Gas log set burning in a black firebox set in a stone wall

A Fireplace Store and More · Downers Grove, IL

Plainfield, Illinois41.63° N, 88.20° Wabout 25 minutes from the showroom

Chimney cleaning and fireplace repair in Plainfield, IL.

Plainfield is about 25 minutes south-west of our shop on 75th Street, the newest town on our list and one of the oldest: nearly every chimney is a builder chase reaching the age at which its cover gives out and its gas unit stops lighting, and the streets around Lockport Street hold the brick of the oldest settlement in Will County. The visit covers flue, cover, panels and burner, written up with photos.

Call (630) 241‑1919Request an estimate

A vented gas log set in a black firebox set into a stone wall, the fireplace most Plainfield houses were built with, twenty years on. The flue above it is metal, and the cover on the chase is what the yearly look is for.

  • Drive time25minI-55 south to Route 126, or Route 59, to Lockport Street
  • One visit1visitflue, cover, panels and burner, all on the same trip
  • Inspection levels3set out in NFPA 211; a late-1990s chase usually needs the first
  • Years of service30+longer than most Plainfield fireplaces have existed
About A Fireplace Store and More

A Fireplace Store and More cleans, inspects and repairs chimneys in Plainfield, 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.

The newest town, and the oldest

Why a Plainfield chimney is due a look at twenty-five

Most of Plainfield was built in twenty years. The village had 4,557 people in 1990, 13,038 in 2000 and 39,581 in 2010, and the subdivisions that grew it came with the fireplace the builder offered: a metal firebox in a wood-framed chase with a metal flue inside it, and a chase cover set on at the end of the build, often the plain galvanized kind. Metal chimneys rust rather than crumble. The cover on top goes first, then the cap, and on a house from the late 1990s those parts have twenty-five winters on them, which is the age at which they start to fail all at once, up and down the same street, while the gas unit below them is on its second thermopile and its first hardened gasket. Once the cover has rusted through, rain travels down the outside of the flue into the framing where nobody sees it, and the same twenty-five winters of fires crack the firebox panels.

Downtown is the exception. Walkers’ Grove was settled on the DuPage River by 1828 and the village was platted in 1834, which makes Plainfield the oldest community in Will County, and the streets around Lockport Street carry brick chimneys laid for wood a century and more ago: clay tile liners with open joints or no liner at all, soft brick and lime mortar that take water every spring and freeze every winter. The houses rebuilt after the tornado of August 1990 sit among them, thirty-five years old now, with the first generation of builder fireplace and the first covers to rust.

A wood fire leaves creosote on the flue walls, a chimney fire cracks a clay tile or warps a metal one, and gas exhaust, which is mostly water, eats at mortar, liners and the seams of a metal flue. A vent that is blocked or has rusted through can push carbon monoxide back into the house, and there is no smoke to warn you. So NFPA 211, the national standard for chimneys and vents, wants the chimney inspected every year whatever you burn, and the gas unit under it gets its service on the same visit.

The Plainfield visit

Clean. Inspect. Report. Relight the fire.

Clean

Cloths down, vacuum on, the cover checked from the roof

The room is covered from the door to the hearth, the opening closed off, and the vacuum runs until the last brush is out. Smoke shelf and firebox cleaned, damper worked, and a look at the cap, the cover and the crown from the roof. The builder chases in the subdivisions and the brick near Lockport Street, wood stoves, gas fireplaces and inserts: every one of them gets the same visit.

Black gas fireplace insert in a red brick fireplace under a wood beam mantel with a tile hearth
A black gas insert in a red brick fireplace under a beam mantel, the job we do in the older houses near Lockport Street. The liner that feeds it runs up the original flue, checked along with the insert.

Inspect

Level 1 for most Plainfield chases, the camera for Lockport Street

The inspection is part of the cleaning visit, never a second trip. Which of the three NFPA 211 levels a Plainfield chimney needs depends on what has changed since the last one; on a late-1990s chase it is usually the first, on Lockport Street the camera, and we say which, and why, before we start.

  • 1
    Level 1: the chase, unchangedA Plainfield house with the same fireplace and the same fuel as last year and no trouble to report. Every reachable part, from the firebox up the flue to the cap, the cover and the outside of the chase or the brick.
  • 2
    Level 2: a change, a sale, or the old brickThe builder’s fireplace taking gas logs or an insert, a chimney fire, storm damage, or a Plainfield house with a buyer. The whole flue on camera, written up so the buyer’s inspector can sign off on it.
  • 3
    Level 3: rare, and you hear firstThe camera has found something serious behind the chase or the wall, and part of it is opened to see it.

