HERE’S one for the annals of homeowner negligence: as of last month, my chimney had gone eight full years without being inspected, much less cleaned. For all I knew, a few generations of squirrels had summered in my bricks before fleeing at the first scent of smoke.

In those years we had probably burned 50 fires, but none since March 2011. But with Hurricane Sandy approaching, I knew I would likely need the fireplace for light, heat and maybe some cooking duties. Could I start it up once more without burning the house?

To answer that question and others, I called on Ashley Eldridge, the director of education for the Chimney Safety Institute of America, and John Gulland, writer and manager of WoodHeat.org, a site devoted to wood-heat systems.

With a few kernels of knowledge and a handful of low-cost items from the hardware store, homeowners can keep a chimney healthy between cleanings and keep the home’s heating system in good repair, they said. My experts also suggested a cheap way to make a great backyard fire pit, but more on that later.

My most pressing concern was whether I could light the first fire of the season without fear. I had ignored stories about chimney safety because my chimney looked fine from the outside, and it wasn’t belching smoke into our living room. People who live in similar ignorance are taking a risk.

Creosote can build up in a flue if you burn enough smoky fires, which come from wet wood, or fires that smolder before catching. This tarlike substance can catch fire with an inferno so intense that flammable materials abutting the chimney can also ignite.

“It just goes nuts in that chimney,” Mr. Gulland said. “All the heat produces a strong draft, so it sounds like a jet engine or a railroad train. It’s terrifying.”

The likelihood of a house fire depends on how closely your home’s builder adhered to safety codes. Some second-story floor beams, for instance, are anchored in the chimney. If they were placed without careful regard for building codes, they could encroach too closely on the flue and ignite in a creosote fire.

A good chimney sweep, Mr. Gulland said, “will have a radar for screw-ups like that, because there’ll be hints.” And keeping the flue clean, he added, minimizes the risk that such factors will come into play.

Mr. Eldridge suggested having a chimney inspected annually by a sweep who carries a certification from his organization, in that way ensuring the sweep meets training, educational and ethical standards. The CSIA.org site includes a searchable index of such sweeps, but none was available in my area.

Like most people, I’ve heard horror stories about swindles where a low-cost chimney sweep with a high-pressure sales pitch will identify costly phantom problems in places you can’t see.

To find a trustworthy sweep, Mr. Gulland suggested asking friends and avoiding low bidders. “You want someone who’s around 45 with a good-looking truck that’s not a rust bucket, the truck of a guy who’s proud of himself,” he said. “When you get a good sweep, you can pretty much tell immediately.”

I had five days before Sandy arrived, and a very low likelihood of finding a sweep before then. I needed to do an inspection on my own, but I had no idea what to look for. Mr. Gulland and Mr. Eldridge suggested getting a pair of safety glasses, a mirror and a strong flashlight, and starting at the bottom.

And that doesn’t mean the fireplace.

A chimney often has two flues, one for the fireplace and one that reaches to the basement, where, in homes heated with water, it connects to the boiler’s exhaust pipe. Multi-flue chimneys commonly terminate in a chamber that catches soot from a “cleanout” passage at the bottom of the fireplace. That soot can build up so much that it interferes with the boiler’s airflow. A little doorway, commonly found on the chimney and below the exhaust pipe, is there for removing soot.

I extracted at least 20 pounds of the stuff, and noticed gaps in the mortar connecting the exhaust pipe to the chimney. I tried not to think about the fumes that were escaping into my basement.

Next, I checked the fireplace itself. I slipped on goggles, opened the damper and, for the first time, checked the flue.

It wasn’t so bad. I scraped the surface with a poker, which revealed less than a half-inch of soot. I ran my finger across it and found a soft, sooty form of creosote rather than the more dangerous tarry variety.

My next bit of do-it-yourself maintenance was clearly not meant for the masses. I got up onto my second-story rooftop with roofing cement and silicone caulking seal. Mr. Gulland suggested sealing any gaps between the metal flashing and the chimney so water did not creep into the seams between the chimney and the house.

I also saw that my chimney cap had been installed with wire mesh, to keep critters out. Lovely. I’ve been looking at the mesh for 12 years and never really registered its existence.

Mr. Gulland and Mr. Eldridge both strongly recommend chimney caps, to keep animals, foliage and rainwater out. I removed the cap and found the boiler flue clear, and the fireplace flue looking the same as it did from the firebox.

Before I lit a fire, I bought a creosote sweeping log ($20), which my local hardware store manager recommended as a way to reduce creosote. I didn’t notice much of a difference in the soot after burning it, but I felt marginally safer, and Mr. Eldridge said it would make the chimney easier to clean, should I ever find a sweep. (Mr. Gulland was more dubious of the value of such products.) Two of my Facebook friends recommended Nutmegger Chimney Service, as did my hardware store manager. After Mike Przygocki, Nutmegger’s owner, and I traded voice mail, he rolled into my driveway with a polished truck and stepped out, looking to be about 45 and as trustworthy as anyone I had ever met.

