How to clean a chimney. How to clean a chimney from soot. Plastic brush: short-lived, but gentle on the chimney

We have all been familiar with chimney sweeps since childhood. A character from Andersen's fairy tale, so sweet and clean, and so far from the real prototype. After all, in life, a person cleaning chimneys must be a strong, healthy man, and his hands can rarely be white. Cleaning the chimney is a responsible undertaking that is vital for the normal functioning of the hood. During the combustion process, various substances are released, which, settling on the walls of the chimney, impair the efficiency of the heating equipment, and in exceptional cases even cause operational failures.

How to clean a chimney: methods and equipment

A layer of carbon deposits on the walls of the pipe causes a decrease in draft, which not only affects the efficiency of the heating unit, but also ensures safety (read: ""). The fact is that if there is insufficient exhaust from the chimney, toxic carbon monoxide remains in the chimney and, even worse, it can enter the room. And this is fraught with consequences. In addition, soot deposited on the walls of the chimney consists of oily compounds that may well ignite. As a result of this, the walls of the pipe may become unstuck, which again leads us to the negative effects of carbon monoxide indoors. In addition, sparking soot can ignite dry leaves on the roof or wooden structures located close to the house.

The question of how to clean a chimney from soot arose a long time ago, and therefore even today you can find folk methods that came to us straight from the past. But in addition to ancient methods, there are also modern ones that allow this procedure to be carried out as efficiently as possible.

How to clean a chimney from soot - folk method 1

You can clean the chimney with table salt. This procedure can be considered preventive, since salt is unlikely to clean off the existing layer of soot and deposits. But with regular use of this method, new carbon deposits form much more slowly.

The essence of the method is extremely simple - you need to add a handful of ordinary kitchen salt to the firewood. When burning, it affects the chemical processes inside the stove or fireplace and, as a result, soot does not settle so intensively on the walls of the chimney. You should resort to this method of cleaning the chimney if the chimney is not yet clogged with soot.

Unfortunately, no one has tested how effective such a smoke chimney cleaner really is. But, however, if salt didn’t help, then no one would just throw it into the fire.

Removing soot from a chimney - method No. 2

An effective, but at the same time risky method. Its essence is to completely burn off the existing plaque on the walls of the chimney. It relies on the chemical composition of the soot in the pipe. The fact is that sticky oily compounds deposited on the walls of the chimney are nothing more than unburned chemicals that simply did not have enough oxygen for complete combustion. Thus, if you heat the firebox to a sufficient temperature, the soot will burn out on its own, leaving not a trace on the walls of the chimney.

The risk of the method lies in the fact that not every stove or fireplace can be designed for such a high temperature. During such a burn, you should be attentive to the sparks flying through the chimney. They are quite capable of setting fire to the roof or neighboring houses.

Some craftsmen, considering that burning soot with firewood takes too long, use naphthalene or gasoline. But in this case the level of risk is even greater. The use of flammable substances can cause not only a fire, but also an actual explosion. Therefore, you should not be lazy and come up with “bypass” methods.

Cleaning chimney soot - method No. 3

In this case, potato peelings are used. The method is designed so that potato starch will interact with the soot on the chimney walls and simply break it down. It is recommended to add half a bucket or a bucket of potato peelings to a burning stove (depending on the size of the stove). Instead of peelings, you can add whole potatoes. This method is relevant if the quality of the potatoes does not suit you.

After the potatoes are burned, the starch rises through the pipe, interacting with soot and deposits on the walls. At the same time, the structure of the soot itself changes. After some time, the deposits themselves will begin to fall away from the walls. If it seems to you that the rate of soot falling off is not high enough, then you can knock on the chimney tube with a stick.

Removing soot from a chimney - mechanical cleaning

Mechanical cleaning is the most reliable way to care for a chimney pipe. If the deposit thickness is more than 2 mm, mechanical cleaning is a necessary solution. Other methods of removing soot and deposits are preventative and only allow you to delay time.

Brush with weight

Chimney cleaning using various mechanical devices has been known for a long time. It is this method that is imprinted in the folklore of many European countries. Monuments to chimney sweeps can be found not only in the West, but even in Russia. Which once again speaks to the importance of their work. However, let’s not be distracted from the main goal, namely the answer to the question of how to clean a chimney.

For round pipes, a brush is best suited. This is a disc-shaped metal brush that is suspended from a cable or rope. A load is attached to the bottom of the brush - a core or a spherical weight. Other objects can also act as cargo. But here it is important to remember that you should only use objects with a stable and undisplaced center of gravity. Otherwise, such a load may get stuck in the pipe and then the problem can only be solved by completely disassembling the chimney.

Under the influence of gravity, the brush falls down the pipe. A cable is used for lifting. The core itself (without the brush) can be used to break through dense clogs and plugs. Thanks to the carabiner connections, the brush elements can be quickly separated and assembled in the desired sequence

Brush with assembled handle

Chimney sweeps also have a regular brush with a long handle in their arsenal. At the same time, the brush handle is assembled, which allows you to significantly lengthen it. This tool is convenient to use not only for top-down cleaning, but also for bottom cleaning of fireplaces. When the brush sections are screwed together, it cannot be rotated in the pipe, since part of the device may simply remain in the chimney.

Scraper

In case of massive carbon deposits, one brush will not be enough. To do this, the soot on the walls is first cleaned with a scraper. Its shape is similar to a chisel. The scraper handle can also be composite, which allows you to reach even the most remote areas of the chimney. The scraper allows you to remove massive deposits of oily carbon deposits, after which you can proceed to cleaning with a brush.

