Stoves require maintenance. If you decide to have one, you will have to take care of its maintenance. But don’t worry – it’s not complicated, really. Taking care of your stove is usually a matter of a regular cleaning and making sure that everything works correctly. Here are some useful tips on how you can maintain your stove operating effectively and securely.

Why is it important to take care of the stove?

Wood-burning stove maintenance is important, and there is no arguing with that. It is essential for a couple of reasons. First of all, thanks to taking care of your wood-burning device, you can enjoy delightfully smelling and amazingly tasting meals for many years.

Clean stove = uncontaminated food

You can be sure that your meals are of the highest quality. Food taken right from a clean stove is also clean and uncontaminated, which in practice means that the chances of sickness or infections are reduced. You have to clean your stove regularly in order not to let microorganisms thrive (they “like” to thrive in warm areas).

Clean stove = minimised fire risk

What’s more, you can prevent accidents thanks to the proper wood-burning stove maintenance. You should do your best to reduce fire risk to the minimum. That’s why your regular actions are crucial. An additional benefit of taking care of your stove is that you won’t have to replace it with a new one as long as it is maintained in good condition.

Clean your stove

It is crucial to keep your stove clean. For a start, you can cause fires by not cleaning grease and debris from cooking. What’s more, when the stove is dirty, its immediate surroundings can potentially get dirty, too. It’s better to avoid that from the start.

Keep your stove clean to increase its lifetime

Please bear in mind that keeping your oven clean is necessary and beneficial, as your device used to heat food will work efficiently for a long time. So, if you want to increase the lifetime of the stove (and save some money in the long run), be sure to take care of its cleanliness.

Make friends with a soft brush, microfibre cloth and a vacuum cleaner to clean the stove’s exterior

How to clean wood-burning stoves properly? The exterior surface and surrounding area can be cleaned with a microfiber cloth, a soft brush and a vacuum cleaner. Such tools can easily help you get rid of any soot and dirt. Don’t use water and other liquids that only make things worse by encouraging the stove body to rust. For some people, it’s obvious, but we would like to emphasise that you should be cleaning your stove only when it’s unlit and cool.

Wipe down once a day, scrub once a week, deep clean once a month

There are a few more tips connected with the maintenance of the cleanliness. We strongly recommend wiping down the stove daily. Cleaning out the ash should also be done regularly. Scrubbing your wood-burning device should be done once a week, as well as cleaning the area on and around the baffle plate. And, finally, it is fairly enough to do the deep cleaning once per month.

Please note that the majority of the stove maintenance can be handled by you – the owner of the device. However, sometimes you might need professional help. People responsible for stove servicing can check leaks from stove pipe connections. They can do a test of Smoke alarm or Carbon Monoxide. They can also check compliance with current regulations. Stove servicing is a privilege worth using.

Use a special aerosol as an insulating coating

If you want your stove to look and work good, make sure to impregnate it with a special high temperature stove paint. Such an aerosol can be used not only to paint furnaces, boilers, or barbecues – it also has the insulation function.

In practice, it means that you should use a high-temperature stove paint which can act as an insulating coating on your stove. This will allow you to enjoy your good-looking (coloured black, white, silver, red, or cream/beige) and well-working wood-burning stove for years.

Check the rope seal on the inside of the stove door frequently

Checking the rope seals is necessary. They cannot be damaged, farying, or too compressed – otherwise, sealing the door correctly isn’t possible. So if you want a properly working stove, make sure that rope seals are exactly as they should be, without any damage. Actually, rope seals are the most frequently changed parts of stoves – the necessity of replacing them occasionally shouldn’t surprise you.

What’s the condition of the fire bricks on the inside of your stove? Don’t forget to check!

As in the headline – checking the fire brick’s condition (especially on the inside) is a must, as such bricks are prone to damage. This is because the temperature inside the stove changes pretty often. The temperature can be extremely high. After a while, it’s cool inside the stove and then the fire re-heats… This results in cracks.

Don’t worry, one single crack doesn’t mean that you should immediately get rid of your stove. However, if the brick begins to crumble and consequently if it starts to expose the stove’s body and the steel behind – think about some changes.

Don’t use other types of fuel – you should only burn wood in wood-burning stoves!

A wood-burning stove, as its name suggests, is engineered to burn wood, nothing else. Don’t burn other kinds of fuel in your device. Do not use freshly felled wood, either. This is not the best option, as such wood contains a high percentage of water, which in practice means more pollutants and smoke when the wood is burned. You should only use wood that has been dried out for not less than one year.

Use the services of the professional chimney sweep

Your home stove needs to be swept annually (sometimes two times a year or even more often – it depends on safety factors, usage, and soot build up). Don’t try to do it on your own – asking a certified chimney sweep for help is a much better option. Chimney sweeping is important in the context of safety. Thanks to that, you can keep your home insurance and all the warranties on the stove and flue system valid.

Please note that you can use the services of the chimney sweep in other situations. Imagine that you have your own wood-burning stove outdoors, and you suspect there is a bird nest in the stove’s chimney. This may happen! Don’t try to solve the issue yourself. A chimney sweep will professionally help you by removing the nest and installing a bird guard.

Summary

Keeping your stove in a good condition is a matter of knowledge, regularity, and patience. You need to clean your stove regularly. You should impregnate your stove with a special high-temperature stove paint. Furthermore, you ought to check rope seals frequently. You also have to check the condition of the fire bricks inside your stove. After reading this article, you already know how to do it. Take care of your wood-burning stove properly and enjoy it for years!