Clean the pipe

Warning: this is a messy procedure. Learn from my woes and surround your interior chimney with an old sheet before proceeding.

Well, since we never actually had winter around here I’ll detail this procedure and post the pictures from when I cleaned the chimbley around Christmas time. The principles are still relevant and I’ll do this same thing in the spring when I clean the chimney again, because it’s a pretty messy operation. It will be better when I staple a sheet to the ceiling around the chimney before proceeding.

Also, this operation only works if you can actually access your chimney from inside. If your chimney is on the outside and you can still get the brush up from below via the cleanout, you’re cleverer than me (most people are). If your chimbley has an elbow and you can access the vertical run from below, you can still do this. That’s how I did it in our last house. If you can’t, it’s up to the roof with you!

It’s as easy as 1-2-3. It’s almost as easy as cleaning a chimney from up on the roof, without all that life-threatening stuff. Unless, of course, you don’t surround the interior chimney with a sheet and you get soot everywhere and your wife threatens your life. If you don’t protect the environs, you’re safer to go up on the roof. This is pretty messy, did I mention?

1. Disassemble the chimney and screw the brush to the first rod.
2. Push the brush up the pipe, adding sections of rod as you go, brushing clear up to the chimney cap.
3. When all is sparkling clean, pull the brush out and reassemble the chimney.
4. Clean up.
5. Clean up.
6. Clean up.

Let the soot begin

Cleaning the lower stovepipe

See? Easy as 1-2-3. Of course the last few steps won’t be necessary next time when I hang a sheet from …oh yeah, I mentioned that. The advantage of cleaning the chimney from roof is that all the gunk falls straight down to the smoke shelf inside the stove. Then you take apart the stovepipe and vacuum up all the gunk from the smoke shelf. (The disadvantage, of course, is the risk of a short-term trip to long-term disability.) The inside method is lots easier. You just remove the pipe first instead of last, with the result that all the soot and pulverized creosote floats out and coats the room. If you hang a sheet first …oh yeah, I mentioned that.

You’ll need to get a wire brush to fit your chimney and enough fiberglass rods to reach all the way to the chimney cap. Both of these depend on your chimney setup. I use a 6” circular wire brush and three 4’ threaded rods. Your local fire department may have everything you need available for free checkout, like the library. Ours did, and I did that when we lived in town, but it’s less hassle to have your own.

And either way, you save yourself a $150 visit from the chimney sweep.