After the cleaning procedure, the ash is collected through special holes. The firebox is cleaned at the very end of the procedure. To collect soot, you can use a special fireplace vacuum cleaner or a vacuum cleaner with a fireplace cleaning function.

Safety precautions

When cleaning a pipe from a roof, you should always remember the following safety precautions:

You cannot work on the roof in rainy or windy weather;
be sure to use insurance;
in the absence of a safety system, you can tie a strong rope around your belt;
Before work, it is prohibited to take any medications that may reduce the reaction rate. Drinking alcohol is strictly prohibited.

How to clean a chimney, video example:

Various animals can often live in a chimney pipe - birds like to make nests there, wasps build their honeycombs, etc. If it is possible to get a nest, then it is better to remove it through the top of the pipe. If it is deep, then it is better to push it down. You should work with wasp nests carefully. If there is a colony of wasps living in it, then it is better to play it safe once again and wear a special beekeeper suit.

Do-it-yourself chimney for a bathhouse - design and installation "). That is why it is important to entrust this procedure to professionals who know how to clean the chimney depending on its operational condition and design features. Read also the article: " ".

Owners of stoves and fireplaces are well aware of the need for regular maintenance of their heating boilers. No matter how perfect the design, the chimney will definitely need to be cleaned. The speed of its clogging is influenced by various factors: operating conditions, device design, quality and type of fuel, etc. However, even in the most ideal conditions, the chimney must be cleaned at least once a year. Often this operation is carried out by employees of special companies, but if you wish, you can do it yourself.

Why is it necessary to clean your chimney at all?

When fuel burns in a heating appliance, soot is released. Warm air lifts it upward, where it settles on the walls of the chimney. Over time, soot accumulates, its layer becomes more and more powerful. This leads to unpleasant consequences:

The smoke exhaust channel narrows, which reduces draft.
The wear of the chimney walls accelerates.
The efficiency of the heating device decreases.
The likelihood of a fire inside the smoke exhaust duct increases.

You can prevent troubles only by promptly and efficiently cleaning the chimney from accumulated soot.

You may also find this article useful on how to properly make a brick chimney:

Methods for cleaning a chimney

All options for cleaning the smoke channel can be divided into three groups.

Option #1 - folk remedies

The most common remedy for soot buildup in a chimney is rock salt. It is usually sprinkled onto the fuel during the combustion process. However, this option can be considered, rather, as a prevention of soot formation. It will not help to radically clean the pipe.

A more effective means for cleaning chimneys is potato peelings or simply chopped potatoes. Their quantity is determined by the size of the heating device, but on average it usually takes about a bucket. The peelings are poured directly into the fire. The starch released along with the steam softens the soot and it comes out of the pipe. After the procedure, you need to clean the oven. Sometimes this operation is carried out before mechanical cleaning, which is much easier.

Another remedy is aspen firewood. Several armfuls of such fuel are burned in a furnace. However, we must immediately make a reservation that this is a rather dangerous method. It involves heating the chimney to very high temperatures, as a result of which the soot begins to burn out. Before using this method, you should make sure that the chimney is strong. In addition, soot deposits must be small, otherwise even the most durable pipe will not withstand the loads and will collapse.

Soot is deposited inside the chimney and closes the exhaust channel space. The draft deteriorates, the efficiency of the heating device decreases and the risk of fire increases

Option #2 - chemical compositions

The industry produces many products designed to clean chimneys. These are a variety of powders, liquids and briquettes. They are added to the firebox during fuel combustion. They light up and release substances that are harmless to humans, destroying deposits on the walls of the smoke channel, which crumble down. Popular products include PHC or anti-carbon chemical composition. A special powder is placed in the firebox along with firewood. Its quantity is strictly standardized: no more than 200 g per ton of fuel.

When looking for how to clean your chimney from a small layer of soot, you should pay attention to the Czech product Kominichek. This powder, when heated, causes a catalytic reaction, causing the soot to burn at a lower temperature. The most popular is the “Log Chimney Sweep”, which can be used in all types of appliances operating on liquid and solid fuels. The product should be used as deposits accumulate. On average, a fireplace that is lit once or twice a week will require one briquette for six months. But for a boiler that is constantly used, you will need one log every two months. IN large fireplaces and ovens burn two packages at once.

Before using the “Log Chimney Sweep” for the first time this heating season, you should inspect the chimney to be sure that it is not clogged with debris or foreign objects. The briquette can be burned with or without fuel. However, for maximum effectiveness, it is placed on hot coals. Before this, the log is removed from the packaging, but the wrapper is not removed. You should wait until the briquette flares up; if this does not happen, the wrapper is set on fire on both sides. The action of the active substance lasts for two weeks. During this time, soot may fall out. After this period, you should inspect the pipe and clean the firebox.

An effective means for cleaning a chimney is a special log. When burning, it releases volatile substances that destroy soot deposited in the smoke channel

However, it’s worth saying a few words about safety precautions (more details in the video):

Although, there is an opinion that all this is written with a pitchfork on the water:

It's up to you to decide who to believe.

Option #3 - mechanical cleaning

No matter how much humanity has advanced in terms of technology, mechanical cleaning of chimneys, just like hundreds of years ago, remains the simplest, most reliable and effective way to remove soot and deposits. Depending on which gas ducts need to be cleaned - vertical or horizontal - a variety of scrapers, blades, brushes and brooms are used. You can make a tool for servicing furnace channels yourself or buy it in specialized departments of construction markets. Most often, a brush-brush is used to remove soot in vertical flues, and a poker and a brush with stiff bristles are used in horizontal flues. If necessary, attach a handle of the required length to the tool.

