Recently purchased a home with a fireplace. I have never had a fireplace before so I am excited.
Previous owners did not care for the fireplace very well. We had to clean ash from the fireplace and in the cleanout in the basement I had to remove 4+ bags of old ash. I got it clean enough!
I hired a chimney sweep to be done today so that he could inspect the elements and tell me if everything was good to use. He didn't get very far. The damper inside the fireplace is rusty, rotten, warped, and stuck. He said that he is not able to do anything with it. We didn't want to damage it and not be able to replace it. He recommended a chimney mount damper but he had never done one on a metal firebox. The brick is only visible for like 2 rows in the front and he didn't know if that would put too much stress on the cable and not function properly. I called Woodland and talked to a tech there and he said that they do not recommend installing them either since the cable needs to be so far to the front of the fireplace. I asked if there was a replacement damper for what I have and he said probably not.
So is my fireplace just junk now? He said I may want to contact a mason and see about tearing it out and installing a new damper setup or look into a insert. Is there anything I can do to repair the fireplace I have? Would much rather spend the money on fixing my fireplace instead of a $3500 gas insert.
Previous owners did not care for the fireplace very well. We had to clean ash from the fireplace and in the cleanout in the basement I had to remove 4+ bags of old ash. I got it clean enough!
I hired a chimney sweep to be done today so that he could inspect the elements and tell me if everything was good to use. He didn't get very far. The damper inside the fireplace is rusty, rotten, warped, and stuck. He said that he is not able to do anything with it. We didn't want to damage it and not be able to replace it. He recommended a chimney mount damper but he had never done one on a metal firebox. The brick is only visible for like 2 rows in the front and he didn't know if that would put too much stress on the cable and not function properly. I called Woodland and talked to a tech there and he said that they do not recommend installing them either since the cable needs to be so far to the front of the fireplace. I asked if there was a replacement damper for what I have and he said probably not.
So is my fireplace just junk now? He said I may want to contact a mason and see about tearing it out and installing a new damper setup or look into a insert. Is there anything I can do to repair the fireplace I have? Would much rather spend the money on fixing my fireplace instead of a $3500 gas insert.
