Popping a cap on a chimney

Need a couple of unused chimneys capping.

First quote:

scaffolding £600 parts and labour £250

Looks like they may not want the job.

They did suggest looking for someone with a cherry picker. First Googling indicates that Hewden offer a 45 foot boom (plenty tall enough) for £270 per week plus £75 delivery.

34 foot (probably just tall enough) is £240 a week + £75 delivery.

So this is significantly cheaper than scaffolding, even if we can't negotiate a one/two day rate.

So why can't the scaffolding company use one? Training requirements plus elf'nsafety? Or just a grim determination to maximise profit - using existing stock plus labour to put it up and take it down?

If we are going to order our own cherry picker then capping the chimney looks more and more DIYable.

So - any advice about gotchas with using cherry pickers (like extending them too far and toppling), and how much more than the vertical height you should use when ordering?

Gotchas about capping chimneys?

Most of the chimneys round here just have a half round tile over the top. Is this enough to keep out the rain, and allow some ventilation? I know that rain is coming down the chimney because the hearth is open and soot is coming down despite having swept the chimney.

Would a different pot be better, or an insert to drop into the pot?

Cheers

Dave R

Reply to
David
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I hired a towable cherry picker to paint my house and it was brilliant. Pretty topple proof as you can even begin to raise it if the legs aren't fully extended an screwed down. Despite this, I did manage to get stuck in the air at full extension once when I hadn't screwed one of the legs down as firmly as I should have. At full extension the furthest away leg was unloaded enough to trip the safety cut-out leaving me high and dry. ;-) Fortunately I had my mobile phone on me and was able to summon help.

Can't wait for my house to need painting again. ;-)

Tim

Reply to
Tim+

Use a nice simple strap on cap with vent mesh - often called a "pepper pot". These come with basically a ginormous jubilee clip that you do up until it won't fall off.

Available painted red so look OK. eg:

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You may also find a HETAS installer or a chimney sweep may be more adept at going up the roof without scaffold - depending on access and height.

I got 2 capped when I had a flue liner put in.

Reply to
Tim Watts

It is.

Reply to
Huge

or even what I was brought up to call a "grannie"

Reply to
charles

IIRC, I paid £450 for the scaffolding, and I did the work myself, but that also included repointing the chimney and redoing the flaunching. I got a lead guy aroumd to redo the leadwork. Also aligned the TV aerial whilst up there. (I worked out the angle from google maps, and used the car satnav to get north, and then set the aerial. Then I discovered that if I looked very carefully at the horizon along the line of the aerial from the top of the chimney, I could just about see the transmitter 25 miles away.)

Ventilating is very important or the chimney fills with condensation and wrecks the internal decorations and plasterwork about 5-10 years later. Must be vented at top and bottom.

You can get vented caps which sit on the pots - earthenware with a ring of vent holes around (which are mortared on to the pots), or metal (Brewer's) caps (which have a strap around the pot which I didn't like so I fitted them a different way). Another option is to remove the pot and seal the top with a paving slab, and put a vented brick in the side of the chimney near the top.

These all have quite different appearance, which may be important if you don't want to change your chimney's so they don't match everyone else's anymore. The Brewer's cap is the least visible from the ground. (There are also Brewer's caps which leave the chimney sufficiently open to still use it, but I'm not referring to those.)

Ventilation is more important than stopping water getting in, i.e it's better not to cap it at all than to seal it in a way which kills the ventilation.

Capping a chimney doesn't stop debris coming detached from the inside and falling down.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

Good suggestion - both the plumber and HETAS installer have been up on the roof to install flues. Also, hadn't thought of a chimney sweep :-)

Thanks

Dave R

Reply to
David

but it does stop birds nesting inside

Reply to
charles

Is a cat ladder the same as a roofing ladder - i.e. a light weight ladder with wheels and a hook at the top to roll up the roof then flip over at the ridge so the hook takes hold?

Anyway, slightly more complicated than that.

The roof is a hip roof (if Wikipedia is correct) and the chimney is on the triangular side so there is no ridge directly above it on which to fix a ladder.

It is also on the side of the house where the car port is so it is difficult to access directly.

Having said all that, I have seen a roofer just displace a few tiles to provide footholds via the battens and walk all over a roof, just replacing the tiles afterwards.

All this suggests that we may end up with a cherry picker. Which is tempting.

Cheers

Dave R

Reply to
David

I think I favour the earthenware vented caps - drop into a bed of mortar sounds good, and they also look attractive.

Stage two of the plan is to block the chimney near the bottom and put a flue door in the outside above the blockage for maintenance access.

That way I can seal the barrier from above and also get at it to check and clear out any debris at a later date.

Makes me wonder about sealed fire places with just a ventilation brick - presumably they are at risk of slowly accumulating debris. Fortunately we only have one remaining chimney which serves the lounge and one bedroom. Must make a note to check out the bedroom (lack of) fireplace.

Cheers

Dave R

Reply to
David

That is a common technique - just watch they put the tiles back "right".

And why not...

The hire place should be able to give you an operating lecture and a demo - they don't want you breaking it either :)

Although I think they are so full of safety features, it would be hard to do something dangerous other than plant your face in the side of the building.

Reply to
Tim Watts

And Santa Claus climbing down.

Reply to
Bod

A chimney sweep will advise and fit. It's part of what they do.

Reply to
stuart noble

the chimney caps with holes are called elephant's foot but they are both very heavy and quite expensive it?s worth checking ebay and local ads to see if anyone close to you is operating a cherry picker service, this type of job is ideally suited to a one man small business and can be much cheaper then the big Hire firms.

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Reply to
Mark

Well, many have outriggers, and need a solid bit of ground under those to stop it tipping over. Is capping a chimney that much harder than fitting a tv aerial?

Our one was done with two ladders, one the normal sort the other the hook over roof ladder. I've been given to understand this has been done quite recently in this street using the same method. Brian

Reply to
Brian Gaff

Ours is a kind of aluminium louver device which is somehow screwed down. Took all of half a n hour for the guy to do it. Brian

Reply to
Brian Gaff

A chimney sweep once asked me to tell him when his brush come out the top. I'm wondering if someone has invented a device that could be pushed up the chimney in similar fashion and snap over the top like a sprung umbrella?

Dave W

Reply to
Dave W

In message , Brian Gaff writes

From what the OP said in a followup, this chimney stack is on the end of a hipped roof. So that sort of access technique can't be used as no where to hang the roof ladder from.

Reply to
Chris French

Well, a highly qualified bloke who works for his local council told me that cat ladders are no longer allowed - it has to be scaffolding which is expensive. He said that all the council estates, he spat the word out, now get electric heating.

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Reply to
Mr Pounder

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