Honest good working local company. The amount they quoted me on the phone was the price I paid after the service was completed.
Chimney inspection in Bloomfield, NJ
An inspection is not a formality before a sweep. It is the part of the visit that decides whether sweeping is even the right thing to do, and on an older Bloomfield stack the answer is often no.
5.0from 38 Google reviews20 towns · open 7:00 AM–9:00 PM
The short answer
A chimney inspection establishes whether the structure is safe to use and puts the answer in writing. There are two levels a homeowner will meet. A Level 1 covers what can be reached and seen without dismantling anything: the firebox, the damper, the accessible run of flue, the exterior of the stack and the connection to the appliance. The second level sends a camera down the whole length and into everything sealed between the two ends. Ask for it when a property is being sold, after any chimney fire however small it looked, or after anything capable of shifting brickwork — a serious storm, a strike, a tremor, or a new appliance going in. In Bloomfield the Level 2 is the more common request, because most of the housing predates 1940 and has been through two fuel conversions, and a Level 1 simply cannot tell you what happened inside the stack during either of them.
Level 1 or Level 2 — which one you actually need
A Level 1 is the annual check on a chimney that has not changed and is doing the job it has always done. It looks at what is reachable and visible, confirms the flue is clear and the structure is sound as far as can be seen, and it is enough for most households in most years. A Level 2 is what you ask for when something has changed or when somebody is about to rely on the answer. Buying or selling triggers it. So does fitting a different appliance, converting a fuel, or any event that could have moved the structure. So does a chimney fire, including a small one nobody was certain about at the time. The practical difference is the camera: a Level 2 sees the whole liner and the concealed structure, and a Level 1 does not.
- Level 1 — the annual check on an unchanged chimney doing its usual job
- Level 2 — a sale, a new appliance, a fuel conversion, a fire, or a storm
- The difference is the camera, and on a pre-war stack that difference is the whole report
On a stack that has carried coal, oil and gas in turn, a Level 1 inspection tells you about the last few feet. The camera tells you about the century.
What the camera finds in pre-war Bloomfield housing
Two findings come up again and again in this township, and neither of them is creosote. One is a mismatch of scale: a shaft laid for coal, adapted for oil, adapted again for gas, and never narrowed at any point along the way. Exhaust that slow cools, turns back into water short of the top, and that water carries enough acid to work outward through the bedding joints. The other is the chamber above the damper, left as raw stepped brickwork rather than rendered smooth — enormous rough surface, deposit clinging to all of it, and the slowest part of any honest sweep. Where the avenue turns to two- and three-family there is a third: the brick divider standing between two shafts, out of sight since the day it was laid, and capable of moving one household's fumes into another's chimney once it splits.
The report, and what it is for
A verbal answer at the door is worth very little three months later, so the inspection produces a document: what was looked at, what was found, what it photographs as, and what — if anything — follows from it. That matters most in the situations where somebody other than you is going to read it. A buyer's attorney wants to see the flue, not a sentence about it. An insurer after a claim wants dated evidence rather than a recollection. A tenant in a two-family wants to know that the appliance in their unit vents where it is supposed to. The report is written so that all three can use it without needing the trade explained to them, and the photographs are the part that does the work.
- Dated, photographed, and written to be read by somebody who is not a sweep
- Every flue in the stack named and matched to its appliance
- Findings separated into act now, watch, and leave alone
Buying a two-family? Ask for the Level 2 by name
Around Bloomfield Center and down the avenue a large part of the stock is divided into two and three dwellings, and a single masonry stack usually carries several flues added to at different points as appliances came and went. With a hundred years of that behind a building, the reachable-and-visible survey answers a far smaller question than the one you are actually asking before a closing. The camera establishes which flue serves which unit, whether the separations between them are intact, and whether the appliance in each dwelling is venting into what everybody assumes it is venting into. That assumption is wrong roughly as often as it is right, and it is a great deal cheaper to find out before the closing than after it.
On the job
What this looks like in practice
The scan runs the whole liner, not the reachable part of it
Cable in at the crown, monitor at the hearth
The screen faces you, which is the point of doing it this way
The firebox and damper get the same attention as the flue
What Bloomfield homeowners say
5.0
38 reviews on Google
Read on
Expert setup, high-powered vacuums, and absolutely no dust residue. Excellent work.
Water had been leaking around the chimney flashing, but the repair solved it completely. The crew sealed and reinforced the affected area with precision. Rain is no longer a concern. The workmanship looks strong and durable.
Questions about chimney inspection
How long does a chimney inspection take?
A Level 1 on a straightforward single-family chimney is usually a short visit. A Level 2 with a full camera scan takes considerably longer, especially on a divided house where several flues have to be run and identified separately. We would rather tell you on the phone roughly what your building implies than give a number that turns out to be wrong on the day.
Do I need an inspection if I never use the fireplace?
Often yes, and for reasons unrelated to burning. An unused flue is the one that fills with nesting material and leaves, and an unused chimney is usually the one nobody has looked up in a decade. If a boiler or water heater vents into the same stack, that flue is in daily use whether the fireplace is or not.
We are selling. Which inspection does the buyer want?
A Level 2, with the camera scan and the written report. It is the document that answers the question rather than raising it, and having it in hand before the buyer's inspector raises the subject is a considerably calmer way to go through a sale.
There was a small chimney fire last winter. Does that change things?
It changes it entirely. Any chimney fire, including one that seemed to put itself out, is a reason for a Level 2 before the next fire is lit. Heat does things to liners and to mortar joints that are invisible from both ends of the flue and perfectly visible to a camera.
Can you tell which flue belongs to my unit in a two-family?
Yes, and it is one of the main reasons the camera goes down. In this housing the stack was usually added to over the years, and the arrangement people inherited from the previous owner is wrong about as often as it is right. Each flue gets identified and matched to the appliance it actually serves.
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