Report

Photos, three lists, the figure, before we leave

You keep a written report with photos, sorted into what needs doing this season, what can wait until next, and what we would leave alone, with the figure for the first. When the maker of a builder unit has stopped making parts, the report says in writing whether it is worth keeping or whether an insert sized to the opening is the better buy. For the terms, see our chimney cleaning and maintenance guide.

  • What a Plainfield report sorts the fireplace into
  • This season
  • Next season
  • Leave it

Fireplace

The late-1990s gas unit, serviced or replaced

The late-1990s gas fireplace is what we service most in Plainfield, and the technician who sweeps the flue is the one who takes the lower grille off. Gas, wood and pellet fireplaces, inserts and stoves of any make and any builder; electric units only where we did the installing.

  • 1
    Lights, runs a minute, quitsOn a twenty-five-year-old builder unit that is the thermopile, almost every time; sometimes a pilot assembly full of dust or a receiver that has stopped hearing the remote. Tested under load before it is replaced, with the common ones on the van.
  • 2
    The hour before the seasonThe service takes the unit apart as far as it should go: glass off and cleaned, gasket replaced if it has hardened, burner and pilot cleaned, logs and embers reset to the maker’s drawing, thermopile tested, switch, remote and receiver checked with fresh batteries, blower cleaned, vent and cover looked at from the roof, and a carbon monoxide reading at the end.
  • 3
    A whole street of the same faultWhen one Plainfield subdivision got one model, the failure next door is the failure at your house. Tell us what the neighbors had done and the same part rides out on the first trip.
  • 4
    The unit that has run out of partsA new direct-vent gas fireplace or an insert in the same opening, with a stainless cover on the chase, installed by the crew that inspected it and chosen on our floor at full size.

Seven things a twenty-five-year-old fireplace shows

Signs a Plainfield chimney or fireplace needs attention

In a Plainfield house these seven are worth a call the day you notice them:

  • 01A fire that lights, runs a minute and goes out
  • 02A brown stain spreading on the drywall beside the fireplace after a storm
  • 03Rust streaks down the siding of the chase, or a cover you can see is lifting at a corner
  • 04A crack across the back panel of the firebox that gets longer every winter
  • 05A sour smell of last winter’s fires on a humid day
  • 06Chirping in the flue in spring, or a nest on the cap
  • 07Twenty-five winters on the house, and no one on the roof since the builder

None of these, on its own, means the chimney is unsafe. All of them mean it is time for someone to look, and in a town where every cover turns twenty-five at once, the early look is what keeps the repair to a cover and a thermopile.

Flue and fire, one crew

What we repair in Plainfield

In Plainfield the chimney sweep and the chimney repair come from the same crew, and the fireplace service technician rides the same 25 minutes on the same truck.

Covers, caps, panels, and the Lockport Street brick

For the builder fireplaces the list is a stainless steel chase cover, a cap, a set of firebox panels and a flue pipe with a gap at a joint; when the maker has stopped making parts, the honest answer is a new direct-vent gas fireplace in the same opening under a new cover, and that is work we do. Near Lockport Street the brick chimneys take caps, rebuilt crowns and tuckpointing, and a stainless steel liner wherever a clay tile has cracked or a new appliance needs a narrower flue. New dampers go in anywhere, top-sealing ones included.

A liner, a rebuild above the roof or a new gas line means a permit in Plainfield, issued by the village’s Building and Code Enforcement department, whose online permitting portal takes the application; we handle the filing, book the inspection and are there when the inspector arrives. The masonry work is on the chimney installation and repair page.

Thermopiles, pilots, panels, blowers

A 1990s Plainfield gas fireplace, whoever built it, fails in a short list of places, and the list is what we carry: thermopile and thermocouple, pilot assembly, ignition module, valve, wall switch, remote and receiver, blower and snap switch, glass, gaskets and refractory panels. On a wood or pellet stove or insert: the door gasket, the glass, the firebrick, and the auger, igniter and controls of a pellet unit. Fire pits, outdoor fireplaces and gas grills: the burner and the igniter.

