Chimney Sweeping
As chimney professionals with an interest in our clients’ happiness and safety, we recommend having your chimney swept regularly — if you use your heating appliance with any degree of regularity, that’s usually once a year. But we’re not the only ones with this recommendation: groups from the The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) offer the same words of advice.
There’s good reason for the recommendation. As you burn fuel in your fireplace or stove, combustion creates a variety of byproducts, many of them dangerous, most of them detrimental to your system’s performance and long-term health. If you have a wood-burning appliance, that includes creosote, a highly-combustible deposit that builds up on your flue walls and can cause many different problems, from fire hazards to a constricted, poorly drafting flue. Other acidic deposits erode and corrode, and the longer the flue is left without a professional cleaning, the more damage those deposits are able to do to the flue and masonry surfaces.
Chimney Sweeping Process
When Mountain Home Chimney Services technicians come to your home for a chimney sweeping appointment, you can expect us to protect your home from messes and to provide a thorough and detailed sweeping, followed by a basic Level 1 inspection of your clean chimney.
Our techs cover the work area around your appliance with heavy-duty drop cloths to protect your home from any errant soot. Once your home is protected, we use special tools and brushes and a specially-designed, high-power vacuum system to remove and contain all deposits in your appliance and along your flue walls. We clean the firebox and grate, damper and smoke chamber and all along your flue, and vacuum and contain any creosote, ash and debris that we remove. We also check all of the readily-accessible areas in your system for damage or safety hazards.
On average, the sweeping process takes a little over an hour, and when Mountain Home Chimney Services techs leave, you’ll have a clean chimney, a still-clean home and an understanding of the basic state of your chimney system.
The Chimney Safety Institute of America (CSIA) has a helpful video that outlines what a certified sweep will do, step by step:
Save Money By Scheduling During The Off Season!
You’ll want to have your chimney ready to use when the heating season starts — and you can save money by planning ahead and scheduling your appointment during our off season, April through August. Contact us to ask about our discounts!
Aside from off-peak savings, having your chimney swept ahead of the heating season has some other benefits. First, you can feel comfortable using your fireplace during those random, cool early-spring or late-summer evenings, without worrying that your chimney’s draft is impeded by debris or creosote. Chimney odors related to a dirty chimney are often worse in the summer months, too, as heat and moisture contribute. It’s not uncommon to see smelly chimney problems cleared up quickly with a simple chimney sweeping, so once we leave, you can enjoy the summer without musty flue odors.
The key, overall, is to make sure your chimney is being swept regularly, whatever season that ends up being. But Mountain Home Chimney and Flame would love to help keep your chimney clean with less hassle and at a lower cost!