A brush for cleaning a chimney can easily be made from scrap materials.

Previously, you could call a chimney sweep to clean your chimney. Since today people of this profession are extremely rare, we will tell you in detail how to properly clean soot from a stove or fireplace:

Clean the firebox from ash and unburnt solid fuel residues.
Close the ash pan, firebox and all cleaning doors tightly - remember that soot consists of microscopic particles that can penetrate into the narrowest cracks. An open fireplace should be curtained thick fabric, which should be moistened generously with water.
Following safety precautions, climb onto the roof. You should have a brush with you, tied to a long rope.
Inspect the vertical flue for contamination with large debris. If large foreign objects get into the chimney, or the smoke channel is blocked by a broken half of a brick, then it can be freed using a cable with a heavy weight in the shape of a ball. It is not recommended to use objects of complex shape (with a displaced center of gravity) for these purposes. They often turn and get stuck in the oven channels, requiring additional effort and time to remove.
After removing the blockage, lower the bristled brush into the chimney and, using progressive up and down movements, clean the walls along the entire height of the pipe. If the chimney has not been cleaned for a long time, or if damp wood with a high resin content was used for the firebox, then remove thick layer deposits can only be removed using a metal scraper.
Check the result of your work and go down. Your next goal is the remaining vertical and horizontal channels. They can be accessed through the cleaning doors. Opening them one by one in the direction from the chimney to the mouth of the stove, remove carbon deposits with scrapers and hard brooms and scoop them out of the channels with a poker.
Stoves with a wide firebox, as well as fireplaces, are also cleaned from the firebox side. Lastly, carbon deposits are scraped off the walls of the fuel chamber and the ash pan, after which the soot is scooped out and the under and grate is cleaned.

When finished with the work, close and carefully seal the cleaning doors, and carry out a complete wet cleaning of the room. The cleaning procedure is usually carried out twice a year, before starting heating season and at its end.

Fireplaces with straight chimneys can be cleaned from below, through the firebox. To do this, use a special metal brush, the handle of which is extended using special extensions.

The problem of cleaning a chimney is easily solved. You can choose from several cleaning options. You just need to take into account the amount of deposits that have accumulated on the walls of the smoke channel. All work, including mechanical cleaning, can be carried out independently. You should read the instructions and follow them carefully. However, those who are not confident in their abilities or do not want to do dirty work can invite a professional. In any case, a clean chimney will please its owner with excellent draft and long term services.

How to reduce soot deposits

Soot and carbon deposits are deposited even in the pipes of gas-fired furnaces. What can we say about the combustion of solid fuel - for it this is an even more natural process. At the same time, the amount of combustion products deposited on the walls of the chimney can be significantly reduced. To do this, you should follow a few simple rules:

No trash. Do not burn plastic, foam, rubber and other substances with a high carbon content in the firebox of a solid fuel stove.
Prepare firewood in advance. Remember that high-quality dry wood burns with virtually no residue, with minimal release of soot and substances that cause soot formation. Among other things, this is facilitated by a higher combustion temperature, which affects the course of pyrolysis processes. As for raw firewood, when used in excess, water vapor is released, as well as substances such as tar, creosote, etc. - they simply do not have time to burn due to the low temperature. Subsequently, all these resin-like substances fall out in the form of a difficult-to-remove deposit on the flue ducts and cause rapid overgrowing of the ducts with soot - it sticks to the sticky substance much more readily.
Use hardwood. Anyone who lights a stove on their own knows that the best firewood is oak, hornbeam, beech, aspen and acacia. In second place is wood from walnut, apple, cherry, larch, poplar, plane tree, etc. But firewood from coniferous trees (spruce, pine, juniper, etc.) contains a lot of resins, so when using them, you will need to clean the stove significantly more often. As, indeed, when burning birch logs, which have a high tar content. By the way, fuel briquettes or pellet granules, which are fashionable today, are also subject to a thorough inspection at the time of purchase. If they are made from pine sawdust or sunflower husks, then it is better to avoid such fuel due to the high content of resins and oily substances.
Make sure that the wood burns in an optimal mode. This corresponds to a flue gas temperature of 150 to 350 degrees. With reduced heat generation, wood carbon does not have time to burn in the firebox and flies away with smoke, simultaneously falling out in the vertical and horizontal channels of the furnace.

In order to achieve the most complete combustion of wood, use the advice of experienced stove makers. Here's what they recommend:

Before putting firewood into the stove, keep it indoors for at least 2-3 days. During this time, they will dry out and warm up to room temperature, which means they will not only burn better, but will also not require additional heat expenditure for preheating;
before laying the main batch of wood, heat the combustion chamber by burning wood chips, pieces of cardboard, etc. in it;
As the wood burns, regulate the combustion process using a damper or ash door. Of course, a high temperature in the furnace is good because less soot is formed, but in this case the heat will not have time to accumulate in the body of the furnace, and will simply fly away into the atmosphere;
Install a combustion indicator on the chimney. With its help, you can more accurately monitor the temperature of the smoke and maintain the heat release process within optimal limits.

A temperature indicator installed on the chimney will help maintain combustion within optimal limits.

The symptoms of an “overgrown” chimney cannot be ignored. First of all, the color of the smoke changes. If the smoke exhaust channel is clean, it will be light, transparent or white. The accumulated soot begins to burn, which changes the color of the smoke. It becomes denser and darker. The shade of the flame in the stove may also change. Under normal conditions it will be light orange. If a rich shade of dark orange appears, then it’s time to think about how to clean your chimney.

