Having fireplace in your home is very important, mainly when your home is usually cold during the night or when the weather is a bit chilly outside. However, it would help if you cleaned your chimney because you may not enjoy your warmth with a dirty chimney; instead, you will be enjoying smoke instead of heat.
You need to inspect your chimney repeatedly to know if it requires cleaning or is okay. In case you don’t want to get yourself dirty while inspecting, you could visit the chimney sweep cleaning Canoga park so that you could get yourself a chimney sweep who will help you with checking your chimney and cleaning it too. The things you should look for as you carry out your inspection are;
Animals
When inspecting your chimney, look for any animal nests or animals living inside there; the nests could hinder smoke from getting out of the chimney, making it come back to your house. For bird nests, you could easily spot them because they are usually on top of the ducts blocking the vent, and you could easily remove them. Squirrels are also widespread animals which love to build their nests in chimneys for their little ones.
After noticing this, you can call a chimney sweep to come and clean off the nests and your chimney so as to remove any buildup that may cause a fire
Bad smell coming from your chimney
The moment you start smelling creosote, it is time to wash your chimney because this smell shows that your chimney has a lot of buildups and needs to be cleaned as fast as possible to avoid fires. No matter what wood you use, whether cured or not, creosote will build-up, allowing moisture to be released together with harmful toxic chemicals to your health.
Oily spots on the wall
When you start noticing your wall is becoming black, it’s because of an oily substance known as creosote. This particular substance leads to a buildup in your chimney and may lead to problems when it comes to airflow. When there is an airflow problem, it first tends to burn colder and more irregular, leading to the oily substance on your wall.
Excess smoke
The moment you burn your fire and start noticing many clouds of smoke coming, it is time for your chimney to get checked. The reason why there is a lot of moisture is that there might be a blockage in your duct, and it needs to be rectified as fast as possible. Things that may be leading to the blockage are soot, creosote and grime. When this happens, avoid starting a fire before the chimney has been cleaned for health purposes and safety.
Conclusion
To avoid all these instances, check your chimney repeatedly to be safe. The smoke that comes out of the chimney is not safe when it enters your house, and you may end up getting sick or die because of a fire caused by the blockage in your duct.