Family-owned prefab fireplace repair serving Dr. Phillips

Factory-built units lined with loose firebrick

Loose firebrick lines the steel walls of some factory-built fireplaces, set in the maker's pattern with its joint material and spacers. One maker's instructions cover that firebrick wall installation step by step, with wall spacers and grate retainers listed as parts.

When a brick in this kind of unit cracks or falls, the repair follows that maker's method and materials. We check the spacers and retainers along with the bricks, since a loose wall can lean toward the fire.

Pipe joints that have come apart

One maker's instructions tell installers to confirm each snap-lock joint by pulling upward on the chimney after locking it. A joint that separates later leaves a gap in the flue path.

Separated joints turn up in attics and chases after roof work, storms or careless storage. We check the joints we can reach, reseat or replace sections as the manual directs and note any stretch of chimney we could not see.

• Joints checked in the attic and chase
• Sections reseated or replaced
• Unseen stretches named on the estimate

Getting to the chimney in the attic or chase

Attic and chase access lets us check the pipe joints, supports, firestops and insulation shield along the chimney. Some homes have an attic hatch near the fireplace, and some chases have no access panel at all.

We tell you where access is needed before the visit, and if an opening has to be made in a chase, the estimate says where and how it will be closed.

• Where the attic hatch is
• Whether the chase has an access panel
• Where a new opening would go
• How that opening will be closed

Rattles, ticks and pops from a prefab unit

Steel expands as it heats and contracts as it cools, so a factory-built fireplace ticks and pops as a fire starts and dies. A new rattle, a loud bang or a change in the sound can point to a loose panel, a free damper weight or a separated joint.

Tell us when the sound happens and where it seems to come from. We match that description with what we find in the firebox and along the chimney.