What do you do with your ash ??

A._Badger

Funnily enough, soot has its uses. It's got a high nitrogen content and the colour means it traps heat. Old fashioned gardeners used to tell the sweep to leave the soot - some of the 'organic' brigade still do.

Man_Overboard_2

I believe celery growers used soot to earth up their plants in order to keep the light out, and keep the whiteness in. I presume that these days they use black polythene

Greenfires

In the good old days, much of the soot from Old London Town was collected up by the Master Sweeps, the nicer ones of whom used to let their climbing boys sleep on sacks of it. When they had a shed full, they used to call in Jones the cart, or their local equivalent, who used to cart it off to farmers up and down the country. Much of London's soot ended up on the fields of Lincolnshire by all accounts - where it was said to "sweeten the soil"

There you go, you can always learn something from a chimney sweep!

Man_Overboard_2

A sweep of my acquaintance tells his customers that their soot will be exported to Africa, where it will be converted into talcum powder

Gloomendoom

shazzafly wrote: »

1. What's the best way/thing to empty ash into without making a mess, I'm currently using large plant pot ?

2. How do people dispose of the ash, I have been putting in garden but fear I may end up with a small mountain ?
3.Any other general stove keeping cleaning tips as dont want to be dropping ash everywhere.

Thanks all. :)

Buy one of these....

http://www.aldi.co.uk/uk/html/offers/special_buys3_26897.htm

and then tip it into the dustbin.

Greenfires

Man_Overboard wrote: »

A sweep of my acquaintance tells his customers that their soot will be exported to Africa, where it will be converted into talcum powder

Now that's much funnier than my story, if slightly less factual! Might have to pinch that one for my customers!!

Greenfires

If you search google for reviews of ash vacuums, you'll find an awful lot of disappointed customers, even for ones using their own power rather than that of your existing hoover. Usual problem seems to be the filter blocking up within no time at all - often before the job can actually be completed. This is probably why a chimney vacuum such as muckybutt or I use costs over £700, and this thing costs less than £20!

If the ashes are cold - then I'd use a plastic bag and a small fireplace shovel. Keep the opening of the bag as close to the stove door as you can, and gently squeeze the air from the bag when you've done keeping the outlet towards the inside of the stove so that any dust coming out gets pulled into the stove by the chimney draught.

Again though - if you use wood you'll only have to do this once a month or so.

suki1964

We are lucky in that we have a large bank of land we can dump our ashes. The wind soon takes them across the fields.

We slip the ash tray out and cover with a bit of paper to walk through the house to the back door. The stove we just brush out what we can ( this is when using smokeless which gives a lot of ash and anthracite which leaves clinkers ) and every now and then take the vacuum to it.

It's just a tesco cheapo vacuum, cost less then 20 quid, only used for the fire and lasted two years so far

My mum has one of those metal containers to slip the ash tray in to. I think more dust escapes as you tip the tray so never use it

Just have to accept that you are going to have more dust to contend with and if you have carpet it's worth buying a cheap rug for in front of the fire as smokeless fuels make one hell of a mess when they roll off the hearth

wrightk

we used to tip ours into an ash bin just outside the door along with the coal bunker. but if your burning coal you will find like we did that the bin fills up very quickly and then it becomes so heavy you cant move it, then you have to manually empty it again into bins or whatever. on the odd occasion we burn logs we will offer the ash around as everyone here has allotments they can spread it onto.

i suppose if your burning logs it will have its advantages in that the ash can actually become useful. perhaps offer any ash on freecycle or similar website/neighbours, lay a tiled floor or similar so any debris can be easily swept up if your budget allows.

mirabelle

Man_Overboard wrote: »

Try this...

The idea of spreading ash/soot over the garden stems from the days when the poor had no alternative!

I once dumped a few bags of soot over my wife's vegetable plot, but the wind got up and blew it in through the open windows

Not good

This is exactly what happens when you try to do a good deed by disposing of your soot in an environmentally friendly way and reminds me of when I carefully carried a pan full of soot intended for the good of the garden , through the house to the back door, opened it, and a gale blew it back in my face and over the coats and boots hanging in the larder.