I'd like to be able to burn wood for heat and ambiance in the living room. Currently my house (1970s) has a masonry fireplace built of block with a clay liner, wrapped in stucco. In addition to the fireplace / insert upgrade, we want to replace the stucco with cultured stone.
The chimney stack above the roofline isn't in good shape right now - it has crumbling block, missing mortar (some of the flue tile is exposed) and flashing, and cracks in the crown. My original plan was to rebuild the stack above the roofline, attach the cultured stone to the existing chimney block, then put in an insert and steel liner inside the tile.
The quote I received was $1,000 more ($7800 vs $6800, not incl the cultured stone) to replace the chimney from top to bottom before adding the cultured stone, which seems safer since I don't know the shape of the block in the main chimney
Now I am wondering about a third option: tear down the existing chimney and replace it with a new zero clearance fireplace instead. I don't see many discussions on this, so I'm not sure if this is doable? It seems like it might be cheaper than rebuilding with masonry just to buy an insert
Are there any benefits to masonry + an insert over a zero clearance in this situation? What option would you choose?
The chimney stack above the roofline isn't in good shape right now - it has crumbling block, missing mortar (some of the flue tile is exposed) and flashing, and cracks in the crown. My original plan was to rebuild the stack above the roofline, attach the cultured stone to the existing chimney block, then put in an insert and steel liner inside the tile.
The quote I received was $1,000 more ($7800 vs $6800, not incl the cultured stone) to replace the chimney from top to bottom before adding the cultured stone, which seems safer since I don't know the shape of the block in the main chimney
Now I am wondering about a third option: tear down the existing chimney and replace it with a new zero clearance fireplace instead. I don't see many discussions on this, so I'm not sure if this is doable? It seems like it might be cheaper than rebuilding with masonry just to buy an insert
Are there any benefits to masonry + an insert over a zero clearance in this situation? What option would you choose?