Candles in gas fire - Is this safe?

Wanton

Hello,

We have a coal effect gas fire that isn't currently working, we had an engineer out to service the fire but he couldn't do it as the previous owner seems to have superglued the gas valve shut. The engineer said its perfectly safe to leave it as it is, but he couldn't carry out the service and get it working again as the valve wouldn't move (it may not have been the valve but something like that).
I'm just wondering if its safe for me to remove the "coals" and put a few candles in for effect? Having a tray to catch the wax.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Wanton

Can anyone help? Don't want to blow up my house :eek:

Davesnave

I can't see how it would be dangerous. There should be no gas coming through into the fire area, as the engineer confirmed. (If there was, you'd be paying for it to go straight up the flue!)

macman

You won't 'blow up' your house. Though you might well burn it down...

prowla

I'm not sure about the safety of it, but I think it might look a bit naff.

ed110220

Can't see any safety problem with it - the candles won't give off a fraction of the heat that the gas fire did. It just sounds a little impractical and eccentric (in the nicest way)