ditch the whole thing and have an electric insert
installed. My wife never liked the wood smell from the downstairs
unit.

We've lived in houses with proper wood fireplaces and liked them. But
I'm happy with the Valor gas units. Except for the downdraft problem,
you just turn them on and push a button to ignite the flame, and they
operate unattended indefinitely. No splitting wood, no cleaning up the
ash afterward. They're pretty to look at (the main flame burns blue as
you'd expect from natural gas, but there are also decorative flames set
rich so you get nice yellow flames up through the fake logs). And they
heat the room quite well because of the built-in heat exchanger.

I also like the fact that I can heat a few rooms of the house even when
electricity is out. We've had a few windstorms lately that have
disrupted power for some customers for days at a time. The Valor units
need nothing more than a natural gas supply to work: the igniter uses a
piezo sparker with a button, the safety systems work off the millivolts
of electricity produced by the thermocouple, the heat exhanger uses
convection (no fan) and the flue draft is natural.

Dave
I can remember people lighting a piece of paper and holding it up in the
fireplace to start a draft. You might be able to do something similar to
warm the chimney. If it has to be automatic it could be some sort of
electrical pre-heater. Even a pilot light might solve the problem.

Don Young