How to remove corner Chimney in kitchen

[swift007]

Hi, I am having a new kitchen fitted in February. I started to rip out the old kitchen this weekend and came across part of the chimney in the corner of the room. It looks like part of the old kitchen stove/chimney had been taken out in the past and a small section remains in the corner of the room sat on a thick concrete base. The chimney is in the living room next door as part of a working open fire. I presume best practice would be to take this back a bit then put in some structual renforcement across the two walls to support that corner of the stack?

 

[tell80]

If you post a pic of the stack it should show how many flues/pots are present?
Are there any more fireplaces, in use or abandoned, in the house?
Is the chimney breast with the open fire directly behind the wall?
Is the very dark patch the remains of a flue?

 

[swift007]

Hi
The working fire place is to the room to the right. There is a fireplace in the bedroom directly abobe and also in the bedroom directly above the living rom. The dark patch is indeed the flue from the fireplace/stove that at one point was in the kitchen. It is a 4 pot stack shared with the neighbouring house. I have no idea what remains in the neighbours kitchen which is something I need to find out but they are away at the moment. I presume it will have been removed in a similar fashion as the council will have done this in the past maybe ?

 

[Koolpc]

Needs expert advice i would have thought. If it were me, i would get a SE in.

 

[tell80]

So its an interior, shared chimney breast - which changes things esp with ref to your neighbour's side of the c/b?
You presumably will want to do something about the concrete platform?
If you do you will need an experienced builder on site to give an opinion - someone who is experienced in removing & supporting chimney breasts).
A bit of destructive investigation might be needed?
Can you lift a board or two in the rooms above - any professional on site would want to see how the joists have been trimmed or supported for instance, & why the joist bays seem to have been packed with a rough concrete?
Does the above FF fireplace have a concrete hearth?

Given the kitchen re-furb then removing plaster - while very carefully looking for pipes and cables, might show the old flue line coated with soot - eg look at the dark smudged plaster below the flue opening.
You can see the previous re-furb plaster - gypsum color.

The flue will need sweeping - get all your flues swept at the same time.
The pots & flue terminals on the stack should be checked.

 

[swift007]

yes the fire above has a concrete hearth which is directly above the joists on that roof. The concrete platform does need to go as the new kitchen units in that corner are a full height fridge freezer and double oven housing. The flue line is already exposed and coated in soot which is the dark part you can see. I plan to lift up some of the boards near the wall upstairs which should be fairly easy as they were taken up in the last year or so prior to me moving in as the house had a new heating system and I can see the pipes through the hole in the kitchen ceiling.