Cleaning Ash From Chubby

I have had the Chubby lit for approximately 5 days and am starting to get the hang of keeping a steady temperature (Started burning coal last Jan). The ash pan on the bottom of the Chubby is too small for the ash compartment and after about 5 days of shaking the grates an enormous amount of ash piles along the inner perimeter of the stove. I bought an Ash Cougar vacuum last year for the dust and the thing stinks. It constantly gets clogged and the hose broke. I have used a metal canister shop vac with a dry wall filter to clean out the bottom of the stove. After using the shop vac, I store the dry wall filter in a metal garbage can in the back yard to avoid a fire in the house. Tonight as I was cleaning the Chubby ash the drywall filter fell apart and the ash went flying into the air of my living room. I checked the drywall filter and did not notice any burns on the filter. It appeared as though one of the side seams fell apart. I am not sure if the heat melted the glue at the seams or there was a defect in the drywall filter. Does anyone have a good suggestion for cleaning the bottom of the stove out? Should I try to find a bigger ash pan for the bottom of the stove?

After 5 or 6 days I use my small shovel and scoop the ash that falls around the edges and gently put into ash pan when dumping the ashes. If you scoop gently and slowly place into ash pan, you will not have much fly ash escaping. I found that the vacuums were a hassle and made more of a mess blowing ash around.

I bought a steel Dust Deputy. http://www.oneida-air.com/category.asp?Id={2C6BB4 ... F1BB570002}

This thing is one of the best investments that I have ever made. It just hooks up to my shop vac. All the dust collects into the steel barrel. There is very little if any dust collected into the shop vac. The shop vac filter stays so much cleaner now and I haven't needed to buy a replacement filter for years. Before using this, I did use my shop vac for sweeping ash, but I could only use is for a few minutes before the filter clogged and needing changed. Check it out. You'll be glad you did.

Why are you waiting 5 days to empty the ash?

I wouldn't go more than 2.

I would just take the ash pan out and then use a flat fireplace shovel and place the ash that you get out in the ash pan, then take the ash pan out to get rid of it. Just do it slow when you dump the ash from the shovel into the ash pan and you should have no problem. I would use the fireplace shovel every couple of days this way and when you get use to it you won't have a problem.

jpete wrote:Why are you waiting 5 days to empty the ash?

I wouldn't go more than 2.

I think he means after shaking and emptying the ash pan for five days; that there is a build up of spill-over in ash pan area. This is a problem with most stoves. It was discussed in another thread just the other day. I have to scoop it out with a shovel after changing out the ash pan every few days also.

Double D,

I think if you check out Larry Trainer's Chubby website, he offers a new "rounnd" style ash pan for the chubbys. Supposed to put the Molina brothers to shame.

The dust catcher is a cool deal. I've seen several ash containers on e-bay that hook to your shop vac or any existing vacume into a steel container. They run around $69 for these type.

my Glenwood has a ash pan that is more than ample but it still drops a few pcs. behind the pan and causes the pan to NOT slide all the way back after I give it a good shake...remove the cold ashes in the pan from "last nites shake" and when ya pull the pan use your flat shovel to remove everything in the ash box, it takes like 3 scoops on my Glenwood and ya good to go.
a clean ash pit is a HAPPY ASH PIT!

Thanks for the replies. I am going to check out the "Dust Deputy" and the larger round pans that Larry Trainer sells for the Chubby. I am not waiting five days to shake and empty the ash pan. The ash that builds up around the ash pan after I shake and floss the grates really builds up every five days or so.

The people on this board are so helpful! I think that I would still be figuring out how to light a coal fire if it wasn't for this board!

Hi DoubleD.
When you say :ash build up, do you mean in the ash pit or around the inside of the fire pot, around the outer wall?
These are 2 very different things with different solutions.
If inside of the fire pot and around it, I may suggest something I certainly would do if I had a Chubby.
If in the ash pit you already had the solutions here.

Tim wrote:my Glenwood has a ash pan that is more than ample but it still drops a few pcs. behind the pan and causes the pan to NOT slide all the way back after I give it a good shake...remove the cold ashes in the pan from "last nites shake" and when ya pull the pan use your flat shovel to remove everything in the ash box, it takes like 3 scoops on my Glenwood and ya good to go.
a clean ash pit is a HAPPY ASH PIT!

Tim,

What is the shape of your ash pan? Mine has slopping sides so the top is bigger than the bottom. That way it's more tolerant of some ash in there and still be able to push all the way back.

One other thing, I use what is called a coal rake, comes from controlling a coal fire used in a forge for blacksmithing. But you don't have to get as fancy as that. You can fabricate one easily. Take a, say, 3/4" by 1/8" or maybe 3/16" piece of steel flat stock and cut a 4" to 6" long piece. Drill a hole in the middle of it and put a threaded rod into it to make a long handle. That way you can reach into your ash pit with your ash pan in place and smooth out the ash in the pan before removal. That way you don't pull ash off the top of the pan that will drop out making you have to clean it out later...

I find that my front corners of the ash pan don't fill up much, so I reach to the back and pull the ash from back there forward filling the pan more evenly and not having any ash to get knocked out while pulling the pan out.

dj

Nortcan,
It is simply a build up in the ash pit not the firebox. Doug did you go with the steel dust deputy or the plastic one? I see the difference in price and am leaning towards the plastic one because I will just be cleaning the ash pit approximately 12 hours after I shake the grates.

I went with the steel Dust Deputy 10 gallon kit. I liked the fact that I could use the lid from the kit on the extra 15 gallon steel barrels I had taken from the trash at work. Undercoating came in the barrels I got from work. I used the extra barrels to hold all the ash from the winter season. Then I dispose the ash in the spring. It really worked great when I used it to clean out the ash trays of my stoves. It even works well with stokers too. I even use it when I sweep out my chimney, this is where I think that it shines the brightest. I don't even have to use a face mask when cleaning the chimney now. I don't have as much dust now that I use a Dust Deputy.

Doug,
I used your trick to clean the mica of my Chubby with unscented baby wipes (saw it on an old thread). It worked perfect!