Eastinlet
Bronze Member
Thought it might be a good chance to clean the chimney owing to the mild weather. Have about a 25' block chimney that used to have 8 1/2 by 13" flue tile. Had a chimney fire that damaged the tile 15 years ago, so we relined the bore with 6" stainless tubing. The corrugated tubing makes a seamless tube from top to bottom. Insulation was poured around the tube to hold it in place. Owing to irregularities the tubing is not perfectly straight but meanders a little, something you can feel while brushing it. By the way, there is no cleanout... the pipe turns a fairly sharp 90 degrees into the cellar.
So standard procedure for years has been to climb up the roof, insert a plastic 6" round brush and then screw on fiberglass rod sections as the brush advances down the tube. Only this time was different, as my son was scrubbing with short strokes and had the brush and one section (we later learned) came unscrewed and stuck in the chimney about 14' down.
This is a real problem... how do you get a chimney brush out of a chimney? Tried a few things first: tried to drop a line and sinker down hoping to get a line through the brush to the chimney base. Sinker would not go through. We cable clamped a couple big hooks onto the rod and tried to snag the brush to lift it out. No go... could push the brush down a little and lift it up a little, but not effective. Plastic bristles and too much give.
After some discussion and prayer we came up with an effective solution and would like to share it. There are probably other and better ways, but this is what we did:
Hose clamped a 6' piece of 1/2" PVC pipe to a fiberglass chimney rod section. Found a 5" carriage bolt that just slipped inside the PVC pipe. Tied braided fishing line just under the bolt head and wrapped with duct tape. Inserted the bolt into the PVC (so only the head is visible). Held onto the line, inserted PVC end into the chimney, maintaining tension on the line as it descends. Screw on another rod, drop it and the line down, letting the weight of the rods be taken by the taut line. And so on. Always letting the weight of the rods be born by the line, which in turn was tied to the bolt inserted into the PVC pipe.
Son could feel the PVC pipe bolt carrier touch the brush, gave a push and the entire pipe unit pushed lengthwise through the plastic bristles. Continue pushing downward until well below the brush, release the line and the bolt fell free and rolled to the inside base of the pipe where I could reach it in the cellar. Extract the rods.
Again, the purpose of the PVC pipe was to hold the bolt captive so it could be pushed through the bristles of the stuck brush. Twine or rope would just sit on top of the brush so we pushed the roped bolt through the bristles and could then grab the bolt at the bottom.
With a line from the top, I tied another stouter line on the bottom end and he drew it upward. We now had a continous line so we could tie something on either side to either push or pull the brush in whichever direstion was easier. At the time we had not counted rod sections and noticed that a rod was attached to the brush, we thought that it was only a brush and that we could possibly even pull it downward... that of course would not have worked with a rod attached.
A line knot snagged on the brush (as it happened) and let us pull the brush upward with a little assistance from a hook attached to rods. But once the line was passed through it was all over with for the brush and we regained control of the situation. Otherwise had planned to attach a disk to the line and use it to pull the brush upward. Hope this could help someone in similar circumstances... punch a line through the brush and you will own it.
Chris Thompson
So standard procedure for years has been to climb up the roof, insert a plastic 6" round brush and then screw on fiberglass rod sections as the brush advances down the tube. Only this time was different, as my son was scrubbing with short strokes and had the brush and one section (we later learned) came unscrewed and stuck in the chimney about 14' down.
This is a real problem... how do you get a chimney brush out of a chimney? Tried a few things first: tried to drop a line and sinker down hoping to get a line through the brush to the chimney base. Sinker would not go through. We cable clamped a couple big hooks onto the rod and tried to snag the brush to lift it out. No go... could push the brush down a little and lift it up a little, but not effective. Plastic bristles and too much give.
After some discussion and prayer we came up with an effective solution and would like to share it. There are probably other and better ways, but this is what we did:
Hose clamped a 6' piece of 1/2" PVC pipe to a fiberglass chimney rod section. Found a 5" carriage bolt that just slipped inside the PVC pipe. Tied braided fishing line just under the bolt head and wrapped with duct tape. Inserted the bolt into the PVC (so only the head is visible). Held onto the line, inserted PVC end into the chimney, maintaining tension on the line as it descends. Screw on another rod, drop it and the line down, letting the weight of the rods be taken by the taut line. And so on. Always letting the weight of the rods be born by the line, which in turn was tied to the bolt inserted into the PVC pipe.
Son could feel the PVC pipe bolt carrier touch the brush, gave a push and the entire pipe unit pushed lengthwise through the plastic bristles. Continue pushing downward until well below the brush, release the line and the bolt fell free and rolled to the inside base of the pipe where I could reach it in the cellar. Extract the rods.
Again, the purpose of the PVC pipe was to hold the bolt captive so it could be pushed through the bristles of the stuck brush. Twine or rope would just sit on top of the brush so we pushed the roped bolt through the bristles and could then grab the bolt at the bottom.
With a line from the top, I tied another stouter line on the bottom end and he drew it upward. We now had a continous line so we could tie something on either side to either push or pull the brush in whichever direstion was easier. At the time we had not counted rod sections and noticed that a rod was attached to the brush, we thought that it was only a brush and that we could possibly even pull it downward... that of course would not have worked with a rod attached.
A line knot snagged on the brush (as it happened) and let us pull the brush upward with a little assistance from a hook attached to rods. But once the line was passed through it was all over with for the brush and we regained control of the situation. Otherwise had planned to attach a disk to the line and use it to pull the brush upward. Hope this could help someone in similar circumstances... punch a line through the brush and you will own it.
Chris Thompson