What is better to choose for heating wooden house, which option is more economical and profitable, you will find out in our next material: .

In any case, even if warning signs do not appear, experts recommend inspecting the smoke exhaust duct at least twice a year. It should be taken into account that cleaning may be necessary not only in case of a build-up of a layer of soot, but also from debris, bird nests, cobwebs, etc. that accidentally got inside. There are many cleaning methods and you can choose the optimal one only after determining the level of contamination, inspecting the condition of the chimney, etc.

Unfortunately, quite often people think about cleaning the chimney when the draft has already disappeared and the opposite one appears - the smoke simply goes into the room. But this is already an extreme degree of clogging of the chimney. But even at the beginning of the problem, you are already breathing not only smoke, which seems safe (we all go to barbecues), but also dangerous carbon monoxide. And the soot that accumulates on the walls of the chimney can even catch fire and lead to a fire!

That is why the profession of a chimney sweep has long existed and been revered. And today’s owners of private houses and bathhouses are not at all afraid of cleaning the chimney - today a wide variety of special brushes are sold for this purpose, with a long handle or telescopic, round in the form of a brush with a weight on a cable, or more intricate ones. And believe me, there is nothing tricky in this matter!

When is it time to clean?

It is impossible to completely avoid cleaning the chimney, no matter what material or design it is made of. After all, over time, due to soot, the passage into chimneys narrows and the so-called reverse draft effect occurs, when the smoke no longer enters the street, but into the room. If you wait a little longer, any oven will simply become unusable. Not to mention that backdraft is dangerous even for people living inside the house!

When approaching the issue of chimney cleaning, you need to consider the following factors:

Downtime, namely how long there was no cleaning.
What is the design of the chimney, how smooth are its walls and what is its service life.
What kind of fuel was used, were any plastic bottles or similar rubbish thrown into the firebox?
Was wet firewood used?
Was there pine or spruce among the firewood? from them resinous substances settle on the wall of the chimney.

You can notice that your chimney needs cleaning based on the following signs:

Change in smoke color. It is ideal if almost transparent, inconspicuous white smoke comes out into the street, but it is bad if it becomes dark - this indicates the presence of a large amount of soot.
Change in flame color. The color of the fire in the firebox also indicates problems: if it is light orange and the wood is crackling, then everything is in order. And if the flame turns a dark orange color, almost orange, this is a sign that the chimney needs to be cleaned.
And finally, there remains the simplest and most logical method - a preventive inspection of the chimney. It's good if a professional technician can do this, but even you can notice problems. For example, professional chimney sweeps lower a special weight along the diameter of the chimney into the chimney, and if it passes easily, everything is in order; if it rests, then it will have to be cleaned.

Moreover, the situation with soot can reach such a critical point when the pollution completely blocks the chimney and ice jams occur. And even worse is coking, when soot accumulates on the bumpers and burns there to large solid fractions similar to coal. Such fractions clog the chimney and block the draft. And to remove all this, just a brush with a load will not be enough; you will have to use a special jack to lift the chimney and clean the stove. This is why it is so important to make all sections of the chimney straight. And on rare bends, install tees with a cleaning system.

In total, three types of methods for cleaning a chimney are practiced today: mechanical, using special devices that need to penetrate the pipe, biological, when natural ingredients are used, and chemical, when cleaning is done using industrial special preparations. Let's look at each of them in more detail.

Mechanical chimney cleaning: only in the warm season

As a rule, ordinary owners of stoves and fireplaces clean their chimney once, before each heating season, and it’s good if this is enough. And the mechanical method is the oldest and even today it makes sense:

You can clean the chimney manually both from inside the house, from below, and from above, directly from the roof. And for each method there is its own tool.

If you choose the brush that is used from above, you need to tie a rope to it and hook a load onto it, and after that launch it into the chimney through the roof. This will go along the entire chimney and pick up soot from the walls. It is only important to lower the brush carefully and gradually, slowly, so that the soot is collected efficiently and the load does not damage the chimney itself. In the same way, lower and raise the brush several times until it becomes noticeable that the soot has been cleaned and the blockage has been broken.

Typically, such a brush lasts up to three heating seasons. But this method has its disadvantages:

Firstly, you will need a lot of time for all this, at least an hour;
Secondly, if you need to clean the chimney, you will not always be able to climb out onto the roof, especially when it is snowing and the wind is strong;
And finally, with such a device it is quite difficult to clean chimney elbows and hard-to-reach places, or the chimney itself is designed in such a way that it is generally impossible to clean it from the outside, through the roof.

And the method of cleaning the chimney from below, from the room, is much safer for humans. You can easily do all the necessary work and not risk your life. Simply take the brush, place it on the flexible holder and insert it through the heating device or a special inspection hole.

In addition, from below, with the help of long flexible holders, soot is easy to clean even in high bends:

For example, a brush with a telescopic holder is good because it is convenient to use on the roof: you just need to insert one part into another, gradually lowering the brush down, and disassemble it in the reverse order when going up:

Here is a step-by-step illustration of what is needed for mechanical cleaning of a chimney with a brush and a weight:

Cleaning using traditional methods: both in snow and rain

Today, many are asking the question: how to clean a chimney from soot using folk remedies in the middle of winter, without the need for mechanical cleaning, safely and reliably?

The most famous biological methods (they are usually called traditional) are cleaning with potato peelings. This method allows you to avoid rough mechanical removal of soot from the walls of the chimney and is ideal for those areas where the heating season is quite long, because then you will not have to stop the furnace firing for a long time.

