Essential Tips for Fireplace & Chimney Care

Now that winter is in full swing, your fireplace probably is too. To continue enjoying the warmth and coziness of having a fire roaring in your home safely throughout the season, it's essential to keep the following in mind:

Have your chimney cleaned and inspected regularly

To remove the soot and creosote that slowly builds-up every time you use your fireplace, make sure to include chimney cleaning as part of your regular home upkeep. If your fireplace is used often (2 or more times a week on average during the cold months), we recommend a cleaning at least once every 2 years.

Don't count on chimney-cleaning log products alone

Although there are plenty of products available on the market that are designed to reduce creosote build-up on flue tiles, they do not physically remove creosote from your chimney.

Get your fireplace inspected if you've had a chimney fire

If you've had (or think you've had) a chimney fire, you should have a technician inspect and clean your flue liner before you decide to use your fireplace again. This is important because fires in your chimney often cause the flue tiles to break or even collapse. Continued usage causes heat and smoke to enter the compromised internal chimney structure, which could produce a structural fire.

Determine the cause if your chimney starts smoking

There are three main reasons why your fireplace may start smoking:

• Negative air pressure from within the home
• External smoke cross-over from a second flue
• Internal smoke cross-over from flue tile deterioration

The most common cause of smoke generation is due to an air pressure mismatch. For proper operation, air needs to be replaced after it's been drawn out of the house through the chimney. Normally, this "make-up" air is pulled in through small leaks and cracks around your doors and windows. If you've recently had your doors or windows replaced, you've most likely sealed up those places where the air was originally pulled in, essentially stifling your chimney's air supply.

The Importance of a Chimney Sweep

Living in Arizona, we often aren’t clamoring to our fireplaces in order to keep warm. However, if you do have a fireplace, it’s important that you have it inspected and cleaned on a regular basis for a number of reasons, even if you don’t use it that much.

When it comes to your family, nothing is more important than health, and you want your home to be as healthy as possible. A clean out of your chimney will help keep your home free of allergens that can have an effect on you and your family’s health. 

Another health-related reason to keep your chimney clean is that regular maintenance will prevent water from rain storms from entering your home and causing damage to your chimney. If you chimney is damaged and cracked, it can let smoke and foul odors into your home. 

Dirt and grime can also block the flue, which causes the common problem of smoke buildup in your home. You may have forgotten to open the flue when lighting a fire in your fireplace a time or two, resulting in a smoky room that needs to be aired out. Smoke inhalation can be dangerous and incredibly unhealthy to breathe in.

Besides the obvious health reasons, it’s incredibly important to have your chimney inspected and cleaned for safety purposes. Even if you don’t use your fireplace that much (and we’re guessing in Arizona you probably don’t), cleaning can get rid of nests that could be potentially have been built by animals in the flue, which is very important to keep clean.

Also affecting your family’s safety are things like dirt and creosote, which is a chemical product, obtained by distilling tar. Excessive buildup of creosote is a fire hazard can actually ignite and cause a fire in your chimney, leading right into your home.


Now that you know why it’s so important to have your chimney cleaned and inspected regularly, we’ll tell you how often and when we think the best times are to do so.

The national Fire Protection Association recommends an annual inspection of your chimney, so start with the NFPA. They’ll come out and check your chimney to make sure it’s all in working order. If you don’t know the best time of year to do this, pick a time in early to mid-October, right before you really start firing up the, well, fireplace.

Once it’s been inspected for structural soundness, call a professional to clean your chimney once or twice a year, depending on how often you use it. We’re incredibly knowledgeable and careful when it comes to taking care of your chimney, so if you haven’t had it done in a while, call us today for a quote at (623) 203-4698.