Search the Community

Hi everyone. I really appreciate any advice. I have a wood burning stove with a flue that terminates just above a sealed fireboard. I've had a WBS company check it out and they said this is unusual, and it needs a whole new flue liner etc to meet modern regs and to brun properly. They say as the short flue could deposit soot onto the fireboard, build up over time, and then cause a chimney breast fire. However I have just discovered an access hatch hidden behind a mirror on the chimney breast, which they, nor I had previously known about. This means I could periodically sweep up built up deposits from the fireboard, and assumingly reduce that risk significantly. I include a diagram of the arrangement and photos further below: My questions are: * Does my mitigation of risk sound reasonable? That if I use this hatch to clean deposits regularly, then the chance of fire is significantly reduced? * Can a sweep still clean the brick chimney by using brushes up the WBS. Or would they have to go up via this small acccess hatch - is that even possible? Of course I could ask a stove supplier, but two have already failed to check for a hatch and quoted me £1800 for a new flue liner, aire vvent in the room, etc. Note: I only really intend to use this fire once or twice a week during the winter. I have decent central heating and the fire iis more of an occasional nicety for winter evvenings. Background: I moved into my house about a year ago. And I was already aware that the WBS in the living room didn't have any HETAS paperwork (discount on sale was appplied!). An old friend of mine who has had stoves all his life said let's run a few tests... see if it's drawing. We did a smoke test, and sure enough looking from outside it was drawing well enough. Then we lit a few fires over the course of a week and it burned reasonably well. The ropes on the doors were falling off, which I think contributed to a lot of smoke smell in the house from the fire. But 3x Carbon Monoxide detectors dottted around the fire room, room above and hallway didn't ping once.

We have a chimney which is to service the WBS when it gets commissioned in early December. Unfortunately the builders positioned the hole for the register plate too far back in the hearth area causing the WBS to sit further back in the "hole" than we would have hoped for. I have spoken with the installers and they say there is nothing we can do to bring it forward. I suggested a double 45 degree bend flue pipe set up but he said because it is a chimney and not a twin flue system, the pipe needs to go vertically from the WBS to the aperture in the register plate. Now, once I have been signed off so to speak is this something I could fit retrospectively or is it a complete no no ? Thoughts welcome.

I found that the gas fireplace chimney crown on my house was pretty cracked and allowed little water in. After removing the crown I discovered that the flue was fitted hovering two inches above the concrete chimney pipe end and not interfaced to it, potentially allowing fumes to go into the chimney box - I did find soot deposits there. Furthermore, there is flexible flue liner running inside the concrete pipe but it stops about 30cm below the top. Couple of questions now: 1. Isn't the flue supposed to be tightly connected to the system below without the break gap? 2. If so, can it be interfaced and sealed to the concrete pipe as the lining ends 30cm too low or will I have to replace the lining with a length reaching all the way to the flue? Please see the photos. The chimney itself is precast concrete on a metal frame. Note the heat boards are removed in the photo as I am going to recoat the frame. Many thanks for any advice. Chimney in loft with heat boards removed Starting on the crown Pretty rotten underneath and the reinforced concrete top also crumbling Flue was flat on top of the rusted plate with a 2" air gap under it Flue liner down the concrete pipe

Hello, We have insulated the whole of our 1940 house from the inside using rigid fibreglass bats and plasterboard. Its previous insulation value was very poor in solid brick. We are on the last room which has a large stone fireplace with a wood-burning stove in it, on an external wall. We use this in winter but not everyday. I do not want this to be a cold spot when not in use and a huge heat loss when it is in use. I have about 4 to 6 inches to play with and still maintain a good air gap behind the stove but I am not sure what materials to use for both maximum efficiency and fire safety. What suggestions do members have for this scenario? I should add that it has a flue pipe through to the top of the chimney with a proper watertight top plate and an insulated one at the bottom. Advice would be most appreciated

Evening all, first request for advice! I’m opening up our fireplace which was previously an open fire and have already placed a lintel for support. I’ve hit a bit of a roadblock in that the bricks inside the chimney angling up to the right do not seem to be supported by anything. On the left side they look to be resting on the one course of bricks, which I would like to remove, on the right, they sit across 3 courses of brick, 2 of which I’m looking to remove. further up, they do not seem to be interlocking with the front or back wall, just mortared to each other almost floating in the middle if I remove some of the legs. Am I safe to remove the bricks in the feet or am I in danger of causing some damage to the chimney? TIA for any comments, Rob

Hi, I have a problem with persistent damp coming through my chimney breast. I had two sides of chimney stack re-pointed a few years ago, and the lead has also been replaced. Unfortunately the problem has not resolved and has slowly deteriorated since. I've attached photos. Could it be that the top plate needs replacing? The Chimney is not in use. Any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

How would you finish the render on these chimneys where the lead trays are. I can see the point of the folded lead but it doesnt exactly leave it easy or neat to render to. Could the fold be trimmed off and the lead meshed and rendered over? Advice welcome

We are thinking about installing a woodburning stove in the middle room of our renovation. After having a quote of £3k for just that one stove, liner and fitting, we are hoping to do it ourselves. The opening is quite wide and has been built from old bricks. however, some of it needs pointing and a few extra bricks. I have been told to use Hydrated lime, is this correct for an old Victorian house, which we suspect had lime mortar used origonally. But the main question is how best to clean up the bricks. It will look lovely if we can clean them up rather than lining with cement board. I am worried that if we just try things, we could be making it worse.

Excerpt from a previous thread. A member asked..... Following on from discussions regarding the desirability and availabilty of low output room sealed wood burners I have been looking at the alternatives. I need something that will satisfy our desire to have a "real fire" while at the same time having a controllable output of around about 2kW. Has anyone looked at using bioethanol burners as a compromise solution in this situation ? Do I need to make any special allowances for flue-less fires in the house or should a standard MVHR system be able to cope ? Are there any building regs to consider ?