Mr. Przygocki, who said he had been sweeping and repairing chimneys since 1983, then inspected the chimney from the same points as I did. The soot wasn’t dangerous, he said, and the chimney’s workmanship appeared to be adequate. (Among other things, the huge grout seams at the top of the structure would likely crack over time.)

But he couldn’t vouch for the chimney’s health (specifically, the terra cotta flue tiles) without sweeping it. This took roughly 40 minutes, and involved Mr. Przygocki’s setting up an expansive drop cloth and a vacuum that, remarkably, kept the soot from entering our house. When it was done, he declared it good to go.

“I’ve seen much worse, but it’s not great,” he said of my circa-1970 chimney. “A lot of developments from around this era were done this way, with old bricks and this kind of masonry work. It’s good for my business.”

Given my fairly infrequent use of the fireplace, he said, I should be O.K. waiting two years for an inspection. And when I showed him the inflatable damper pillow ($57, from Battic Door) to prevent drafts, he declared it “not a bad idea.”

My last order of business was building a fire pit, because my family had been requesting one for years. I assumed it was an arduous and expensive job. It was neither. (New York City residents, take note: fire pits violate the fire code.)

Mr. Gulland said the most common mistake with fire pits is that people make them too big. “Make it tiny,” he said. “A proper campfire, which is really what you’re building, is only 18 to 24 inches in diameter, and it’s just as pretty and less intimidating if it’s small and bright.”

I spent around $35 on 27 bricks from Lowe’s and a $17 grate from Home Depot, and assembled the pit in 20 minutes. My family was thrilled.

When Hurricane Sandy knocked out our electricity, the fireplace provided much-needed warmth, light and hot pasta. The fire pit will get its turn soon enough. And the trees sprawled across our property should keep both busy for a few seasons at least.

A Few Tips on Building a Better Fire

A BLAZING fire can be good for the soul but bad for the lungs, at least if you do it wrong.

“Many of the same components that are in cigarette smoke are in wood smoke,” said Nancy Alderman, president of Environment & Human Health, a public-health organization.

To avoid breathing those toxins, it helps to perfect the art of the low-smoke fire. For this, you need the right wood, a new approach to fire building and, perhaps, some insulation.

Hardwoods, like maple, oak and apple, are less likely to produce smoke than soft woods, like pine or cedar.

But hardwood will smoke if it’s not cured for at least six months before burning, said John Gulland, writer and manager of WoodHeat.org. “Low moisture content and correct piece size are more important than species,” he said.

Prevent backdrafts by clogging drafts elsewhere. Ashley Eldridge, the director of education for the Chimney Safety Institute of America, said if your attic door isn’t properly sealed and insulated, it can draw air from everywhere else, including your fireplace.

Also, burn hot fires. Because the traditional kindling-at-the-bottom approach typically leads to smoldering, Mr. Gulland suggested a top-down fire design, with heavier pieces at the bottom and kindling at the top. This gives kindling more air to burn, and helps produce a hot fire more quickly, and with less smoke.

The post Smoking Out Chimney Issues – The New York Instances appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

News

From Selim Algar

June 21, 2023 | 2:59 p.m

It’s the stripes of San Francisco.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis painted a bleak picture of the city by the bay in a campaign ad released Tuesday night, claiming that “leftist politics” had brought it to its knees.

The Republican presidential nominee toured the California city Monday amid a deepening rift with Gov. Gavin Newsom, the former mayor of San Francisco.

“This is the once-great city of San Francisco,” says DeSantis, standing in front of a graffiti-covered wall on an unfamiliar street. “We came here and saw people defecating on the street. We’ve seen people use heroin. We saw people smoking crack cocaine.”

DeSantis, 44, has regularly called Democrat-controlled cities corrupt dystopias and singled out the Sunshine State as a thriving counterpoint.

While dodging the crap and outdoor drug use, DeSantis noticed rows of boarded up shops and “so much rabble walking around,” according to DeSantis.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis toured San Francisco this week.News Licensing / MEGA

DeSantis said liberal politics are to blame for the growing plague.Twitter / @RonDeSantis

“You look around and the city is no longer alive,” he states in the spot story. “It really collapsed because of left-wing politics. And these policies have caused people to flee the area.”

DeSantis hailed Florida as a “law-and-order state” and criticized California’s city and state leaders for the indulgence of prosecutors and the “debris” they left in their wake.

“You’re doing it wrong here,” he says. “No wonder so many people have moved from San Francisco to Florida in recent years. We have to stop this madness. We must restore sanity to this country.”

Due to rising crime and homelessness, downtown San Francisco has been forced to relocate several major retailers in recent months, including Nordstrom and the area’s largest mall.

DeSantis’ broadside in the Bay Area was the final salvo shot in his ongoing war with Newsom, who happily returned fire.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has taken issue with DeSantis in recent weeks.AP

DeSantis said he witnessed San Francisco’s decay firsthand this week.AP

The Californian, who was mayor of San Francisco from 2004 to 2011, tried this week to silence speculation about a possible White House bid.

“Not on God’s green earth, as the saying goes,” Newsom told the Associated Press after being asked about the president’s aspirations.

