MID SEASON SERVICE ADVICE

01.29.09

This Winter season is turning out to be like the old fashioned Winters of old. Sustained cold coupled with consistent snowfalls. Fun for the skiing enthusiasts and (Winter) service businesses; less so for some others.

Fireplaces, wood stoves, and the newer outdoor wood furnaces are getting a good work out, often burning close to 24 hours a day.

For the first two, it may be time for a mid-winter flue and chimney cleaning. Frequent fires in fireplaces, along with steadily used wood stoves are great generators of sooty smoke that can build up quite rapidly in the chimney or flue liner. Caked soot deposits are great "hosts" to chimney fires, being incompletely burned fuel that can re-ignite (far) up the chimney later in the season. An older chimney, without an up-to-date flue, or flue liner, is prone to possible failure from extreme heat generated by a fire in this area. The result can be a dangerous house fire should such a chimney fire get through the damaged chimney.

Newer chimneys and flues are quite resistant to this problem but can still be dangerous if combustion starts up the shaft since the intense heat can weaken a chimney from within, setting it up for a more dangerous problem later.

It could well be time to hire a chimney cleaner for a mid-season cleaning and the cost spent now may save you a much bigger problem, and cost, down the road.

©2009 R. Leech features.