I bought a cheap 7-inch wire brush off Amazon for 20 bucks last month to clean a flue in an old house near Austin. The bristles started falling off after two uses and one got wedged in the damper. Spent Saturday cutting it out with an angle grinder. Anyone else had luck with a brand that doesn't shed like a shedding dog?
After three years using square wire brushes from the hardware store, I finally swapped to a round poly brush for my regular residential jobs. The round brush gets into crooked flues way better and I cracked a tile liner trying to force a square brush through a tight spot last Tuesday. Has anyone else made this switch and found it works better for older masonry chimneys?
I used wire brushes for YEARS on every job, thinking they were the only real option. Then I picked up a poly bristle rod from a supply house in Columbus about 2 months ago and it completely changed how I handle creosote buildup. It flexes way better around offsets and I don't have to worry about scratching stainless liners. Has anyone else made that change or am I late to the party?
My old Vacuum truck has been making this weird grinding noise for weeks. I thought for sure it was the motor going out and I was looking at a couple grand in repairs. A buddy in the trade told me to check the carbon brushes first, they are like 12 bucks each and you can swap them yourself. So I got a kit for $80 total and spent maybe an hour taking the motor housing apart. Sure enough the old brushes were worn down to almost nothing. Put the new ones in and the thing runs smooth as butter now. Has anyone else had a cheap part save them from a huge repair bill like that?
The homeowner watched me work and said try a flexible shaft with a diamond wheel instead of the standard wire brush, and I gotta admit the difference in getting into those tight flue bends was night and day.
I spent last month in Cincinnati trying to clean a chimney that had 3 years of buildup from a wood stove. My old shop vac kept clogging every 15 minutes. So last week I finally grabbed a proper HEPA vacuum with a 5 micron bag and a cyclone separator. It cost me around 400 bucks but I finished the job in half the time. First time I didn't have to stop every 10 minutes to unclog the hose. What do you guys use for heavy soot jobs?
I had a customer in Omaha last spring who used to be a mason. He pointed out my firebox mortar joints were all uneven and said I was smearing instead of packing. Idk, I thought I was doing fine for 8 years. So I spent a weekend practicing on a mockup in my driveway with a trowel and a level. The change was simple: pack the mortar deeper and finish with a slicker motion. Now my repairs pass inspection way faster and the older sweeps in my local guild actually nod when they see my work. Has anyone else had a customer call them out on something basic that ended up helping?
I had a chimney fire call over in Medford last October. After I knocked it down I rinsed the flue with cold water like I always do. Next inspection I found this thick tar-like buildup that wasn't there before. Learned the hard way that hot water mixed with trisodium phosphate works way better for breaking down creosote after a burn. Has anyone else run into this problem with cold rinses?
I was reading through some NFPA reports last night and stumbled on a fact that surprised me. Turns out chimney fires caused over 25,000 house fires in the US just in 2021 according to their data. What got me is that most of those fires were from creosote buildup that could have been prevented with more frequent sweeps. I used to think twice a year was fine for my customers but now I'm thinking three times might be smarter, especially for wood stoves. Found this info on the NFPA website under their fire loss statistics section. Has anyone else adjusted their recommendations after seeing hard numbers like this?
Everyone says you gotta use a power drill attachment to scrub creosote out of stainless liners, but I found a $12 wire cup brush on a 4-inch angle grinder cuts through the hard stuff in half the time. I tried it last month on a job in Dayton and the liner came out spotless, no scratches. Anyone else skip the fancy tools and just use what works?
I used to think a stiff brush was the only way to really scrub a flue clean, but this 60 year old sweep in Columbus showed me I was just scratching up the liner and making more work for myself. He handed me his regular poly brush and I knocked out a heavy creosote job in half the time with way less mess. Has anyone else had to eat crow after ignoring advice from the guys who've been doing this since before I was born?
