Pour-In-Place Deleted Smoke Chamber?

[TWH5001]

Hello,
First time posting here, and very excited to have found this community.

We just moved into an older home that we purchased from foreclosure, and getting ready to revitalize our chimneys. We've got two on the house--one in the dining room and one in the kitchen.

This thread is about the kitchen fireplace, which had a Pour-In-Place flue put in at some point. Looks like the goal there was to connect directly to an insert (now gone).



In the images you can see where the Pour-In-Place concrete created a flat ceiling in our firebox. We don't plan to use an insert, but with this concrete ceiling, it seems like our smoke chamber is basically gone. My question is whether anyone has ever seen this before, and if the concrete can be removed/hammered out to create a new smoke chamber? Hoping to use this hearth for cooking eventually, but concerned that an open fire in there will flood the room with smoke.

Let me know what y'all think, and thanks in advance.

 

[bholler]

Hello,
First time posting here, and very excited to have found this community.

We just moved into an older home that we purchased from foreclosure, and getting ready to revitalize our chimneys. We've got two on the house--one in the dining room and one in the kitchen.

This thread is about the kitchen fireplace, which had a Pour-In-Place flue put in at some point. Looks like the goal there was to connect directly to an insert (now gone).

View attachment 281121
View attachment 281122
In the images you can see where the Pour-In-Place concrete created a flat ceiling in our firebox. We don't plan to use an insert, but with this concrete ceiling, it seems like our smoke chamber is basically gone. My question is whether anyone has ever seen this before, and if the concrete can be removed/hammered out to create a new smoke chamber? Hoping to use this hearth for cooking eventually, but concerned that an open fire in there will flood the room with smoke.

Let me know what y'all think, and thanks in advance.

It absolutely will not work as is. It may be possible to create a bit of a smoke chamber but the flue probably won't be large enough to support an open fireplace if it was meant for an insert

 

[bigealta]

"Hoping to use this hearth for cooking eventually"

I would be thinking Wood stove with a top that you can put a pot on. Hopefully that flue has room for a liner.

 

[EbS-P]

What kind of cooking are you contemplating. I can cook pizza in med-small wood stove. Anything you cook in Tinfoil can go right on the coals. And here is a picture of my 10” Dutch oven and lid in my Drolet 1800i which has a spark screen and can be burned with the door open. While large rotisserie items bigger than a leg of lamb may not be possible, I think one could get quite good results cooking in an insert/stove 2 cu ft and larger. Insulated liner should be a requirement.