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Fireplace??? Any experts???

ImThere

ImThere

Well-Known Member
Joined
Oct 20, 2015
Messages
6,592
Location
Lewisburg, TN
Anyone here a fire place expert? I had a company come out to check ours and I feel they are full of ****. Lol. The fire places are from 1970. He kept telling my wife about all this work we needed to bring the fireplace to code. They have been using this fireplace over 50 years. I'm not concerned with up to code. Should I be?
Here's the quote
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I'm no expert but we've burned wood for years in the homes I've lived in. I'd get a second opinion. It's pretty straightforward to install a double or triple wall liner if your masonry chimney is junk. There's a risk of fire and carbon monoxide as with anything burning so we have a smoke detector close as well as a carbon monoxide detector.
I clean the creosote out of the chimney yearly or maybe a little more if really cold and using the stove a lot.
They have to cover their @$$ in case you burn your house down and they told you not to use it so it wouldn't hurt to get a second opinion and play dumb.
 
Yep that’s the quoted price. That’s why I’m asking! Lol. The fireplace looks like it’s in good condition to me. But it’s not up to code?


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A second opinion is either cheap or free, if nothing else I'd get a second quote just to see if they can beat the price quoted. I'd get one and not show them this quote, see what they say could be an issue
 
also i see they are charging for "sweep/inspection". ridiculous. any contractor worth his weight should clean up the place and makes it look like they were never there, sans extra charge
 
We got a similar quote for ours, but the chimney was in danger of falling apart-a bunch of the exterior mortar gaps were... Just gaps, no cap, etc. We got 3 quotes that were all very similar, ended up just doing the exterior brickwork/cap/waterproofing to button the house up, ditched our plans to start using it so skipped the liner/firebox repair. It's hard to say how accurate the quote is without knowing to what extent they would need to remove and redo the brickwork etc, but that is not a number that surprises me if it's anywhere close to what mine was like.
 
Seems if there is block issues, a normal mason could take care of some of that stuff. Nothing special to a chimney guy. Flashing, and water proofing can be done by any roofer. Not sure how much they would charge. I would get a second price just to compare. Not 100% sure on a fire place. But every other type of construction does not require constant code up date. It's grandfathered in unless you up date something. Than those things need to be up dated. If you change a receptacle in a house, doesn't mean all of the electrical needs to be updated. Just what your fixing.
 
MattMan81 said:
Seems if there is block issues, a normal mason could take care of some of that stuff. Nothing special to a chimney guy. Flashing, and water proofing can be done by any roofer. Not sure how much they would charge. I would get a second price just to compare. Not 100% sure on a fire place. But every other type of construction does not require constant code up date. It's grandfathered in unless you up date something. Than those things need to be up dated. If you change a receptacle in a house, doesn't mean all of the electrical needs to be updated. Just what your fixing.
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I sure every state is different but I'm 99 percent sure here in my state u would need to pull permits and have a fireplace inspected after the work is over....maybe I'm too cautious but that is something that if neglected can ruin ur whole life. Look on utube and the internet .....maybe u can tackle it urself....worst that could happen is u have to pay the quote u were gonna pay in the first place if it ends up being to difficult
 
Wow…. They wanted $4k to demo and rebuild the top 4’ of mine and I thought that was crazy.

I got a chimney resleeved for $950.

How bad does yours look? does it need to be repointed? Crap falling down into firebox/clean out?
 
No that’s what alerted me to what I think is ridiculous. I thought the fireplace was in good shape. He kept saying it has to be brought up to code. He scared the crap out of my wife the whole time I’m telling her not to worry I think he’s wrong.


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Second opinion for sure and when you are home. Pepper him with questions. Unfortunately a lot of those guys try to take advantage of the unknowledgeable especially when they are dealing with females. Ask for what codes are in violation etc…
 
ImThere said:
No that’s what alerted me to what I think is ridiculous. I thought the fireplace was in good shape. He kept saying it has to be brought up to code. He scared the crap out of my wife the whole time I’m telling her not to worry I think he’s wrong.


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@ImThere - I agree with @MattMan81 … don’t need to bring something “up to code” if it was built to the code that applied at the time of construction. I also agree with @enkriss - you can have the chimney above the roofline rebuilt pretty inexpensively by roofers that do such work … they’re often cheaper than the dedicated chimney masons. I had my chimney rebuilt above the roofline for under $1000 in CT which I thought was very fair at the time (about 5years ago). I also had a stainless steel flue liner installed for about the same price. The contractor recommended that to make it easy toclean the chimney annually myself. I bought the chimney cleaning brushes and segmented poles online for about $100 and don’t have to pay anyone else to clean my chimney now. Brushing the flue liner annually is a piece of cake. Total time for setup / brushing / takedown & cleanup is about an hour

As for the quote you got from this guy, it looks outrageous to me, and if you don’t see obvious issues* when you inspect the brick & mortar yourself, I wouldn’t trust that contractor.

* cracked bricks, mortar line breaks, broken or damaged flashing at the roofline, badly needed repointing, etc.
 
I'm no expert either but 6 years ago I had a new Regency 3100i fireplace insert installed, my existing 35' masonry chimney lined with 35' of ss stovepipe and a mortar type mix that fills in between the stove pipe and the masonry chimney (safer and more reliable than a wrap for that long span) for $5k clean and I had to get a building permit for the woodstove fireplace insert. It is our only heat source. I get it sweeped and inspected every year for around $250-$300 but my existing masonry chimney was in good shape to begin with. It sounds like you have some existing structural issues that they are also contending with but I'm no expert. Just a sound matter of practice, I would get comparison quotes as suggested but be sure they are looking comprehensively at not only heat production but insulation and adjacent combustibles protection.
 
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