Smoke & Draft Diagnostics

Booking smoke & draft diagnostics isn't glamorous work, but skipping it is how small chimney problems become house-fire headlines. A smoky fireplace is almost never the chimney's fault alone — it's a system diagnosis. A chimney isn't a single object — it's a stacked system (firebox, damper, smoke chamber, liner, crown, cap, chase), and every piece has to do its part or the whole system leaks heat, smoke, water, or carbon monoxide.

Here's how we work. Every smoke & draft diagnostics appointment opens with an NFPA 211-aligned inspection. That means a camera down the flue, a rooftop look at the cap and crown, a firebox check for cracked refractory, and a draft reading in the room. Nothing gets quoted before we can point at what we found. A rushed guess is how homeowners end up paying for a full reline when the actual problem was a $60 damper gasket.

You'll get a plain-English walkthrough — no code numbers thrown at you, no scare tactics. We'll show you the photos and the camera video, explain the options (clean it, repair it, reline it, or wait and monitor), and hand you a flat written price before any tools come out. Trucks carry the parts most jobs need: stainless caps, top-sealing dampers, chase covers, crown-coat, refractory mortar, mesh spark arrestors, and stainless liner components. Nine out of ten jobs finish in one visit.