A wooden fireplace is cozy to have in your home. For you to keep it in perfect working condition, you need to do a number of things. Some of these things as given by chimney repair professionals include:

Only burn dry, cured wood

You need wood to light up the fire. The best wood to use is dry, cured wood. This is wood that has been split, stacked, and dried for at least six months. You can dry the wood by yourself or buy already dried wood.

When buying the wood, remember to carry a water meter. This is to ensure that you don’t buy any wood that is wet.

In addition to ensuring that the wood is dry, you also need to ensure that it’s made from hardwood. Some of the best hardwoods that you should go with are: which oak, beech, hickory, sugar maple, white ash, and many others.

If you can’t find hardwoods, you should go ahead and buy the less dense woods such as white pine or spruce, but ensure that they are thoroughly dry. You should note that when using these woods, you will have to use more of them thus you will expose them more.

Only burn firewood

When some people don’t have access to wood or when they are simply looking to experiment, they burn other materials such as lumber, crates, and others. This is wrong.

You should note that these materials compromise the air quality in the house. They also lead to the accumulation of soot and creosote requiring you to undertake frequent chimney cleaning.

For you to keep the chimney in top working condition, only burn wood. No other material should find its way into the chimney.

Undertake regular inspections

Even if you are burning the right woods, you need to ensure that you regularly inspect the chimney. This is to determine that everything is working optimally. You can do the inspection by yourself if you have the skills, but if you have never done it before, hire a chimney inspection professional to help you out.

During the inspection, the professional should pay attention to the amount of creosote in the unit, presence of cracks, among many other issues. If the chimney has a lot of creosote, you should clean it. The same thing applies if it’s broken—you should fix it.

Pay attention to the smoke

Wood burning fireplaces are associated with smoke; therefore, you should pay close attention to it as it will guide you on how effectively your chimney is working.

If you notice the smoke getting into your house, it’s a sign that the chimney is blocked and you should clean it.

In some cases, your chimney will produce a lot of smoke. This comes about when you are burning the wrong wood. To fix the issue you need to change the wood that you are using. The chimney will also produce a lot of smoke when the damper is closed—you need to open it fully, to fix the problem.

Remove creosote

Creosote is dark, hard, crust-like flammable material that comes about as a result of incomplete combustion of wood. Poorly dried and stored woods are the ones that are known to produce a lot of creosote; therefore, you should avoid using them.

For you to keep your family and property safe, you should inspect the amount of creosote in your home. If excessive amounts of it have buildup, you should ask a chimney sweep Bowie to clean it for you.

Creosote is dangerous as it puts your chimney at the risk of catching fire in addition to giving your home an awful smell. Due to this, you should remove it as soon as possible.