fireplace heat from neighbor

Bear in ind that in a typical mid 1800’s row house, the back of the firebox is ONE brick thick. The balance of the party wall is two courses thick, but if they haven’t built a masonry firebox properly with fire brick lining, you have a big problem. Fireboxes were NOT built to contain wood fires. A chimney company when consulted about the flue could accurately evaluate the flue/chimney, and possibly install a metal sleeve/liner. Unless they knew old houses, they would have no way of knowing that the firebox itself is unsafe or inadequate. When looking at a brick wall, it isn’t obvious how thick it might be behind. If you saw it yourself or saw a picture, a proper firebox for wood burning will jut out into the room, usually looking like an ungainly blob. This because a wood burning fire box has to be a certain depth to draft the smoke up instead of into the room, and the extra course of refractory bricks makes it stick out further. If theirs is shallow, you got a problem.

brucef

in About Brooklyn 11 years and 9 months ago

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redlandsgirl | 11 years and 9 months ago

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Has anyone experienced hot walls from your neighbor’s fireplace? We have a neighbor who did a gut reno on their building a few years ago and now their fireplace hearth is against our bedroom wall. The heat was moderate but extremely noticeable at first. After we registered our concern, they got an opinion from a chimney company that recommended a metal plate be installed to reduce the heat emanating big time into our bedroom. After this installation,the heat is extremely hot on our wall and worse it’s higher up and wider! Would love to hear if anyone has experienced this and how it was resolved. Thanks.

steam_man | 11 years and 9 months ago

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A metal (steel or cast iron even copper) plate installed around a heat source is what we typically refer to as a radiator. I surmise the chimney company person is a nincompoop. You need an insulator not a radiator. I’m not really qualified to tell you what to do here but perhaps a different chimney company with a long history can. Please look into that.

GreenThinker | 11 years and 9 months ago

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I imagine something like Roxul rigid mineral wool insulation would be better suited.