Gallery Page
Below are just some of the problems that can happen in a chimney without regular cleaning. To avoid letting these types of problems from occurring in your home get you chimney swept regularly
 | This is what an Oil boiler looks like when the flueway becoms blocked with soot |
| This is the brush that was used to clean the boiler flue above. Once the chimney had become blocked, rain water turned the soot in a paste which staines anything that it comes into contact with |  |
 | Still the same boiler. This is some of the sludge that came down the chimney after the brush had been removed. |
| A Chimney with cobwebs inside to the point where air and flue gases can't escape up the chimney. |  |
 | This plate was taken from inside an appliance burning solid fuel, where the plate has melted flames could now pass through straight into the flue increasing the risk of a chimney fire. Always look after your heating equipment. |
 |  I was called to this house only to discover that the chimney was in such a state that I refused to sweep it because it would probably have fallen down. There was not a lot of mortar left at the top holding the bricks together and the chimney had started to lean over, but what made it worse was that the upper section was not even connected to the house.I advised the owner to get a builder asap. The chimney has since been taken down and completely rebuilt |
| In this chimney someone had driven a waste pipe through the flue nearly blocking the chimney. |  |
 | In this chimney a section of flue pipe had cracked letting smoke and soot pass through into another room. |
| This is what a normal un-swept chimney looks like. |  |
 | These cowl types are called inserts and are only allowed for chimneys that are not in use. They provide ventilation only for unused chimneys. This chimney however is in use and excessive tar has been forming due to slow fume movement through the flue See our cowl guide for more details |
| This pile of twigs had been deposited by two rooks within a week. |  |
 | This is a register plate in a thatched cottage that had been "cleaned every six months" by a local uncertified sweep, as you can see from the picture, he failed monumentally and actually left the chimney in a more dangerous condition than it was prior to his visit and no certificate of sweeping was left for some reason. They then called me in and I found a 10 inch deep pile of soot. I cleaned it fully and pulled out 5 bin bags full of soot. They now have a clean chimney and register plate with a certificate of chimney sweeping for there insurance company every six months |
After being called to this property I noticed that the fire was previously an inglenook that had been filled in to make a small open fireplace which the current tenant was still using. Unfortunately the person who did the work had not separated the two cupboards either side from the back of the fire and smoke and deposits from the fire were collecting on the wooden doors (see picture below) and could have caused a fire. I refused to sweep the chimney due to the dangerous condition and issued a warning notice to be handed to the responsible person in charge of the property and also told the tenant it would be a bad idea to use the fire until adequate repairs had been made. |  |
| Same property as above. A door on the side of the chimney with soot covering it, causing a potential fire hazard and health issues. |  |
 | Same door as above. Apart from the other hazards listed above, when the door is in its closed position you can see a gap between the door and the frame in which smoke was escaping into the room. |
This is the remains of my brush after it was eventually removed by a builder.
I noticed that something was wrong halfway up the chimney and that the brush would not move up or down. After sending up a cctv camera it was discovered that an electrical cable had wrapped round the brush and rods holding it fast. Once the builder had made a hole in the chimney and cut the cable (after first turning off the electricity) it was discovered that the cable was live and running to the oil boiler as well as the water pipes all going through the chimney breast. Unfortunately nobody knows who the installer was but as least it has now been made safe. |  |
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This page was last modified on Thursday, February 02, 2012 01:43:08 AM