My brush handle actually snapped mid-sweep and I realized the solvent I was slathering on every time was eating through the fiberglass threads, has anyone else had this issue with the GreenGuard brand?
I was working on a routine flue cleaning at this old house in Oakwood, went out to grab a brush from my truck, and came back to find smoke pouring from the roof. Turns out the homeowner had been burning unseasoned pine and the creosote buildup caught mid-job. Has anyone else had a close call like that on a job?
It listed a single sweep doing 12 chimneys in one day back then, which floored me since I'm lucky to hit 4 with modern gear. The entries mentioned using nothing but a brush and a cloth sack for soot collection. Makes you wonder how those guys managed without vacuum setups or masks, huh?
I swear every time I do a sweep in an old house in Richmond, the homeowner has stuff piled right in front of the cleanout door. Makes a simple job take twice as long. I started bringing my little Rigid shop vac to just clean out the debris before I even start brushing. Has anyone else dealt with people sealing up their cleanout doors with silicone caulk?
I was up on a steep roof in Portland last Tuesday trying to clear a soot dam in a curved flue. My rods kept binding up about halfway through and I couldn't get past the bend. I tried different brush heads, less pressure, even a smaller rod section. Nothing worked for like 45 minutes. Then this old sweep who was working on the house next door walked over and showed me his trick. He tied a heavy steel nut to a length of paracord and dropped it down from the top of the flue. Once it passed the dam, he tied his brush to the bottom end and pulled it back up through the dam from below. It cleared everything in about two pulls. Has anyone else used this string method for tricky flues or do you have a different approach?
I was going through my receipts last week and realized I've already done 300 flue repairs in 2024. That's way more than my normal pace, especially since I cover both Greenville and Spartanburg. Not sure if it's just more old houses needing work or if I'm getting faster at it. Has anyone else seen a big jump in their numbers like this?
Spent three hours just chipping it out with a hand scraper because the rotary tool kept binding up, and what's the worst creosote buildup you've ever had to break through?
Last week I was on a job in Denver where the homeowner wanted me to vac every speck of dust before I even started brushing. I spent 45 minutes just sucking up loose debris that would have come down anyway during the sweep. 3 years ago I learned the hard way that aggressive vacuuming can pull out the mortar between liner joints if you're not careful. Now I only use the vac to catch the big stuff after I brush, not before. Has anyone else seen damage from over-vaccing an old clay liner?
I started sweeping chimneys back in '99 with an old timer in Philly who refused to use a vacuum, just tarps and brushes and a lot of elbow grease. Over the last 25 years I watched us go from that to HEPA vacs and spinning rods that do half the work, but I swear the old guy's results were cleaner even without the fancy gear. Anyone else feel like we lost something good when we traded sore shoulders for all this tech?
Ngl I was pretty ticked off. I bought this heavy duty poly brush head from a supply shop in Cincinnati, paid $80 for it. On the third chimney I used it on, the bristles just started flying off everywhere. I had to stop mid job and pick bristles out of the flue. Has anyone else had a tool fail that quick on them?
Stopped by a job site last week where a newer guy tried vacuuming out a hot creosote log fire instead of using rods. The shop vac melted in about 30 seconds. Anyone else run into rookies who won't listen about letting stuff cool down first?
I always thought sweeping by hand was the only way to really know you got everything. But last week I was on a job with an older sweep who showed me his HEPA vac setup. He ran it on this old masonry chimney that looked pretty clean... and that thing pulled out so much fine dust I couldn't believe it. Made me realize I've been missing a ton of the nasty stuff that settles in crevices. Has anyone else had a change of heart on vacs vs hand tools?
I was looking through an old trade journal from 1887 that a customer handed me, and it said a standard brush and rod set back then ran about $12. Adjusted for inflation that is over $400 today, which is wild. I paid $350 for my first beater truck when I was 16. Makes you appreciate how cheap our tools have gotten, even if the materials are different. Has anyone else run across old price lists that made you do a double take?