Expert: James Ball - 10/18/2011

Question
Hi James,

After removing the old wallpaper in the kitchen of my recently purchased home, I discovered an old metal chimney pipe that was covered up by dry wall and plaster. Obviously, the house (built in 1932) originally had a wood stove but the pipe feeds directly into an active flue that vents the furnance and hot water tank. I highly doubt this is a proper way to seal off the pipe so I was wondering how I go about properly sealing off the pipe. Mainly I want to know whether it is something I can do myself or if I need to hire a chimney sweep. I don't really want to pay somebody to come seal off the pipe if they are just going to do something as simple as put in a cement board plug and motar over the plug.

Answer
Hello Curtiss, I had the exact same thing in my home when I re did my kitchen, you must brick up the hole and the flue MUST be relined (the brick you might be able to do I use Fast Setting Cement from Home Depot) I would have a local Certified Chimney Sweep www.csia.org, (there you can look up by zip code to find one near you) take a first hand look at what you have, they should be able to help with sizing and liner install.
this is not safe to use until it is relined, cost, $1000-4000 be sure to pull a building permit.
Hope this helps
James