CHIMNEY CLEANING: A DO IT YOURSELF APPROACH in Tenderloin, NY
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- Prepare the Area Around Your Chimney
First thing’s first. You should remove anything that is in front of your Tenderloin, NY fireplace. Also, move any furniture as far away as possible. If you don’t want anything getting dirty, make sure you cover everything with old sheets. You should also roll back any rugs that are near the fireplace. If you have carpeting, it would be wise to set down a tarp.
- Remove the Grate from the Fireplace
This may go without saying, but do not operate an open flame in the area surrounding the fireplace while attempting to do any chimney cleaning in New York County. Be sure to wear a dust mask and protective gloves while you attempt to clean the fireplace. While being mindful not to inhale any dust or soot, shovel out ashes and debris from the inside of the fireplace.
- Inspect Your Chimney
Use a torch, (carefully!) to look up the flue of the chimney. If there is a damper fitted to your flue, you will need to ensure it is open. If there is, use the damper handle to push the flap back and lock it open. Check for any animals or birds that may have taken up residence in your New York County chimney. Inspect for any cracks or missing firebricks and take remedial steps if the damage is found. The lining of your flue is important to prevent gas or smoke from escaping. Check the thickness of any creosote build-up using a blade or scraper. If you notice significant damage, it may be time to get some professional chimney cleaning company, or even chimney repair, with Ageless Chimney.
Select Your Brush
By now you should have determined the size and shape of your New York County chimney flue. It will be either square or round. You should also estimate the height of your chimney. Once you choose the correct brush, attach it to a rod. Push the rod up the flue until the bottom end of the rod is in the middle of the fireplace.
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- Scrub, Scrub, Scrub!
Start scrubbing up your chimney by going through the hole in your dust sheet or cardboard, attach another rod to lengthen your chimney brush. Scrub using a slight clockwise movement as you push, and never twist the brush counterclockwise. With a hard and vigorous thrust, scrub the flue with the brush, adding more rods as you proceed up the flue.
- Remove Brush and Soot
You will know that you have reached the top of your chimney when you feel less friction. Withdraw the brush unscrewing one rod at a time. As you unscrew the last rod, let the brush fall into the soot pile that now lies at the bottom of the fireplace. Lift the bottom of the dust sheet or cardboard covering, remove the brush and carefully shovel the pile of soot into a metal bucket.
- Cleaning Up
The first thing you should do is remove any dust cloths or cardboard that may have been assembled. It is now time to get the vacuum or shop vacuum out and clean up all that soot! To complete the project, you will need to assemble the fireplace’s grate once more. If you used an old sheet, you should take it outside and shake it off. As soot is non-toxic and environmentally friendly, it can be buried as a means of disposal. Hard deposits of creosote are corrosive and more toxic, however, they can be buried too. Any edible plants in your garden will not absorb creosote, and when you eat the fruit or vegetables they produce, they will not contain the chemicals present in creosote.
Call Us Today
Getting your chimney swept and inspected improves the quality of the air in your home, keeps your loved ones safe from toxins, and reduces your home’s fire risk. Ageless Chimney takes pride in providing the safest, most cost-effective cleaning procedures. Call us today at 516-795-1313!
The Tenderloin was an entertainment and red-light district in the heart of the New York City borough of Manhattan during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Early in the 19th century, the major vice district had been located in what is now SoHo, called at the time “Hells’ Hundred Acres”, but as the city grew steadily northward, the theater district along Broadway and the Bowery moved uptown as well, as did the legitimate and illegitimate businesses that were usually connected with show business. For some time, the city’s “Rialto” theater district centered on Union Square and 14th Street, but the Fifth Avenue Hotel broke new ground when it opened at 23rd Street and Fifth Avenue in 1859, beginning the expansion of the Union Square Rialto to 23rd Street and Madison Square. By the 1870s, the Fifth Avenue Hotel had many competitors in the area, and where the hotels were, the prostitutes followed.
By the 1880s, the Tenderloin encompassed the largest number of nightclubs, saloons, bordellos, gambling casinos, dance halls, and “clip joints” in New York City, to the extent that one estimate made in 1885 was that half of the buildings in the district were connected with vice. Reformers referred to the area as “Satan’s Circus”, and one anti-vice crusading minister, the Rev. Thomas De Witt Talmage, denounced the entire city of New York as “the modern Gomorrah” for allowing it to exist.
The clientele of these establishments was not necessarily working-class: one set of seven sisters ran side-by-side brothels in a residential neighborhood on West 25th Street, inviting their upper class customers with engraved invitations. On some nights only gentlemen in formal evening dress were allowed to attend, and the girls of these houses were as socially adept as they were sexually; on Christmas Eve profits were given to charity.
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