Gas log set behind a three-panel mesh screen in a stone fireplace

A Fireplace Store and More · Downers Grove, IL

Aurora, Illinois41.76° N, 88.32° Wtwenty to thirty minutes from the showroom

Chimney cleaning and fireplace service in Aurora, IL.

Aurora is the far end of our regular run, twenty minutes to the Route 59 side and about half an hour to downtown, and it gets the full visit: a chimney sweep and a chimney inspection, the gas fireplace serviced by the same technician, a written report with photos. The city has both kinds of chimney in quantity, builder chases on the east side and river brick that has stood since 1881.

Call (630) 241‑1919 Request an estimate

A gas log set behind a three-panel mesh screen in a stone fireplace. The logs changed what burns; the masonry above them is still a chimney and still takes an Aurora winter, and the burner still takes its service.

Route 59 side19minOgden Avenue or I-88 west to Eola Road and Route 59
Downtown31minto Stolp Island and the streets on both sides of the river
Counties4Kane, DuPage, Will and Kendall; the city sits in all four
Years of service30+from one address on 75th Street, the same people for the flue and the fire

About A Fireplace Store and More

A Fireplace Store and More cleans, inspects and repairs chimneys in Aurora, Illinois — liners, crowns, caps and masonry repair — from its showroom at 1202-B 75th Street in Downers Grove, open seven days (Mon–Fri 10–5, Sat 11–4, Sun 1–4). Book online or call (630) 241-1919.

Two cities in one

Why an Aurora chimney, and the fireplace under it, get a yearly look

Aurora’s old town is on and around Stolp Island in the Fox River, and the streets on both banks, the Tanner and Near Eastside historic districts among them, carry the oldest brick we see: fireplaces laid for wood a century and more ago, clay tile liners with open joints or no liner at all, crowns that have shed their mortar a winter at a time. Many of those fireplaces have not had a fire in decades, and the chimney above them has had no attention since the last owner.

Then there is the far east side. Development along Eola Road and Route 59 began in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and the subdivisions of the 1990s and 2000s doubled the city. Almost every one of those houses came with a factory-built fireplace, many of them gas: a metal firebox in a wood-framed chase with a metal flue inside it, and a chase cover on top set on at the end of the build. A metal chimney does not crumble, it rusts, at the cover first and then the cap, while twenty or thirty winters crack the firebox panels and wear out the thermopile under the logs. Water that gets past a rusted cover runs down the outside of the flue and into the wall before anyone sees it.

Whatever burns, the flue pays: creosote from a wood fire, a cracked tile or a warped metal flue after a chimney fire, wet gas exhaust eating at mortar and liners a season at a time. Let a vent block or crumble and carbon monoxide comes back into the house with nothing to smell. The national standard for chimneys and vents, NFPA 211, answers all of that with one rule, an inspection every year whatever you burn, and the gas unit is opened on the same visit.

The Aurora visit, both sides of the river

Sweep. Inspect. Report. Service the gas unit.

Clean

Cloths down, vacuum on, from the river to Route 59

Cloths go down from the door to the hearth, the opening is sealed, and the vacuum stays on for as long as there is a brush in the flue. The smoke shelf and the firebox are cleaned out, the damper worked, the cap and the crown or the chase cover checked from the roof. The old brick near the river and the metal flues on the east side, wood stoves, gas fireplaces and inserts: the same care on all of them, and the report says which kind you have.

Arched gas fireplace insert burning in a red brick fireplace with a slate hearth — An arched gas insert in a red brick fireplace with a slate hearth, the job we do most in the old houses near Stolp Island. It vents through a stainless steel liner run up the original flue.

Inspect

The three levels of NFPA 211, one chosen for your flue

The inspection rides with the cleaning; nobody drives back out for it. Which of the three NFPA 211 levels an Aurora chimney needs depends on its age and what has changed since the last look, and the level is named, with the reason, before we start.

1
Level 1: the same fireplace, the same fuelFor an Aurora house where nothing has changed: the firebox and the damper from inside, the flue as far as a light reaches, the cap, and the crown or the cover from the roof, then the outside of the chimney from the yard.
2
Level 2: the camera, on either side of the riverA log set or an insert going into old brick, a chimney fire, a lightning strike or a storm, or an Aurora house about to be sold. The camera goes the full height of the flue, and the report reads as a buyer’s inspector needs it to.
3
Level 3: we say so before we open anythingRare, and only when the camera has found something it cannot judge: part of a wall or the chimney is opened to see.