“I’ve been fairly consistent — including recently on Fox News — in his candidacy,” he said of President Biden.

DeSantis — who remains second by a wide margin behind former President Donald Trump in most polls — will visit South Carolina, Washington, DC and Texas in the coming days as he tries to close the gap.

He will also be interviewing Trump’s former press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, on Fox News Wednesday night.

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San Francisco politicians are considering another policy that would harm tenants in the event of property violation: a ban on smoking in private homes.

On Thursday, a committee of the city’s board of directors voted to propose a bill banning smoking in private homes in homes with three or more units. The San Francisco Examiner reports that the restrictions would apply not only to tobacco products, but also to smoking marijuana and even vaping.

According to billing sponsor supervisor Norman Yee, the goal is to protect non-smoking apartment residents from the fumes of their ruthless neighbors.

“I take pride in helping residents avoid exposure to secondhand smoke in their own homes,” Yee tweeted as he introduced the bill last week. “Smoke moves easily between units and buildings. Now that more of us are working from home, it is more important than ever because there is no way to contain it.”

San Francisco currently prohibits smoking in the enclosed public areas of multi-unit buildings. Yee’s proposal extends to the interiors of these buildings’ private homes, as well as balconies and terraces.

The bill would allow the city’s Department of Health to punish offenders with a fine of up to $ 1,000, though the investigator reports they would receive warnings first. According to the legal text, a violation of this prohibition would not be a reason for eviction.

During the first year of the ban, the Ministry of Health would also need to “conduct a multilingual and culturally engaging public information campaign to raise awareness of the smoking ban and smoking cessation resources”.

63 California cities have similar bans. Yee’s proposal is endorsed by the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Action Network, the American Heart Association, and the San Francisco Tobacco-Free Coalition, all of which have issued letters of support.

Common claims about the dangers of secondhand smoke are made in these letters, including the notion that “there is not a safe amount of secondhand smoke exposure” and that secondhand smoke kills 41,000 people annually. However, recent medical studies have not found a clear link between secondhand smoke and lung cancer. Unlikely claims that smoking bans in public spaces are causing massive, immediate decreases in heart attacks and heart disease have also been largely debunked. A 2016 report by the Royal College of Physicians in the UK stated that “there is no direct evidence of such passive exposure to date [to e-cigarette vapor] is likely to cause significant damage. “

Yee has spoken out in favor of his ban as people are expected to seek refuge in their homes during the pandemic. One could use the same argument against the proposed ban: it is better to let people smoke in their homes than to light up on crowded public streets.

This is especially true for marijuana smokers, who would have few places to pamper themselves if Yee’s ban were passed. In San Francisco, smoking marijuana is illegal in public and in almost all businesses except the city’s cannabis lounges, which are closed during the pandemic.

In his credit, I think Yee proposed a change that would allow people with medical marijuana cards to continue smoking weed in their homes, the examiner said. At least one manager, Rafael Mandelman, has said he wants a blanket exemption for cannabis.

Given the weak public health case to crack down on second-hand smoking, it is difficult to view this proposal as anything other than an advanced form of invasive nanny statism. It effectively treats people’s homes as public places just because they happen to live in an apartment building.

That’s pretty bad for privacy and pretty bad for freedom. It’s also quite discriminatory to apartment dwellers. People who are rich enough to be able to afford a house or at least a maisonette in the extremely expensive city are not affected by the ban.

None of this is meant to ignore the preferences of non-smokers who don’t want to smell cigarette smoke in their own four walls. However, this preference can be satisfied by living in a building where smoking is prohibited as a condition of the lease. Likewise, smokers who want to live in their own four walls should be able to choose a building that allows them.

Obviously, people’s ability to find a building that suits their indoor smoking preferences is made significantly more difficult by the prohibition of apartments in much of the city in San Francisco. This lack of housing forces these two groups of people to live cheek to ashtrays in whatever houses they can find, creating conflict.

A better solution would certainly be to legalize new buildings so that consumers can choose from more types of housing in more locations. Smokers and non-smokers would then be better able to choose environments that better suit their needs.

The entire board of directors will be considering Yee’s smoking ban for the next month.

The post San Francisco Considers $1,000 Fines for Folks Smoking Tobacco or Hashish in Their Residences – Cause.com appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

The county regulators are expected to vote on the proposal during Tuesday’s board meeting.

RELATED: San Francisco Board of Directors unanimously votes in favor of e-cigarette ban

Smoking is already banned in public spaces such as stairwells and hallways, and many landlords do not allow it entirely indoors. However, this proposal goes a step further to protect other residents from secondhand smoke.

Repeat offenders could be fined $ 1,000 per day, according to SF Chronicle. However, tenants could not be evicted for violations.

According to Chronicle, protecting the health of nonsmokers is important, especially low-income residents living in high-density residential buildings.

If passed, a ban on smoking cigarettes and cannabis would apply to buildings with at least three units.

The only exception would be medical cannabis.

Sixty-three California cities – including Alameda, Berkeley, Santa Clara, and Santa Rosa – and counties already have bans.

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