Hi all, complete and utter layman here trying to get some advice. Apologies for the length of post!
I live in a semi-detached dormer-roof house. There are two pre-cast flues along the ridge tiles of the roof, one on my side, one on my neighbours.
I have an electric fire and my neighbours have a gas fire on the other side of the wall. They have recently had a new fire fitted. My neighbour knocked on the door and advised that when his fitter was putting the new fire in and testing the flue, they discovered that their fire was venting through the flue in my wall and coming out of the vent on my side of the roof. He suggested that when the property was built (early to mid 1970's) it must have been that "somehow" the two flues were crossed over?
My neighbour asked was it alright if the fitter went up onto my side of the roof to check the vent, to which I said fine. Week or so later, neighbour called again and said because of this crossover flue issue, the fitter wanted to go into my loft to check that there was no issue re leaks etc. As far as I know, there are just breeze blocks separating the two loft spaces.
Noticed this evening that our living room wall and the bedroom wall directly above is getting very warm to the touch vertically along where the flue will be.
Need to call this fitter tomorrow about going in the loft but am now getting a bit worried that things are not right. Questions are:
1) Is it possible that these flues could have been "crossed over" when the property was built? If not, how else could the neighbours fire be venting through my flue?
2) Is it normal for a wall to be so warm to the touch along the vertical line of the flue?
3) On the one hand, happy for the fitter to go into the loft to check things out but is it more advisable to get our own engineer in too to check things over? Obvious safety concerns but whose responsibility is it if there was a problem with my flue caused by my neighbours vented gas, bearing in mind my fire's electric and so my flue should really be redundant? Could my buildings insurance be affected in any way?
Thanks for reading and any advice.
I live in a semi-detached dormer-roof house. There are two pre-cast flues along the ridge tiles of the roof, one on my side, one on my neighbours.
I have an electric fire and my neighbours have a gas fire on the other side of the wall. They have recently had a new fire fitted. My neighbour knocked on the door and advised that when his fitter was putting the new fire in and testing the flue, they discovered that their fire was venting through the flue in my wall and coming out of the vent on my side of the roof. He suggested that when the property was built (early to mid 1970's) it must have been that "somehow" the two flues were crossed over?
My neighbour asked was it alright if the fitter went up onto my side of the roof to check the vent, to which I said fine. Week or so later, neighbour called again and said because of this crossover flue issue, the fitter wanted to go into my loft to check that there was no issue re leaks etc. As far as I know, there are just breeze blocks separating the two loft spaces.
Noticed this evening that our living room wall and the bedroom wall directly above is getting very warm to the touch vertically along where the flue will be.
Need to call this fitter tomorrow about going in the loft but am now getting a bit worried that things are not right. Questions are:
1) Is it possible that these flues could have been "crossed over" when the property was built? If not, how else could the neighbours fire be venting through my flue?
2) Is it normal for a wall to be so warm to the touch along the vertical line of the flue?
3) On the one hand, happy for the fitter to go into the loft to check things out but is it more advisable to get our own engineer in too to check things over? Obvious safety concerns but whose responsibility is it if there was a problem with my flue caused by my neighbours vented gas, bearing in mind my fire's electric and so my flue should really be redundant? Could my buildings insurance be affected in any way?
Thanks for reading and any advice.