The second method is dry aspen firewood, which burns so quickly and hotly that it burns all the soot in the chimney. But this method must be used carefully so as not to actually cause a fire.

The third relatively cheap and reliable method to extend the life of a chimney during the heating season is to sprinkle salt on the firewood. With each kindling, the salt binds the soot and does not allow it to settle on the walls of the chimney.

You will be surprised, but even the usual, long-known in Rus', chimney cleaning with potato peelings is actually a fairly effective method:

Let's give just a little advice: if you want to clean the chimney with raw potato peels, you need to clean at least half a bucket of it. When the peel is burned, starch will remain from it, which will corrode the soot, and it will simply fall down. After this, all the ash will simply need to be removed from the oven.

Dry cleaning: caution required!

But it happens that soot is difficult to clean, especially if old firewood was used, and then you will have to resort to the chemical method. The advantage of this method is that it will not take up either your time or your energy.

The variety of special products for cleaning chimneys today is pleasing to the eye: liquids, briquettes, special powders. Their secret is that such substances are ignited in a heating device and they release active gases, which are what soot is afraid of. Under their influence, it becomes fragile and begins to fall away. Moreover, some of the small particles simply fly out along with the smoke, and the rest falls down and is removed along with the ash.

The powders are simply thrown into the firebox without unpacking, directly with the firewood, and there should be a lot of firewood itself. You only need to throw in one packet every two to three weeks. The only limitation of this method is that it makes sense to use powder products only if the soot on the chimney walls is no more than 2 millimeters. But if you use this powder constantly, you won’t need to clean the chimneys at all:

But if you have a deeper problem, then you will have to use a log - this is a chemical substance in the form of a briquette, which you just need to put in the firebox once every two months, also in a package. It is used when the wood has already burned out, in order to set it on fire separately. This log contains wooden saw blades, urea, sodium sulfate, coal wax, ammonium sulfate and amorphous silicon.

This composition of active substances is capable of removing all accumulated soot in the chimney in just one go. After you burn the chemical log inside the firebox, you will still have soot falling off the chimney walls for another two weeks, and you just need to clean it up.

Very convenient: just put a log on the fire, and chemical gases corrode the soot not only on the surface of the chimney walls, but also inside the heating device itself, even on the heat exchanger and the internal chimney. And in its own way it even prevents the appearance of new soot. It is this method that allows you to remove soot in the most inaccessible places of bends and knees. And, most importantly, such cleaning can be done at any time of the year - even with an active winter furnace. The only point: if the chimney has not been cleaned for a long time, a blockage is clearly felt and there is almost no draft, then first you will still have to use a brush.

Here is a clear example of how to clean a chimney using modern chemicals:

Professional chimney cleaning: fast, reliable and expensive

Strange as it may sound, the profession of chimney sweep exists and is still valued all over the world. You will be interested to know that the traditional chimney sweep cylinder has always been the privilege of the master only. And to become one, you had to serve as an apprentice for more than one year - this specialty is so complex.

In recent years, the profession of a chimney sweep has been on the verge of extinction, and only relatively recently has it become in sharp demand. It's all about fires due to poor installation of chimneys and their operation. Modern house is so expensive today that it makes more sense to hire a specialist than to rely on “maybe”. Indeed, it is much more logical to call a professional chimney sweep before the start of the heating season, rather than a fire truck in the middle of winter.

For a long time, chimney cleaning was carried out by the All-Russian Voluntary Firefighting Society, but today such services are already offered more by private companies. After all, the correct operation of modern chimneys requires periodic inspection, cleaning and prevention. So the concept of professional chimney cleaning appeared, when special equipment was brought in for such a purpose. For example, a special vacuum cleaner that simply sucks out soot from the chimney through the firebox. And then you don’t need to drag it across the entire room (and soot is volatile and difficult to wash off furniture).

Therefore, to this day, professional cleaning is simply not enough in the most advanced cases, when:

the chimney is covered with a dense layer of hard soot (especially from wet firewood);
the chimney walls are old and damaged, and soot clings tightly to them;
You don’t have the slightest desire to do such menial work.

In practice it looks like this:

For example, in professional cleaning of chimneys of private houses the following special devices are used:

Modern high-speed installations that completely clean the chimney in just an hour cope with their task quite quickly:

How to make DIY cleaning devices

Special devices for cleaning chimneys from soot are sold in a regular hardware supermarket or specialty store, or you can make them yourself.

Let's compare a metal brush with a plastic one. Let's start with the fact that a metal brush, of course, will retain its working shape longer, but with particularly intensive cleaning it can scratch the chimney from the inside. Modern plastic cleaners are soft and scratch the chimney much less, although they do not last long and easily break, losing their working shape. That’s why there is an unspoken rule among summer residents: for a brick chimney, take a metal chimney brush, and for a metal one, use a plastic one. Basically these are the following devices:

Plastic brush: short-lived, but gentle on the chimney

Making a plastic brush is as easy as shelling pears:

If you are going to build such a brush for cleaning the chimney, then the whole job will take you no more than 15 minutes.

So, a regular chimney brush is a strong base with a brush threaded through a metal wire with a weight on a chain. In addition to all this, you will need a rope along which the brush will need to be lowered into the chimney. Instead of a weight and rope, it is quite enough to use a special holder. At least then the brush won’t get stuck in the chimney and you won’t have to pull it out later.

