Why Is Chimney Slanted In Attic In An Old House

The brick chimney terminates in the attic and it has had a chimney liner put in sometime in the past.

Why is chimney slanted in attic in an old house.

It has been abandoned and the bottom part covered over in the walls of the home. Colonial masons often brought a more central chimney straight up into the attic floor then built the chimney on an angle specifically to cause it to exit the roof at the roof s highest point the ridge. That s why you see some houses from the 1800s or even 1700s where the bricks are still in great condition. One problem with the house is a chimney that was built towards the back of the house but then was built slanted in the attic so it would appear centered on the roofline.

Chimneys like this are all missing flue tiles and generally need some form of repair. Early furnaces had a small brick utility chimney often square. It has a brick chimney that has been cut off below the basement floor joists. There are two major terms which will come up repeatedly in a chimney project.

So if you have an old house you probably have pretty good bricks. Now this chimney does not look in good shape to me. Here s a few that we have encountered. There are several reasons why a house could have a chimney without having a fireplace.

In the event you wish to remove the chimney for purely aesthetic reasons the effort involved may prove more than it s worth. Here s an example of one below. It was straight from the basement up to the attic and then slanted from there. The reasons for that decision were both cosmetic or aesthetic and possibly for improved fire safety and in some conditions improved draft too.

The ground is always moving a little bit. Yet you ve also probably seen modern houses with the faces of the bricks popping off. On the exposed slanting part in the attic there is black stuff on the outside of the chimney and a whitish powdery film. This was a house that was moved from its original site to a new site and it was put on a poured concrete foundation.

Shifting ground and your old chimney.