Starting to think of a chimney liner...where to start?

[MJFlores]

I have a 12 year old chimney, clay liner that appears to be in decent shape still. I have a cat stove on the living floor level attached to the chimney...if I take the stove pipe off from the stove and look in directly across the liner has some small cracks forming, probably from years of heat. Nothing missing, just a few cracks...you could probably detect them with your thumb nail if you reached way in and felt for them. Anyway, from the stove inlet to the peak is 17 feet...what's a rough cost to expect, and what would I ask for? From what I've read, insulated flex stainless pipe if what I need right? Who do I call....as in how do you find a reputable installer? Just call some chimney sweeps in the area?..or stove shops?

 

[bholler]

I would start by calling reputable chimney sweeps in your area. If you don't know any go to csia or nfi websites they will have a list of local sweeps. Flex is probably the way to go and defiantly get it insulated for safety and performance. In flex you will have a choice of heavy or light wall liners and 304 or 316 both heavy wall or light wall will work we only use heavy wall for wood stoves we feel it is worth the extra cost but light wall will work as well. 304 is all you need for wood but there is nothing wrong with using 316 either. Stove shops will probably not do it with out selling you a stove and i think you will probably be better off with a sweep. But be prepared if you are calling now you are probably going to wait quite a while. I would actually be concerned if a sweep was not really busy now. we are noe scheduling for the second week of december.

 

[BrotherBart]

Call stove shops. They are a great source of info on good sweeps/installers. Or in the case of my stove shop, "We wouldn't recommend any of them here.".

 

[bholler]

That's funny bart i would not recommend any stove shops around us to do any work lol.

 

[begreen]

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