A unit that has run out of parts is replaced in the same opening by the crew that inspected it, chosen from our floor 25 minutes away. Send the make from the plate behind the lower grille with the request and a call with a time follows within one business day. If there is a smell of gas, leave the house and ring Nicor at 888-642-6748 or 911 from outside before you ring us.

I-55 or Route 59

Booking a Plainfield visit, and where the showroom is

The whole visit takes place at your Plainfield house. The truck takes I-55 south to Route 126, or Route 59 south through Naperville, and is in the village in about 25 minutes in normal traffic. Call (630) 241‑1919 or book online, and tell us the fuel, the last cleaning you know of, and, for a fireplace that came with the house, the make and model from the plate behind the lower grille. For a gas unit that has stopped working, add what changed, and a call with a time follows within one business day.

Plainfield callers usually open with one question: is the fireplace that came with the house worth fixing? The chimney inspection settles it: flue, cover, panels and burner together, and a written repair-or-replace answer. For a replacement the showroom is about 25 minutes away at 1202-B 75th Street in Downers Grove, unit B; park at the door and walk in, any day, Sunday afternoons too. You can see direct-vent fireplaces, inserts and doors there, and the electric ones are lit.

Asked in Plainfield

Questions we get from Plainfield

The fireplace came with our Plainfield house in the late 1990s. What usually needs doing at this age?

The cover and the cap first: the plain galvanized cover of that era rusts through at about twenty-five years, and the stain on the drywall beside the fireplace is how most people find out. Then the firebox panels, which crack from the same years of fires, and the thermopile, which is why the fire lights and quits. The flue itself is usually sound, and the cleaning and inspection say so with photos. A stainless steel cover, a cap, a set of panels and a thermopile put the unit right for another long stretch; a unit whose maker has stopped making parts gets the replace-or-keep answer in writing.

Our house near Lockport Street has an old brick chimney. Can we use the fireplace?

Not before someone has put a camera up it. Old brick near Lockport Street can have a tile liner with open joints or none at all, and heat reaches the framing either way. If the tile is cracked or missing, a stainless steel liner makes the chimney safe to use again with the street-side brick untouched, and it takes an insert or a log set as easily as a wood fire.

Our gas fireplace worked last winter and now the remote does nothing. Is that a service call or a battery?

Try the batteries first, in the remote and in the receiver box behind the lower grille, and try the wall switch if there is one. If the wall switch lights the fire and the remote does not, the receiver or the remote has failed, and we carry the ones the late-1990s builders used. If neither lights it, the pilot or the thermopile is the likelier fault, and that is the visit; send the make from the plate and the technician brings both.

We have listed our Plainfield house. What chimney paperwork does the buyer’s inspector need?

The Level 2 inspection: the whole flue on camera, every reachable part checked, and a report with photos that the buyer’s inspector can take as it is. A cover, a liner or a crown it asks for is quoted on the same visit, and there is usually time to do it before closing.

Will the village want a permit for the work?

None for a cleaning, an inspection or a service visit. The village’s Building and Code Enforcement department covers liners, rebuilds above the roof and new gas lines, and we do the paperwork. Plainfield takes applications through its online permitting portal; we file it there, set up the inspection and are on site when the inspector comes, so the job is signed off before we call it finished.

How do I know if my chimney needs cleaning?

Look up the flue with a flashlight after the fireplace has been cold for a day: a dusty black coating is normal soot; a shiny, tarry or flaky layer thicker than a coin is creosote that needs to come out. A smell of old smoke on a humid day, a fire that draws badly, and black flakes on the smoke shelf say the same. If you cannot see up the flue, which is most factory-built fireplaces, the yearly inspection is how you know, and it is what NFPA 211 asks for whatever you burn.

Between Plainfield and 75th Street

These are the towns on the road between Plainfield and 75th Street; the same crew, a page for each.

Plainfield chimney and fireplace · cover, panels, thermopile, one visit, in writing

Call (630) 241‑1919Book online

A Fireplace Store and MoreA Fireplace Store and More · Downers Grove, IL

Ready when you are.

A whole town of chase covers turning twenty-five at once, and the gas units under them on their second thermopile. Book a Plainfield visit now, before the first cold night.

Call (630) 241‑1919Request an estimate

Showroom hoursMon–Fri 10–5Sat 11–4Sun 1–41202-B 75th St, Downers Grove

The showroom aisle at A Fireplace Store and More in Downers Grove — a linear gas fireplace set into a display wall

Our showroom, 75th Street, Downers Grove