The Hot Box, Part 1

Fall is incredible at Sweetwater.  The trees are resplendent in their scarlet, gold, and violet foliage.  Gradually the leaves lose their grip and float gently to the ground until the earth is carpeted with a crispy, crunchy layer of windblown beauty.

Besides the beauty though, it’s also a warning–winter is coming.

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I had known from our first look at the cabin that we would need to install some way to heat the place during the few really cold spells the area gets every year.  There was an old hundred gallon propane tank nestled against the back wall of the little house, and some copper tubing running here and there underneath, so I knew the previous owner had depended on hauling in that gas for heating and cooking, at least at some point.  

I liked the idea of having propane as a backup for times when we could not be at the cabin, but Annie emphasized the necessity of hauling the heavy tank in and out using the rugged, weather-dependent driveway to our little getaway.  Heck, during times of heavy rain, snow, or sleet, four-wheel-drive is often non-optional.  Of course, there was more than that, like finding a place to refill the tank, the possibility of doing without heat if we were caught short at an inopportune time, things like that.

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I knew we would be cleaning up a lot of brush and fallen trees and limbs on the place.  Heck, on one of our first trips out there we were stopped a few hundred yards short by a two-foot diameter oak tree that had fallen across the driveway.  The fact that we got there well after dark and it was starting to rain didn’t help when I realized I would have to chop some of the tree apart with an axe.  It occurred to me that there was a lot of potential heating in that big old tree…as we rolled the chunks out of the roadway and down the hillside bordering the drive.

Yeah, we’d have to cut some trees anyway, so why not install a wood-burning stove for heat?  That, plus the added romantic atmosphere and heart-warming ambiance of relaxing while watching the fire through a glass door almost made the decision for us.

The fact that I like wood heat and was able to find a used stove on Craigslist for $50 made the conclusion even easier.  It even had a glass panel in the door.   Perfect!

Yeah, I bought it.

I took the stove home, disassembled it, wire-brushed off the rust, repainted it, replaced all the seals, and put it back together.  Oh, I also cut and installed new firebrick to replace some of the old time-and-heat-damaged refractory blocks.

If I do say so myself, it looked pretty good.  All I had to do then was install an insulated steel chimney in the cabin and hook up the stove to it.

That’s all? 

Yeah, if only it were that easy.

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For one thing, I would have to install a frame on the attic-side of the living room ceiling, install a support box which the insulated pipe would rest in as it passed through the attic space, and run the pipe directly up from the support box and through the roof.  Then I would stabilize the pipe and install a rubber boot to prevent rain from following the pipe through the roof and into the cabin, add a baffle cap to the top and…and…oh, I guess that’s it.

I have installed chimney pipe a time or two before and did not find it difficult at all…at least those times.  This one, however, would be different.  The attic constituted a problem.  You see, it was less than two-feet deep at the point above the optimum place for the stove to sit in the cabin.  Between that shallow space and the even smaller spaces presented by the trusses it would be virtually impossible for me to crawl in and around and work.  The spaces in the trusses were barely wider than my hand’s breadth at most and were, of course, triangular, which made the usable area much too small for my less-than-anorexic bulk.

My first, most logical next step was to ask for help from some of my sons who had children young and small enough to navigate the space in the attic while also being old enough to reliably do the work needed.  No matter how I tried to cajole, or convince, or even bribe them into making the long trip to the cabin and supervise said child in said work in a hot, cramped, dusty space, none could/would comply.

In other words, my incredibly intelligent and incredibly capable descendants were also incredibly absent.

Dang it.

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The ceiling in the living room is vaulted and covered in corrugated tin.  It looks rustically nice but would require at least two, preferably more, people to remove the tin (each sheet is the full width of the living room) and open a hole through which we could fabricate a frame for the support box and attach it to two trusses.  Then we would replace the sheetrock we had removed, measure and cut a hole in the tin to match the opening in the frame for the support box, and reinstall that corrugated metal. 

Also, at some point, we would have to find a way to cut a hole in the roof which obviously is also vaulted, albeit at a different angle that the ceiling.  That hole had to be directly above the hole…and smaller so that the rubber boot would cover it, yet give us room to add something across the hole to stabilize the insulated pipe.  There was no room for error in that part of the equation.

But wait, there’s more.

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As difficult as all of that would have been to accomplish with some little-person to crawl around in the attic, it would be even more difficult to do, basically by myself.

My sweet, patient, long-suffering wife is always happy (kind of) to assist me with my projects, so she would be there.  But the only way I could figure out to do it without someone in the attic would have basically required me to do most of it by myself, working through a hole just slightly larger than my head, while still absolutely demanding that I have someone help me at times.

