Stove cleaning in Riga and the Riga region - fireplaces, stoves and saunas

What we clean: fireplaces, stoves, wood-burning cookers and sauna stoves

Soot builds up in different places in each appliance, so the work differs too. The chimney is only one part. The other is the path the smoke takes from the firebox to the chimney, and that is often where more soot collects than in the flue itself.

• Fireplace and stove fireplace: the smoke chamber above the firebox, the baffle plate in the firebox, the connecting pipe and the chimney. More detail: Fireplace cleaning.
• Tiled and masonry stove: long internal flue channels that turn several times, with cleaning doors at each bend. More detail: Tiled stove cleaning.
• Wood-burning cooker: channels under the hob and around the oven chamber, and the flue pipe to the chimney.
• Sauna stove: a metal stove where high temperatures alternate with long cooling, so tar often forms in the flue. More detail: Sauna stove cleaning.

If the heating comes from a wood, pellet or coal boiler, that is a different appliance with its own cleaning procedure: boiler flue cleaning. If you need only the chimney without the stove channels, see chimney cleaning.

How flue channel cleaning in a stove works

1. Inspection We ask when the stove was last cleaned, what you burn and whether the stove smokes. We find all the cleaning doors in the stove, the chimney and the attic. The stove must have cooled down.
2. Chimney We clean the flue with a brush on flexible rods from the bottom, or with a brush and weight from the roof, depending on access and the shape of the flue. The soot falls down to the lower door.
3. Stove channels Through the doors we clean each section of the channel with scrapers and smaller brushes and lift the soot out of the bends. For a fireplace we remove the baffle plate to reach the smoke chamber.
4. Flue pipe We take out the connecting pipe from the stove to the chimney or clean it in place. Here soot often blocks half the cross-section.
5. Draught and doors We close and seal the doors, and check the draught and how the damper works. If the draught is weak even with a clean flue, we look for the cause.
6. Certificate In the certificate we record the property, the location of the flue, the cleaner, their qualification document and an assessment of the result.

How often a stove and fireplace must be cleaned

The frequency depends on whether the appliance stores heat. A masonry stove with a large mass holds heat for a long time; a metal stove cools quickly. In the fire safety regulations, an appliance that does not store heat for longer than three hours is a long-burn appliance, and its flue is cleaned twice a season.

In borderline cases, for example a fireplace with a cast-iron firebox and a masonry surround, it is advisable to clean twice, especially if you light it every day. More on deadlines: how often a chimney must be cleaned.

Wood-burning cooker cleaning

A wood-burning cooker is one of the harder appliances to clean. The smoke runs under the hob, around the oven chamber and only then to the chimney, and every turn is a place where soot and ash settle. If the cooker is built of masonry and has a heat-storage wall, or “warm wall”, attached, there are even more channels.

When cleaning a cooker, we remove the hob rings or the hob cleaning covers, clean the channels underneath, then the side and lower doors, and finally the flue pipe and chimney. Signs that cleaning the wood-burning cooker is overdue: the oven chamber no longer heats up, the cooker starts to smoke when lit with the door open, and the wood burns slowly in the firebox. We record cracks in the hob or the masonry in the certificate, but we do not build or rebuild cookers.

What we find when cleaning and what we do next

Cleaning is also an inspection. Typical findings: cracks in the stove masonry or the upper part of the chimney, collapsed bricks in the flue channel, a layer of soot and tar that points to damp firewood, and several appliances on one flue. We record everything we see in the certificate and explain it on site.

• A crack in the chimney or a damaged chimney head: we offer chimney repair, name the price separately and start the work only with your agreement.
• Damage to the masonry of a stove or fireplace: this is work for a stove mason, which we do not do. In the certificate we describe what needs fixing.
• A stove and a gas boiler connected to one flue channel: the building code forbids this, and the solution is a separate flue or fitting a liner.
• Weak draught with a clean flue: how we look for the cause is on the chimney has no draught page.

Can you clean a stove yourself

Yes, if it is your private house and the stove burns solid fuel. The regulations allow the person responsible for a single-dwelling property to clean the appliance and flue themselves, and then no certificate has to be drawn up. A certificate is needed if another person or a company does the cleaning, and always in an apartment building.

In practice owners often clean the chimney themselves but not the stove channels, because the doors are hard to find or bricked up. If you need a document for insurance or a sale, cleaning it yourself does not give you one. More detail: can you clean your own chimney.

How much stove cleaning costs

Cleaning one heating appliance together with its flue pipe and chimney costs from €100, usually €100–130. The price includes the call-out in Riga and the Riga region and the certificate. The price depends on:

• the type of appliance: a tiled stove with long channels or a wood-burning cooker with a heat-storage wall takes more work than a metal stove;
• the height of the chimney and access to the roof, if the flue has to be cleaned from the top;
• the amount of soot and tar, especially if the stove has not been cleaned for several years;
• several appliances at once: we name the price for each additional flue before the work.

All prices: prices.