Chiminea question

murmini

I have a BGE Chiminea and I would consider myself to be a fully qualified pyro! I have had BGE Large for about 15 years and I have run a wood stove as my winter heat source for decades in my house, cutting, splitting, seasoning and burning hard woods. However I may boast about my fire-making skills, the Chiminea frustrates me. It doesn't draw, with equal amounts of smoke coming out the front as out the top. My sense is that the chimney isn't tall enough and once I held a 4 inch stove pipe over the top of it and improved things no end.

My question is, what opinions do you other chiminea users have on the way it burns? I use all kinds of wood including well-seasoned oak, but it still strikes me it was designed more on an aesthetic note than a practical one. I would love to hear your views.

[Deleted User]

I have a BGE Chiminea as well. Yes it does occasioanlly smoke from the front. I also have a door that's seriously rusted (I think stainless steel would have been a better choice for this part).

The biggest frustration we have is that the darn thing is just to small around IMHO. I think it would be much better if it were, perhaps, as big around (diameter) as the large BGE. You just can't get enough wood into the darn thing. The other thing I would like to see is MORE openings than just the front. If you are right in front of it, and it has lots of embers, you can stay warm, but towards the sides and back there is like no heat. Part of this, I'd presume, is because of the insulating qualities of the ceramic. It's great for a slow smoker, but, and please correct me if I'm wrong, the idea of a Chiminea is to provide warmth.

I love mine, I just wish they'd make a few changes to the design.

JLOCKHART29

In my simi enclosed Smoke Shack it was running me out. Since it never moves I piped mine up like in the pics. Works like a charm.

murmini

Very nice, I bet that fixes it's drawing problem... Thanks for sharing!