How often should a liner be inspected and cleaned?

[latichever]

This will be the fifth heating season for my pellet stove, which is a fire place insert venting into a chimney liner that extends three stories of my residential house.

The liner has not been inspected nor cleaned.

How often should this be done?

I received an estimate of $175 from a sweep. Is this reasonable?

 

[webby3650]

Typically you would want to have a solid fuel appliance cleaned every year. Pellet stoves create a lot of fly ash that can clog up the flu. You will probably get the same price to clean it as you would get for a wood burning appliance. I recommend getting it serviced by a pro that REALLY knows pellet appliances.

 

[smwilliamson]

$175 is steep fir the liner alone, IMHO. But they aren't making any money if they come out to clean one liner and charge you any less. Are they cleaning the stove too? If so, then I think they are not charging enough. If I'm performing an annual service, I do the liner while I do the insert. I charge a service call and an hourly rate, as every installation and stove is different. Some are more dirty, some are less.