Refer back to my sweet, patient, long-suffering wife, while keeping in mind that there is no way she could have stood around, watching me work for hours and hours while waiting for those few steps that would necessitate her being below while I was working on the roof.  It would drive her crazy, especially because she would simultaneously think of a few million things that she could be getting done if she was not standing around watching me.

Yeah.

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So Annie worked on her projects within an area of roughly five acres in and around the cabin while keeping her ear turned toward my shouts for help, sometimes muffled by being indoors, while tuning out my frequent colorful descriptions when things just didn’t quite work the way I needed them to, not to mention the times when my efforts failed dramatically.  I don’t know if colorful adequately describes the things I shouted then.

Just sayin’.

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I was spending a week at the cabin while Annie would only be able to join, and help, me for the weekend so, while I was waiting for my lovely assistant to arrive, I marked a square the dimensions needed for the support box to fit in the ceiling.  Then I drilled holes in the corners and “wallered” them out enough that I could fit a jigsaw blade through them.

That’s when I discovered that I had carefully marked out the square in an area that included one of the attic trusses.  For the record, cutting through a truss that supports both the room and the ceiling is a recipe for disaster.

Oops.

I relocated and re-marked the square, “wallered-out” the corners and cut out the hole in the ceiling.

So far, so good.

Being unable to take off the tin sheets meant that I would now have to do almost all of the attic work through that little head-sized square hole.

Yeah.

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With the hole finished I cut the attic insulation and flipped it back out of the way.  This allowed me to use a flashlight while measuring the distance between the two trusses (yeah, three things with two hands working through a hole that barely allowed both hands to fit at the same time).  I then cut a 2’x4’ and a 2’x6’ the appropriate length.  The reason for the two different dimensional pieces was that, you’ll remember, the ceiling was vaulted, and the chimney pipe had to be perfectly vertical.  Thus the frame would have to be perfectly square and canted, compared to the ceiling, so that the support box could be attached so that its bottom was absolutely level.  So I not only had to attach the 2’x4’ and 2’x6’ through the little hole, I had to pre-start toenail screws, then hold the boards up into the attic, use a torpedo level to ensure that they were level/plumb, then hold them steady with one hand while I drove in the wood screws.

With all that considered, it was surprisingly easy.  It was even easier when I measured, cut, and attached two more 2’x4’s between the previous 2’x4’ and 2’x6’ so that I was left with a perfectly square/level/plumb opening to which I could then attach the support box, again, perfectly plumb and level.

At that point, the rest of that step was unexpectedly easy

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Need I point out that, although the phrase surprisingly easy is used several times in this post, it is not superfluous.  When I’m working on a project, easy is always a surprise.  Heck, success, even though it is virtually inevitable, often requires numerous failed attempts.

I prefer to call them, “learning steps.”

But, yeah, failures.

Remember the old admonition, “failure is not an option”?  Well, when I take on a project, failure is ALWAYS an option.

Just sayin’.

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As the daytime hours dwindled and I more-and-more looked forward to a shower and my bed, I pushed the support box up into the hole the appropriate distance, figured where I needed to drill holes for screws to attach it to the frame.  I would then remove the box and drill said holes.

Uh, remember when I said the chimney pipe had to be perfectly vertical?  Yeah, that would require the bottom of the support box, in which the chimney would rest, to be perfectly level.

At this point I was slapped in the face by what I find to be one of the most frustrating facts of modern manufacturing, ie: the box was not assembled in such a way that the bottom could be perfectly square, horizontally speaking.  So, as the box was held in place by friction I checked the level of the bottom with the torpedo level, then tapped or pulled whichever corner or side needed to be adjusted to achieve said perfect level.  After what some would consider an inordinate amount of time I came to the conclusion that, while I could level two sides of the bottom, I could NOT level all four sides at the same time.

I was then faced with deciding how close to level is level-enough. 

With that done I cut a piece of cardboard into an appropriate square, then folded it so it would fit through the circular hole in the support box. Once in the box I folded it back out so it would lie flat over the hole and act as a block to the frigid air in the attic which was even then absolutely pouring into the living room.

With that much success behind me I was able to call it a night and go shower and climb in bed where my ever-active brain was tumbling and kneading the steps ahead of me toward getting the chimney installed.

Put it this way, my sleep that night was not perfect.  In retrospect, it was a logical end to the day.

Next time I will show you what passes for success in my world.  It may surprise you.

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