Plastic bottle brush: no cost

Moreover, you can even make a homemade brush from an ordinary plastic bottle (at least several). Just 2-3 of these brushes will be enough for one season. So, here's how to make such a bottle brush:

Step 1. Make round holes in the center of the lid.
Step 2. Cut the walls of the bottles into strips lengthwise, approximately 1.5 or 2 centimeters wide.
Step 3. Make a hole in the bottom of the bottle using a heated nail and thread a 5 mm thick wire through it.
Step 4. Now simply insert one bottle into the other through the cut strips and attach a thick wire to one end.
Step 5. Place two plastic bottles, press and secure them so that it is convenient to tie them with plastic wire.
Step 6. Spread the cut strips of plastic evenly in a circle and secure the steel cable as finished.

The only difficulty in making this is to make sure that the load and rope (cable) are exactly in the center, and the brush does not warp during use.

Hard round brush: using scrap materials

Another great option is to make such a brush from a disc brush for an angle grinder. This brush is much stronger than previous options and can handle even the most soot. It is only important that the diameter of the brush is equal to the diameter of the chimney, because its bristles are stiff and do not bend well:

To such a brush you need to hang a weight of about 5 kg on a steel cable, behind which you will pull the brush along the chimney. Just in case, attach another rope to the load, which will help another person from inside the room pull out the stuck brush. It is important that the load is at least a third less than the chimney, otherwise it will get caught and you will have to tinker.

Clean the chimney with similar homemade devices you need this:

Step 1. Climb onto the roof, remove the damper from the chimney and lower the brush into the chimney all the way to the end.
Step 2. Now start pulling the brush back.
Step 3: Lower the brush down again and pull it out again.
Step 4. All this needs to be done within a few minutes, keep in mind that below, inside the room, soot will fall abundantly and this must also be removed.

As you can see, everything is simple!

Asymmetrical wire brush: for difficult sections of the chimney

If your chimney does not have a large length, elbows, bends and does not become very clogged (for example, we are talking about a chimney in a seasonal bathhouse), then the following simple devices are suitable for one-time cleaning:

Telescopic brush: for working indoors

Usually, flexible meter-long sticks that twist into each other and are also called telescopic, otherwise prefabricated, work well as a gesture. Working with it is quite simple:

Step 1. Screw the brush onto the first handle, push it straight through the heating device, push it through and clean it for one meter.
Step 2. The next step is to screw the second one to the end of the handle that you are still holding and which sticks out of the chimney and thus push the brush another meter up the chimney.
Step 4: Repeat this entire process until you have completely cleaned the entire chimney.

See how simple everything turns out to be in practice:

A telescopic brush can penetrate very deeply into the chimney pipe:

This brush costs significantly more than the previous option, but the advantage is that such sticks usually do not break and last quite a long time. In addition, with such a rigid handle it is easier to push through the blockage in the chimney. In addition, using this method is quite difficult to clear soot from the bends of the chimney.

As for choosing the size of the brush, everything is simple here: you need to select one according to the diameter of the chimney, preferably equal to it or 12 cm larger, so that the brush can easily catch on and not slide along the walls, slightly missing them:

Let's summarize: no matter what device you use to clean the chimney yourself, the main thing is to do this cleaning regularly.

Every home owner sooner or later faces the question of how to clean the stove. Specifically, the chimney in the stove. As the stove smoker becomes dirty, the draft becomes less and all the smoke goes into the house. If measures are not taken in a timely manner, the stove will become unusable and will have to be disassembled and reassembled from scratch, and this process is very difficult and time-consuming, so you need to clean the stove as it gets dirty, at least once a season.

How to tell if your oven needs cleaning

The time it takes to operate without cleaning is different for each oven. It also depends on how to heat the stove correctly, with what and how often. If the owner of the stove does not make such gross mistakes as burning unnecessary things, trash, plastic bottles and other material unsuitable for heating in the stove, then the stove will last a long time. The stove can only be heated with wood and coal, and everything else threatens the stove by cluttering the chimney.

However, firewood can also cause blockages. This happens if firewood is thrown into the firebox undried. This is unacceptable, because firewood can be damp in two cases:

If the tree has just been cut down and the wood has not had time to dry naturally.
If the firewood was stored in a wet or humid area or in the rain.

To reduce stove contamination, you need to make maximum use of dry firewood that has not just been cut down, but that has lain in a dry place for more than a year.

As for the types of wood, this fact is of great importance, as well as the fact that wet wood cannot be heated. For example, varieties such as spruce and pine are difficult to dry due to the presence of resin inside. When burning, this resin will clog the chimney, and therefore this type of wood is not suitable, but fruit trees such as cherry, apple, apricot and plum are quite suitable for the firebox.

How to understand when it's time to clean the oven

How to clean a chimney. Methods for cleaning a chimney

First you need to inspect the chimney. To do this, lower a weight into the chimney. If it runs normally, it means the chimney is not clogged. And if it gets stuck, it means there is a lot of soot in the chimney.
Check traction. If there is no draft, then you need to clean the furnace of soot.

Can be used folk remedies in order to try to cure the stove from soot without mechanical cleaning.

There are two ways to do this.

Traditional methods of cleaning a chimney

Throw the potatoes into the oven. When they burn out, starch is released, which goes into the chimney and cleans the soot from the stove.
Throw dry aspen logs into the oven. They heat the furnace to maximum temperature, and thanks to this, the soot breaks through and flies out of the furnace. However, this procedure requires a strong oven.

