Advantage Air Duct Cleaning of Eugene, OR recently had the pleasure of restoring a customers dangerous unlined chimney back to a usable and very safe fireplace that she can enjoy any time and feel good about it with a new chimney liner. This customer owns a beautiful home up the McKenzie River that was built in the 1800’s. As you can imagine, the 1800’s weren’t times of builder codes and regulation. 1910 was the year that a terra cotta tile liner was code in all masonry chimneys built for heating a dwelling came in effect. To this day we still come across many chimneys that were built in the 50’s and 60’s that don’t have a terra cotta tile liner. The purpose of a terra cotta tile liner is to protect the home from heat transfer. It only takes 12 hours to heat through a brick before the heat that fire produces can be transferred to whatever it is pressed up against. Normally that would be the wood framing in a home. The fear of heat transfer is a phenomenon called wood-pyrolosis. Wood-pyrolosis is amazing phenomenon as over the years as a piece of wood is heated, its kindling point can be reduced to 200 degrees without flame! That’s right, without flame! That means that if you burn your chimney for years and heat has transferred through the brick 1000’s of times and heating the wood that’s pressed up against it, the wood-pyrolosis phenomenon can certainly take place and can result in a life threatening house fire. Wood-pyrolosis is basically spontaneous combustion of wood. It is very dangerous yet can be easily prevented. With the inspection from the eye of a professional, an unnecessary and dangerous house fire can be prevented. If you use your fireplace, wood stove or wood stove insert and its been awhile since you’ve had it cleaned or inspected, you should certainly give us a call. We would be more than happy to come visit your home and check the safety and usability of the system that is in place.
Have a safe and happy burning season!
Sincerely,
Nate Hollembaek
Owner/Operator