Chimney Repair in Louisville, KY

Chimney repair is often the first masonry job a Louisville house needs. A brick chimney sticks up above the roof with rain hitting it from every side, no overhang to protect it, and heat and cold working on it from the inside and out. On a city with 48 inches of precipitation a year and winters that swing above and below freezing, the top courses of a chimney wear out decades before the walls of the house.

Signs of chimney trouble

HomeGuide's chimney repair guide lists the warning signs we see most often:

• Cracks in the crown, the concrete or mortar cap on top
• Loose, missing or flaking bricks
• Crumbling mortar, especially in the top few feet
• Water stains on ceilings or walls next to the chimney
• Rust on the damper or inside the firebox
• A chimney that leans or has pulled away from the house

You can spot a lot from the yard with binoculars. Bricks on the ground or in the gutter are a sign to call soon.

Where chimney leaks come from

The crown. Many crowns are a thin layer of mortar that cracks within a few years. Water goes straight down into the brick. A proper crown is thicker, sloped and overhangs the brick so water drips clear.

The flashing. Metal flashing seals the joint between the chimney and the roof. When it lifts, rusts or was simply caulked, rain runs inside. Flashing leaks show up as stains near the chimney on the ceiling below.

The cap. A missing cap lets rain, leaves and animals down the flue.

Open mortar joints. Brick and mortar soak up water, and on the exposed part of the chimney that water freezes in winter. We look at all four before deciding what to fix.

Repair, partial rebuild or full rebuild

If the brick is sound and only the joints are worn, repointing the exposed section and replacing the crown is usually enough. If the top courses are loose or many bricks have spalled, we take the chimney down to solid brick, usually somewhere above the roofline, and rebuild from there with matching brick, a new crown and new flashing. A full rebuild from the foundation is rare and only needed when the whole chimney is leaning or structurally failed.

Older Louisville houses often have several chimneys, some no longer used. A chimney that no longer serves a fireplace or furnace can sometimes be capped off or taken down below the roofline. We will tell you the options and what each costs.

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Older chimneys

On pre-war houses the chimney brick and mortar are often soft and lime-based, just like the walls. Hard modern mortar on that brick speeds up cracking. We match mortar to the original, and on homes in Louisville Metro's preservation districts we follow the Landmarks masonry guidelines and plan for the Certificate of Appropriateness that exterior changes need. Visible changes, such as removing a chimney, are the kind of work that review covers.

What we do not do

We are masons, not chimney sweeps. We work on the brick, crown, cap and flashing. If the flue liner or the inside of the chimney needs inspection or relining for a working fireplace or furnace, have a certified chimney sweep check it. HomeGuide lists a basic chimney inspection at $100 to $300.