Methods for mechanical cleaning of the oven:

The stove is heated from three sides, holes
First, a long pole is inserted through the chimney, onto the end of which you can put a metal brush. You need to push the pole as far as possible.
The work of a chimney sweep is dirty, so you need to be prepared for the fact that soot can stain not only the chimney sweep himself, but also the room in which the stove is located. To do this, you need to close the valve in the furnace with a plug and close the door so that soot does not penetrate into the room through these holes.
After cleaning the pipe, the soot will fall closer to the furnace. You need to carefully open the door and clean out the soot from below through the lower compartment where the firewood is stored.

The cause of contamination can be not only soot, but also foreign objects entering the chimney. For example, birds can make nests there in the chimney. The nest must be removed through the cleaning door. To do this, you will need to push this nest through the chimney with a rod and then remove it.

In order not to overthink devices for cleaning manually. You can buy a universal brush for cleaning the chimney.

Cleaning a chimney with your own hands is a troublesome and tedious procedure. But to do this kind of work. You need to spend the whole day. It is necessary to take into account that washing after cleaning also requires spending a lot of time. Professionals do it faster and easier because they have many special devices and also have cleaning skills. But you can also clean it yourself, especially if you do it together, because doing it alone is not very convenient and is also boring.

How to check the ventilation duct for contamination

Every apartment has ventilation. Old houses were built more than 50 years ago, and in most cases no one checked the ventilation. And this needs to be done, because the direct purpose of ventilation is ventilation, and if dirt is clogged in the channel, then it is missing.

To check the ventilation, you need to bring a match to the hole and check the draft. If there is traction, then the channel is most likely open and does not need to be cleaned. And if there is no traction, then you urgently need to start cleaning.

Cleaning of chimneys and ventilation ducts follows the same principle. Take a thin long rod, preferably hard, that is, metal, so that it does not bend. Thick wire is suitable for this. Then the wire is inserted into the hole and cleaned. In practice, usually more than two buckets of debris can be raked out of a vent. There are leaves, dust, foreign objects, and fragments of bricks and dried mortar. People living on upper floors sometimes making repairs in their apartments can pollute the ventilation ducts. Over the years, all the debris accumulates and renders the structure unusable.

If you clean the ventilation duct annually, this will allow you to stay in the apartment without the risk that people will breathe dirty air, soot and other nasty things that are not visible at first glance and a person does not feel it.

Modern technologies allow you to clean the chimney gas oven using a special vacuum cleaner. Such devices are very effective, however, only specialists have them. And to clean the chimney yourself, you can take into account the length of the chimney and the degree of contamination. A rod of a certain size is selected, a brush is attached to it, and the pipe is cleaned with simple movements back and forth. Cleaning the chimney of a gas boiler is a very responsible process and must be done on time, in accordance with the contamination. It is better not to joke with gas and therefore treat the gas stove responsibly, that is, operate it in accordance with the rules.

The tool for cleaning chimneys is a metal brush. In addition, a scraper can be used. It is necessary in order to clear a very clogged chimney from a dense layer of soot. And there is also such a tool as a steel core. It is lowered into the chimney on a steel rope to break through dense dirt. And then a brush and scraper are used. They will completely clean the chimney walls of soot.

After the soot has been punched from the top and pushed down, it needs to be raked out of the furnace. It's dirty work and very difficult. The difficulty is that you can smear soot on everything near the stove and on yourself. But washing off soot is not so easy. Therefore, before cleaning the stove, you need to dress appropriately in overalls and equip yourself with gloves and an easy-to-clean raincoat, shoes and hat.

One of the latest ways cleaning is vacuum cleaning of chimneys. However, such methods do not always help, especially if the contamination is complex and there is no experience in cleaning. One of the people's simple ways The method is this: pour 3 liters of boiling water from the top of the pipe. This type of cleaning can break through the contamination plug and wash away soot that has settled on the walls of the pipes.

Very effective method cleaning pipes - logs. Chimney cleaning logs are a special log made from powder with the addition of chemicals that, when burned, settle on the chimney and prevent soot from settling for several months. This procedure is recommended to be carried out 2 times per season. You can use several logs for burning at once. They are placed on hot coals and burned.

After burning, there may be an unpleasant odor in the room, which must be ventilated. This cleaning method is less labor-intensive and can be a good alternative to mechanical cleaning. But if the log does not help, then you need to break through the contamination from above with a brush, and then set the log on fire in the oven. This will certainly clean the chimney.

Lighting up a stove or fireplace can be marred by a lack of draft, and the most common cause of this trouble is clogging of the chimney with products of incomplete combustion of wood, simply soot. Without proper chimney cleaning, the operation of the heating device is dangerous for your life, since the smoke simply will not have time to be removed through the system and will begin to accumulate in living quarters! So how to clean a chimney and is it necessary to resort to the help of professional stove-makers and chimney sweeps? Read about this in our article.

When the logs crackle merrily in the fireplace, it seems to us that they are completely burned, leaving behind only a handful of ash in the firebox and carrying light smoke into the chimney. But this is far from true: the combustion conditions in the stove and fireplace do not allow the wood to burn out completely, and soot is carried up the chimney along with the smoke. It is gray or black in color and is similar in composition to coal. Soot particles settle on the pipe walls, especially at bends, forming a thick layer of loose deposits.

When using coniferous firewood, in addition, water vapor and resin are released, which firmly bind the soot into a hard crust. The lumen of the pipe gradually narrows, the draft deteriorates, and the soot layer becomes thicker. Sooner or later the draft disappears completely, and this condition requires immediate cleaning of the chimney.

There are several ways to clean a chimney:

mechanical, using a brush;
chemical, using special tablets or liquids;
preventive, using traditional or modern combustion catalysts.

