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looking forward to adding info on Sweepnman Inc. in the days to come the company has grown and we are looking forward to creating a safer environment in chimneys throughout our area of service
ReplyDeleteIt's Febuary 17th Spring is getting closer we are contacting our customer/homeowners who have needed masonry work but where unable to get the work done due to the weather and temperature
ReplyDeleteSmoke Chambers
ReplyDeleteI’ve been in the chimney sweep profession since 1987 and I have seen a lot of wonderful fireplaces over the years. One thing I have never made an issue about but yet knew the NFPA211 states the safety issue clearly,” the smoke chamber shall be parged smooth.” I never made this an issue because I never really understood it for what it was there for.
First off we know that Time Turbulence and Temperature are the three main cause for the amount of creosote buildup. The smoke chamber is the first place the smoke enters after it leaves the fireplace. It’s a large area above the fireplace that the smoke has to travel through to reach the flue. Some of these chambers are extremely large and some are really small and shallow. The rules for the chamber are that the height of the chamber should be the same as the width of the fireplace opening. The chamber is usually corbelled to shape the angle leading to the flue. Some of the flues are on the right side some of the flues are on the left side and some are in the middle or offset a little to line up with the way the chimney is built.
This corbelling looks like upside down steps and when the smoke travels along this area it tends to spin at each step and causes from that turbulence creosote buildup. Sometimes this is difficult to clean depending on what stage creosote it has become. By the way the three stages of creosote are 1st stage powder 2nd stage flaky and the 3rd stage the most flammable is the heavy black glaze. If the corbel in the smoke chamber was smooth there would be no turbulence and the gasses/ smoke would travel faster to the actual flue. That is why the chamber should be parged smooth.
The walls of the chamber are usually only one brick thick between the house construction and the masonry construction. This can be an issue if the chamber gets heated up. When masons build this area of the chimney there are supposed to parge the walls with a refractory cement and this can reduce the clearances some. A lot of smoke chambers that I come across do not have this protection especially the exterior chimney’s.
With the products on the market such as Chamber Parge, Chamber Teck 3000, Heat Shields refractory foam and Smoke Tight products, the chamber can be smoothed out and made leak tight to allow the smoke to smoothly run through the system. Reducing turbulence and residence time inside the chamber. The first defense you have against chimney fires is a properly shaped smoke chamber. When cleaning the fireplace flue, the smoke chamber is really more important than the flue while both need to be swept clean the most intense heat is just above the fireplace.
Some examples here are of a smooth shaped chamber
sorry pictures didn't copy
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