singh.blair•8d agoProlific Poster

That job at the old Victorian in Portland taught me a lesson

I was sweeping a flue in this 1890s Victorian over in Portland last spring. The homeowner kept complaining about smoke backing up, and I figured it was just a standard blockage. Turns out the previous sweep had shoved a bunch of creosote chunks down into the smoke shelf and left them there. I had to spend an extra 3 hours scraping and vacuuming that mess out. Anyone else run into lazy work like that from the last guy?

2 comments

2 Comments

carter.hugo8d ago

Did you catch that podcast where a sweep found a whole dead raccoon stuffed behind a fake brick?

amy_murphy158d ago

I had a similar thing happen last year but honestly I kinda see it from the other guys side. The previous sweep on my job had left a bunch of old mortar chunks in a chimney I was working on and yeah it added time but the homeowner was super chill about it. I think sometimes we blame the last person but chimneys just collect junk over time especially in those old Victorian builds where the smoke shelf is basically a catch-all. Maybe it was lazy work but maybe the guy just hit his limit for the day or the access was really tight.