Which method is right for you will become clear upon further reading of the article.

Mechanical method of cleaning a chimney

Mechanical cleaning involves removing soot using a metal brush, which is inserted into the chimney and, making rotational and translational movements, scrapes off the soot from the surface of the chimney. The method has several advantages: it is effective against blockages and solid deposits, it is cheap and quite simple, and does not require special knowledge and skills. At the same time, manually cleaning a chimney through a pipe is a rather dangerous task, because you will have to climb onto the roof.

What is a ruff?

This is a twisted cable with steel wire, equipped with a torsion handle on one side and a wire or plastic nozzle on the other. The length of the cable can be different and depends on the length of the chimney. The brush is inserted into the pipe forward with the nozzle, while simultaneously rotating its handle. In this case, rotation is transmitted to the nozzle, and it mechanically scrapes off the soot layer from the pipe walls.

How to clean a chimney with a brush:

Fully open all valves and vents that block the draft in your stove or fireplace. Place a container for soot under the chimney at the mouth of the stove or in the firebox - there will be quite a lot of it. In order not to stain the furniture and floors in the room, the open fireplace insert can be curtained with unnecessary fabric.
Observing safety precautions and using a safety belt, climb onto the roof. Remove the head from the pipe. Carefully insert the cleaning cable into the pipe and try to push it some distance. At the same time, rotate the handle on the cable. If the length of the chimney is more than 3 meters, it is more convenient to do this together - one person directs the cable into the pipe, the second rotates the handle, standing at some distance.
If the cable does not pass through the lumen of the pipe in any place, it is necessary to determine where it is stuck - in the bend of the pipe or in a straight section. If the pipe does not bend in this place, most likely there is a serious blockage there. It can be pierced using a weight tied to a rope, lowering it into the pipe quite sharply.
It is necessary to clean the chimney using this method until soot stops pouring from the chimney into the firebox. After cleaning, check the draft using a lit newspaper - it should improve significantly.

It is sometimes impossible to clean a Russian stove with a complex chimney, including several turns at an angle of 90 degrees, with a brush through a pipe from the roof - the length of such a chimney is quite large, and the brush stubbornly does not want to go through the turns. In this case, you can combine pipe cleaning with mechanical cleaning of the chimney.

Is it possible to clean a complex, winding chimney using a brush?

Of course you can, to do this, strictly follow these instructions:

Inspect the oven carefully. On its side and rear walls you will find doors designed for cleaning the chimney. They may be caulked or painted over, but will need to be opened. Place a bucket or other container under each door.
Change the standard brush attachment to plastic bottle, cut in half and slightly cut around the circumference to make a “daisy”. You can fasten it like this: the ends of the wire, which act as a ruff, need to be collected into a bundle, passed through a cork with a hole made in advance and bent. Screw the cork onto the bottle. A plastic brush is much softer than a metal brush and goes through corners better, and by using different sized bottles you can gradually clear all the corners.
Insert the resulting device into the chimney from the firebox side and push it as deep as possible, rotating and removing it from time to time along with the soot that has fallen into the bottle. Clean the chimney until the amount of soot is reduced to an insignificant amount. Also clean the chimney from all doors.
Open all dampers and clean the chimney from the roof as described above. If you do this before cleaning the chimney, you can seriously clog it, as there will be nowhere for the soot to fall.
Clean the firebox side of the chimney again. Sweep away soot with a brush, including from valves and views. Close all doors on the back and side walls and check the draft using a newspaper or a torch. If the draft is good, light the stove with a small amount of wood. If the chimney cleaning doors smoke, cover them with a solution of clay and sand.

Sometimes, instead of doors for cleaning the chimney, stove makers install removable bricks. It is not recommended to remove and install them yourself without special skills; to clean such a stove, it is better to contact specialists.

Chemical chimney cleaning method

To clean your chimney regularly, you don’t have to climb onto the roof and get your hands dirty. It is enough to buy special products in tablets, granules, or liquid for cleaning the chimney. The principle of its operation is to break down soot-binding substances, after which it turns from a hard crust into an easily crumbling powder that burns in the lower part of the furnace.

The method of using these products is very simple: they are placed on firewood during the next fire of the stove and set on fire, carefully heating it to better burn out the fallen soot. In this case, you should follow all the recommendations indicated on the packaging. The chemical method can also be used to pre-soften the soot layer before mechanical cleaning.

Video instructions for working with chemical soot remover

Cleaning the chimney from soot using folk remedies

Prevention of blockages and soot deposits in the chimney can be done in several ways:

Pipe insulation. This method is based on reducing the formation of water vapor condensate in the pipe during combustion. During the cold season, the temperature difference on the inner and outer surfaces of the pipe can lead to the deposition of moisture and resins on it, which bind soot into a solid sediment. The use of sandwich-type pipes with non-combustible insulation reduces the formation of condensation.
Regular use of combustion catalysts in the form of tablets or special logs of specific types of wood with additives designed to clean the chimney will reduce the deposition of soot on its walls.
If you heat the stove with wood, from time to time add dry aspen logs to them: aspen burns with the formation of a strong high flame, which destroys the binding elements of the soot and burns it, and with the active rise of smoke, all the soot deposited in the chimney simply flies out into the chimney. It is better to do this in winter so that the soot gets on the snow and does not stain the roof too much.

Timely cleaning of the chimney using these methods will make firing the stove and fireplace a pleasant experience - just bring a match to the dry wood, and now a live fire is dancing in your fireplace, warming and giving comfort.

Video: Cleaning a chimney in a house using the old-fashioned method

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