Serving Minneapolis, St. Paul and the Surrounding Communities
Neglecting your chimney might seem harmless … until the repair bill arrives. Every year, homeowners across Minnesota face thousands of dollars in avoidable damage simply because they skipped regular chimney maintenance. What starts as a small crack or minor obstruction can quickly become a major safety hazard. The true cost of ignoring chimney maintenance isn’t just financial—it can also put your home and family at risk.
Using a fireplace in a home is one of the great joys of the winter season, and we’re certain you’re looking forward to spending time with your family around the roaring hearth. But before we get too deep into the fireplace season, we want to talk to you about some of the dangers that might lurk in your chimney.
Chimneys and fireplaces need special attention, and it’s our job to provide our customers with the best in chimney inspections and chimney cleaning in Minneapolis, MN to ensure they can stay safe and cozy each year.
Let’s look at several of the common issues that might make your chimney unsafe and the best ways to deal with them or prevent them.
On this site, we emphasize the importance of having regular chimney and chimney flue cleaning in Minneapolis, MN. We recommend a yearly cleaning along with a Level 1 chimney inspection to ensure the chimney is free of buildup of creosote and anything that may block it, and to check for possible damage and wear that needs repairs.
But are professionals like ours really necessary? You might wonder if you can clean the chimney yourself. Maybe you can find an online video tutorial. With a face mask, a set of old clothes, tarps on the ground, a few scrubbers on long handles, and a bit of elbow grease, you should be able to get the job done. Right…?
Although we encourage you to handle some chimney maintenance tasks on your own, the actual job of cleaning a chimney is something to leave to the professionals. We’ll explain why below.
In our previous blog, we discussed when you need a chimney inspection and the three different levels of inspection. These levels are established by the National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA) and are standardized to ensure that homeowners receive the inspections necessary for the situation and to protect their households.
When you’re looking to have a chimney inspection in Minneapolis, MN, you’ll probably only need a Level 1 inspection, which is the standard inspection for a chimney that hasn’t experienced any major problems and is receiving regular use. It consists of inspections of all accessible parts of the chimney to look for cracks, creosote, and structural damage—anything that might trigger a repair need or a higher level of inspection.
In this post, we’re going to look at the highest level of inspection, Level 3, because people want to know more about how in-depth it goes and why it’s often necessary.
We often recommend that customers call us for a chimney inspection in Minneapolis, MN in the fall, before the winter arrives and the fireplace sees extensive use.
However, if you didn’t arrange for a chimney inspection before the winter, it isn’t too late to have it done. This isn’t a service you need to “catch” in time or just forget about—it’s vital you have your home’s chimney inspected by professionals annually. This helps to keep your fireplace and chimney safe, energy efficient, and working the way it should.
What happens when our experts come to your home for a chimney inspection? We’ll go over what you can expect.
Temperatures have dropped which means that everyone is trying to stay in areas that are warm and dry. This doesn’t apply to just humans; critters and creepy crawlers are trying to find cozy places to hole up for the winter. In fact, they may already have found a spot they love and never want to leave: your chimney.
Your chimney needs to be unobstructed when you want to use it. But if there is a nest stuffed in there or damage to the flue from an animal invasion, you’ll have a hard time getting your fireplace to function properly. Getting a chimney inspection in Minneapolis, MN is a great way to see if you need to clear out left-behind animal debris or evict some small invaders from your chimney before the fire is lit.
This is one of the busiest seasons of the year. You want to be able to just use your fireplace without having to think about it. You opened the damper and made sure you are using the system right and that should be the end of it. We understand the sentiment. And we want you to know that a chimney inspection is going to help ensure that you can use this part of your home without any hassle.
We know that stopping to get a chimney inspection can seem like a hassle but it is well worth your time. Why? We will explain the reasons why scheduling a chimney inspection in St. Paul, MN now is your best course of action here.
The chimney might appear flawless from the outside, but it may be hiding all manners of critical repairs on the inside. So how does a person with an untrained eye know when it’s time for a chimney repair?
A quick chimney inspection from an expert will reveal potential problems that need to be looked into. In some cases, the professional may use a camera scan of the inside walls of the chimney to reveal areas that need urgent repairs.
So when should you schedule a chimney inspection? As a general rule, you should schedule a chimney inspection twice every year (because of soot and creosote buildup). However, you should sign up for an inspection right away if you notice the following 5 signs.
Summer is in full swing and it isn’t likely that you are going to be using your fireplace and chimney for the next several months. With that said, this doesn’t mean that your chimney should be completely off your mind. Much like checking on a car that hasn’t been used for a few months to ensure it is still in working condition, you should want to make sure that your fireplace and chimney aren’t deteriorating while not in use.
This time of year is actually when you want to take the time to schedule a chimney inspection. After all, getting a professional out to check on your chimney when you aren’t using it and don’t need it makes things a lot easier for both you and the technician!
Springtime is in full swing and summer is right around the corner. You can always tell that winter has ended because of the sudden increase of blooming plants, flourishing foliage, and an abundance of furry and feathered critters around the area. It is always a treat to sit on your porch or in your backyard and hear the birds chirping away in the trees or watch squirrels run around in the grass. Spring is always a season full of life that is thriving just outside your door.
And as cute as those squirrels are you probably want them to stay outside.
While springtime and summer are both wonderful times of the year thanks to the great weather and extra sunshine, they can also be seasons during which you start having problems with your animal neighbors because you don’t see eye to eye–where you see a chimney and fireplace built to keep you warm, they see a great place for a nest and a new home.