help with a chimney that's not drawing properly

notatvstar

Hello all, as this is where knowledgeable hang out I thought I might pick your brains (so to speak).

Me and the boyf live in a very old cottage. It has a chimney in the middle of it and I believe it's shared with next door as this used to be one large cottage but it now split in two.

We have gas central heating, but as the cottage is old, the walls are stone and it has no real foundations (I believe). I think it's built straight into the ground. We like to heat the living room with an open fire, but every time we've tried we've smoked ourselves out the room. Our next door neighbour (our land-lady! - who's really nice btw) heats her house via a large wood burning stove but lately she's also noticed a significant down draft and her chimney hasn't been drawing properly as well.

We have access to free wood and we think we can save money by reducing the central heating to the rest of the house, but be nice and cosy in the livingroom. When we go to bed, then we can just snuggle.

The chimney opening is large, so we were considering 'drafters', but also we were considering a stove. But the cost of lining the chimney in order to safely use a stove was exorbitant! The boyf has come up with the idea of these fan things that you can put on top of your chimney to prevent down-drafts and improve draw.

Does anyone have any advice that is cost effect?

We are going to have a chat to a sweep about this, but I think the more knowledge I have the more of his conversation I'll understand.

Many thanks

PS - this is a repost as I originally posted this in the DIY thread.

Whoopsie. And soz...

Canucklehead

Hi...a HETAS registered installer, after conducting a site survey, would be best placed to comment on safe solutions for your particular issues.

Canucklehead

DVardysShadow

First things first. As the landladies fire seems to have stopped drawing, maybe the chimneys have become blocked? I would suggest getting yours swept and take it from there.

G_M

Could be blocked (birds nest?) and need sweeping.
Could be downdrafts - I have 2 chimneys, 1 works fine the other is a constant problem.

Turns out it's something to do with height of the chimney, the fact the house is on side of a hill, and wind direction. When the wind blows from over the hill, it is drawn downwards as the ground level drops, till it reaches the house and.... down the chimney! (If wind comes from opposite direction - no problem).

You can buy specialist cowls to put on the top of the chimney to stop downdrafts. Use google.

If you are brave enough, another possibility is lack of heat. Once the fire gets going, the heat produced rises, counter-acting any downdraft, and draws the smoke up. Problem is you have to suffer smoke in the room till the fire gets going and of course there's no guarantee this will work esp if the problem is actually a birds nest!

A._Badger

Ask an experienced sweep. Judging from my experience, HETAS installers will just try to sell you an expensive stove and an (even more expensive) liner.

Sweeps have practical, hands-on experience that's hard to beat.

Canucklehead

A._Badger wrote: »

Ask an experienced sweep. Judging from my experience, HETAS installers will just try to sell you an expensive stove and an (even more expensive) liner.

Sweeps have practical, hands-on experience that's hard to beat.

Good morning: I suspect many HETAS installers started out as sweeps...not a sweeping generalisation.:D

Canucklehead

w50nky

Arrange to have your chimney swept. You should have it swept yearly as a minimum. This will reveal if yours is blocked and you would need to do this even if you were thinking of fitting a stove and liner etc. It will be £40 or so well spent IMHO.

muckybutt

Speaking as a sweep, there are a few factors to be considered for chimneys not drawing right.

1) Atmospherics and the surrounding area.
2) Chimney height and how the chimney has been designed.
3) Blockages.
4) Cold chimneys.

1. The weather can wreak havoc on chimneys, sounds daft but its true, high winds and even no wind will slow the draught down. Surrounding structures can also play a big part in getting a chimney to draw, one of my chimneys is a pain in the bottom as the particular chimey pot is lower than next doors roof line. Tall trees are often problematic.

2. Similar to the surroundsing area, ideally you want a chimney high enough to reach calm air, ie air that has not had the flow disrupted by tall buildings etc, the inside of the chimney also ideally needs to be as straight as possible, the more bends it has the slower the draw will be, also at the throat of the fire it needs to be chamfered and not squared off at right angles, Right angles cause turbulance and will always kick some smoke back, if thats the case then sand and cement the right angles till they are all chamfered.

3. Blockages...obvoius first port of call for a chimney not drawing correctly...get it swept. Could be anything from a dead bird or two or three....nests are a pain anything from a few twigs to half the blinking garden up there. Could be a partial collapse of the feathers ( the bits in between chimneys ).

4. Cold chimneys are also a common one, a chimney relys to some degree the warmth to help it draw, if you havent used a chimney for a while get it swept for starters that way you know its not blocked, then light a small fire....some kindling and a bit of coal, gradually build the fire up over a few hours this will enable the chimney to warm up. It might take a few days depending upon how cold and damp the chimney has got but it'll get there.

hethmar

All as mucky says.

However, the majority of large old open fires dont work satisfactorily. Forget the photos in glossy mags, they probably have a chimney fan or are pretend gas flames. The fact is that there is a relationship between the fireplace opening area and the serving flueway. If the ratio is out of balance then the smoke will come back into the room. Think of motorway traffic trying to get on to a B road - it just cant get away. The big openings would have originally had something like a range in them, taking up the area. You need to make the opening area smaller by some means - raising the hearth, bringing in the sides/putting on an adjustable canopy until the smoke goes up the flueway and doesnt curl backwards into the room.

When you say the chimney is shared - you mean there are two separate flueways, yes?

BUT if the fire opening isnt a big one (Id assumed a very old stone cottage would be an inglenook):

You say the old lady next door has only started having the problem recently which would seem to suggest a blockage OR nearby trees have grown a lot in the last couple of years and are causing the down draught. When were the chimneys last swept?

Re chimney fans - they are very expensive and you have to have them running all the time the fire is on. This is fine in a place like a noisy pub or restaurant but we found that domestic customers said the noise drove them loopy if they just wanted to sit and read in the room by the fire. I dont think it would be a good option for you plus the times places like pubs, running fires 24/7 on duff wood, would ring to say a fan had caught fire because their sweeps had refused to go up on the roof to clean them - the debris would build up on the fan and either stop/break it or catch fire when a spark caught it.

A good woodburner with a lining fitted properly would be a much better use of your money. A big open fire will give very little heat into the room in comparison. If the boyfriend is a competent DIYer then he could do it himself he is has a mate who can help and isnt frightened of heights - then you get the local buildings control to come out and certifiy it as safe - about £120 for them to sign it off for you (and required by law).

hethmar

I just thought - when you said a chimney fan - I wonder if you meant a cowl? I honestly dont think a cowl would sort your problem.

notatvstar

Many thanks all.

We get our chimney swept every year in September, although I have to confess to hearing 'cooing' recently. The cottage is old and is so damp that it's positively soggy so perhaps it does need to be heated prior to lighting a full on fire. The boyf is NOT DIY competent... (he says he is, but then he told me he knew what he was doing when he bought his last car... another story) so I've basically said NO, emphatically and enthusiastically with threats of physical violence when he proposed installing a wood burning stove himself. He managed to cut off the tip of his thumb when chopping wood once, so goodness knows what will happen if he gets on a roof.

Thankyou for the 'heads-up' concerning a fan. That's good info and the irritation factor is a great tip. We're calling a sweep soon. It's not vital that we have an open fire, it's just the boyf keeps trying to and I'm getting bored of the dulcet tones of the fire alarm, acrid smelling clothes and having to sit in the kitchen until the smoke goes away.

... I suppose a change in boyf may also improve things... (bless him - love him really)