Report

Photographed and written before the long drive back

The written report, with photos, sorts what we found three ways, now, later and leave alone, and carries the figure for the first list. Because the drive is a real one, the report also says what we can do on a return trip in one visit, so a cap, a cover and a damper are done together rather than three times over, and the fireplace parts come on the same truck. Our chimney cleaning and maintenance guide has the vocabulary.

What an Aurora report sorts your chimney into
Now, before the next fire
On the return trip
Leave it as it is

Fireplace

The east-side gas unit and the downtown log set

The gas fireplace that came with a house off Route 59 and the log set in a brick fireplace near the river are serviced by the technician who sweeps the flue, on the same trip out. Gas, wood and pellet fireplaces, inserts and stoves of any make; electric fireplaces only when we installed them.

1
The 1990s and 2000s gas unitMost Aurora service calls are a builder gas fireplace from the east-side subdivisions that lights and quits, or will not light at all: a thermopile that has aged out, a pilot full of dust, a receiver that has stopped hearing the remote. Tested, then fixed with the parts on the van.
2
The yearly service, once we are thereIn the order it happens: glass off and cleaned, gasket checked and swapped if hard, burner and pilot cleaned, logs and embers back to the maker’s drawing, the thermopile tested under load, switch, remote and receiver checked with fresh batteries, the blower cleaned, the vent and the cover checked from the roof, and a carbon monoxide reading at the unit before the tools go back in the van.
3
Glass, gaskets, blowersA white film on the glass, a gasket that leaks at the frame, a blower that rattles or runs on, embers that have shifted: cleaned, resealed or replaced with the maker’s parts, most on the first visit.
4
The river-district fireplace, back in useA cold brick fireplace in the Tanner district becomes a gas insert on a stainless liner once the camera has cleared the flue, chosen at the showroom and installed by the crew that inspected it; a vented log set is the other answer where the flue is sound.

Seven things to notice in Aurora

Signs an Aurora chimney or fireplace needs attention

If any of these has turned up at your Aurora house, it is worth a call:

01Smoke that rolls into the room on a still night
02A smell of old fires on a humid August afternoon near the river
03Clay tile chips on the smoke shelf, or black flakes at the opening
04A crust of white salt on the brick, or brick faces lying on the roof after a freeze
05A rust line down the siding of an east-side chase, or a stain on the drywall beside it
06A gas fireplace that quits after a minute, or a remote the unit no longer answers
07A year or more since anyone was on the roof or behind the lower grille

No single one of these makes the chimney unsafe, and not one of them improves with another winter. All of them mean the chimney wants a look, and the early look is what keeps a small repair small.

Both trades, one crew

What we repair in Aurora

In Aurora the crew that sweeps the chimney is the crew that handles the chimney repair, and the fireplace repair technician is on the same truck out I-88.

River brick and east-side chases

The brick near the river asks for caps and rebuilt crowns, tuckpointing, and stainless steel liners where the clay tile has cracked or a new insert needs a narrower flue. East of Route 59 the work is chase covers, caps and cracked firebox panels, and when a maker has stopped making parts the unit is replaced, not patched. A new damper, throat or top-sealing, fits any of them.

Liners, rebuilds above the roof and new gas lines are permit work in Aurora, through the city’s Division of Building and Permits; the city takes applications through its online portal or in person at the permit office on South Broadway, and the filing, the inspection date and the inspector’s walk-through are ours. The masonry work is described on the chimney installation and repair page.

Builder units and old-brick log sets

On the gas side, whatever the make: the pilot assembly, the thermocouple or thermopile, the ignition module and its electrode, the valve, the wall switch, the remote and its receiver, the blower and its switch, the glass, the gaskets and the refractory panels. Wood and pellet stoves and inserts: the gaskets and the glass, the firebrick, and on pellet units the auger, the igniter and the control board. Outdoor fireplaces, fire pits and grills get their burners and igniters seen to as well.

