Next house puzzle: Chimney breast vent?

NorthernKitty

Next daft question folks, am trying to sort my Edwardian terrace out before I move in, on very tight budget, with not much DIY knowledge and need to do as much myself before forking out for tradespeople.

Downstairs the chimney breast has one of those electric fires installed with fake white pebbles in, (still trying to work out why rocks would be on fire, so will be swapping them for fake coal) and upstairs in the main bedroom the chimney breast is just a wall, lumpy and bumpy (tap on it in various places and get various sounds), but it doesn't have a vent or anything. 

The L3 survey didn't mention/notice the upstairs chimney breast not having any vent on it, but as the downstairs one presumably doesn't have any air circulation with an electric fire crammed in the gap, I suddenly thought won't damp cause problems.
So before I paint that wall of the bedroom:

1) Should I make a hole in the wall and put a plastic vent cover in it ASAP? 
2) If so, will the boarded-up bit be plasterboard or do people use solid wood?
3) Do I just stick a screwdriver in the wall where the old fireplace must have been,  in a particular place then make the hole bigger with a hacksaw or something?
4) I looked up 'vent covers' on Homebase website but there are umpteen kinds, do they have a specific name for sticking on chimney breasts, or will any rectangular small plastic vent work? 

Sorry to be dim, just had last-minute panic!

Eldi_Dos

NorthernKitty said:

Next
2) If so, will the boarded-up bit be plasterboard or do people use solid wood?

   Be wary with a house of that age. It is not unknown for sheeting containing asbestos to be used for that purpose.
   If you can work out when it was boarded up that will help rule out what materials might have been used.

FreeBear

Do the chimney pots have caps to stop water getting in ?

If not, get some fitted to all the unused pots. As for ventilation, if it is needed, you only need a couple of small holes, say 16mm diameter or just one at 25mm. Got a couple of fireplaces in bedrooms here that got bricked up in the mid 70s. Pots are capped, but no air vents. No hint of damp or other problems. However, I do have a stove in the lounge which pumps quite a bit of heat in to the chimney breast and have measured a wall temperature of 25°C+ upstairs - That would help to drive off any damp.

NorthernKitty

Thanks all. Taking on board everything you've said. And will find a knowledgable friend with good eyesight and binoculars to see if there looks to be something capping the chimney pot. I stuck a screwdriver in the wall in an approximation of where I'd expect the boarded up bit to be, and hit something that might have been brick. So for now I'm ignoring it until such a time as I can get someone who knows what they're doing with walls to look at it. Especially as I discovered a gap under the skirting board (Edwardian fireplace floor tile has chunk out of it in the same place) which a draught is blowing through, which I hope will do for now until it is blocked with carpet. 

FreeBear

NorthernKitty said: I discovered a gap under the skirting board (Edwardian fireplace floor tile has chunk out of it in the same place) which a draught is blowing through, which I hope will do for now until it is blocked with carpet. 

Get yourself a foam gun, gun grade expanding foam, and a can of gun cleaner. Go round the room squirting a thin bead of foam in to the gaps (a nozzle from a tube of mastic is handy for getting in to tight spaces). While you are waiting for the foam to set, give the gun a good clean. Once set, trim off any excess with a sharp knife.

Alternatively, grab some draught excluder foam, and with a stripping/putty knife, poke it in to the gap between skirting & floor.

Don't rely on a carpet plugging the draught... One thing I did (after fixing the skirting), was to cover the floor with aluminium foil (the wide stuff used for turkeys at Christmas), then lay some 5mm thick woodfibre laminate underlay on top. Needed to swap the nails in the gripper rods for 25mm wood screws, but that was fairly easy. With some decent foam underlay, no more cold draughts coming up from the floor, and the room is nice & cosy.