Can you close off a chimney completely?

[onionsa]

Hi all, just wanting to get a firm answer on whether or not you can completely seal an unused Chimney? We're looking to take the fire place down and turn the wall into just a normal wall, but I see many posts about vent blocks.

Many thanks,
Anthony

 

[big-all]

you must vent top and bottom
if you fully remove from the chiminie pot down there is nothing to vent

 

[onionsa]

When you say fully remove from the top down, what would this require? At the moment we basically just have a hole running through our house with a pot on the top and a tiled hole in the lounge.

 

[big-all]

a lot off expense really
remove stack down to attic level fill and repair void in roof at that point you may or may not wish to get a bit hand on removing the breast below

 

[onionsa]

Yeah that seems like more than we're wanting to do. So we must have a vent in the existing chimney mouth in the lounge, but can brick up the rest, right?

 

[big-all]

as long as there is airflow via a vent top and bottom yes you can brick up and do as you wish
you just need airflow to prevent damp
you may actually be fine without any vents but any damp will appear somewhere if theres no ventilation

 

[onionsa]

Ok, we'll air on the side of caution in this respect and see if we can find some vents that dont look aweful lol

Thanks very much for your help!

 

[TicTac]

It'll require a bit of core drilling, but look to put the vents in the side of the chimney breast, if you want to hid them a bit.

 

[John D v2.0]

If you wait until it's time to redo the roof it'll hardly add any expense to take down the part above roof level.
Our roof was rebuilt and re roofed for our extension so it was mostly the cost of disposal extra

 

[TicTac]

Sorry, might not have read the OP correctly, but it may not have been clear enough either. Are you looking to remove the chimney breast in the ground floor and the first floor rooms, and then possibly in the chimney and above the roof line as well. You can take it out in the rooms, and put in a gallows bracket and plate in the loft, and then have the remainder of the chimney vented from in there. But is this just your chimney, or is it back to back with a neighbours.