When a unit is past repair the crew that inspected it puts the replacement in the same opening, and you pick it out on our floor at 75th and Lemont. Send the make and model from the rating plate with the request and the call with a time comes inside one business day. If you smell gas anywhere in the house, leave it and call Nicor at 888-642-6748 or 911 from the street; the repair visit comes after.

Out I-88, back I-355

Booking an Aurora visit, and finding the showroom after

Chimney and fireplace work is done at your house, on whichever side of Aurora it stands. The truck takes Ogden Avenue or I-88 west and is at the Route 59 and Eola Road side in about twenty minutes, downtown in about thirty. Call (630) 241‑1919 or book online, and have three things ready: the fuel, the date of the last cleaning, and which side of the river the house is on. For a gas fireplace that has stopped working, add the make and what changed, and you hear back with a time inside one business day.

The first thing Aurora callers ask is whether we really come out that far, and we do: the cleaning, the inspection, the service and any repair happen at your house. The showroom is only for the choosing, once the report says the flue can take an insert, a log set or a door. It is I-88 east to I-355 south, off at 75th Street, then east to 1202-B at Lemont Road in Downers Grove, with parking at the door; walk in any day we are open, Sunday afternoons included. You can see direct-vent fireplaces, inserts, log sets and doors there at full size, the electric ones lit.

On our floor in Downers Grove, I-88 and I-355 from Aurora: a traditional fireplace in a cast stone mantel with an arched glass door, on display.

A Fireplace Store and More

1202-B 75th Street, Downers Grove, IL 60516

Showroom hours
Monday – Friday	10 am – 5 pm
Saturday	11 am – 4 pm
Sunday	1 pm – 4 pm

Get directions (630) 241‑1919

Aurora asks

Questions we get from Aurora

Our house near downtown Aurora has its original brick chimney. Can we use the fireplace?

Not until the flue has been on camera. An early-1900s chimney can carry a clay tile liner with open joints, or none, and in both cases heat can reach the framing. Where the tile is cracked or missing, a stainless steel liner brings the chimney back into service without touching the brick you see from the street, and it takes an insert or a log set as readily as a wood fire.

The fireplace came with our house off Route 59 in the 1990s. Is that something you clean and inspect?

Yes, and they are most of what the truck sees on the east side of Aurora. The metal flue sits inside a framed chase, and the chase cover on top, the cap and the firebox panels are the parts that give out, while the gas unit below wears out its thermopile and its gaskets. The flue is swept, the panels and the cover checked and the unit serviced, and where the maker has stopped making parts the report gives a keep-or-replace answer with an insert sized to the opening as the alternative.

Our gas fireplace in Aurora clicks, lights for a moment and dies. Can that be fixed the same day?

Usually, yes. Lights-then-dies on a builder unit points to a thermopile that no longer holds the valve open, sometimes a pilot flame too small from dust in the assembly. The technician tests the thermopile under load before replacing it, carries the common ones for the makes the east-side builders used, and checks the vent and the cover while the unit is open, so the visit is the fix rather than the diagnosis.

Our Aurora house is going on the market. What will the buyer’s inspector ask about the chimney?

The Level 2: the camera through the whole flue, every part we can reach looked at, and a written report with photos that the buyer’s inspector can read as it stands. A liner or a crown it calls for is quoted on the spot and can be finished before the closing.

Do we need a permit from the city for chimney work?

Cleaning, inspecting and servicing need no permit at all. The city’s Division of Building and Permits handles a liner, a rebuild above the roof or a new gas line, and the paperwork is ours. Aurora takes applications through its online portal or at the permit office on South Broadway; we file it, set up the inspection and are on site when the inspector comes, whichever county your part of the city is in.

Can I clean the chimney myself?

You can brush a flue, and a hardware-store rod set will get soot off the walls. What it will not do is see: a cracked tile halfway up, a gap at a joint in a metal flue, a cover rusted through under its paint, a smoke chamber full of old creosote above the damper. Those are what start chimney fires and let carbon monoxide into a house, and they are what the inspection finds. If you sweep your own, keep the yearly look; it is the inspection, not the brushing, that keeps the house safe.

Between Aurora and the shop

Between Aurora and 75th Street the same crew serves these towns, each with a page of its own.

Aurora chimney and fireplace · the flue, the cover and the burner on one trip, written report

Call (630) 241‑1919 Book online