Rotary brushes vs manual scrubbing, there's no contest on old flues

After fighting a sooty 1880s chimney in Charlottesville last Tuesday for two hours with a wire brush, I rented a rotary set and finished the same job in 20 minutes. Anyone else find the old way is just stubborn pride, or am I missing some trick with the hand method?

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1 Comment

gavine4112d ago

Man, you're not crazy at all. The real trick with hand brushing is knowing the flue's got a taper, so you gotta work in short strokes and keep the brush angled, not just shove it up and down like a plunger. I found that out the hard way on a 1900s place with a 90 degree bend, my arm was toast after 15 minutes. But yeah, once you hit a heavy creosote glaze, hand tools just smear it around, rotary actually chips it off. I'll take the machine every time, the old way is just for folks who enjoy the sore shoulders.