Chimney Inspection & Cleaning in Morristown, NJ

Morristown, Morris County

What chimneys are like in Morristown

Morristown has genuinely old buildings, and we treat them differently. Around the Green and through the Historic District there are Federal and Greek Revival houses from the first half of the 1800s, and in Franklin Corners and out toward Normandy Heights there are large late-Victorian and early-1900s houses. A Federal-era chimney was built as a solid brick mass with multiple flues running up through it, no clay liner, and mortar that was mixed with lime rather than portland cement.

That lime mortar matters. It is softer than modern mortar on purpose -- it lets the masonry move and it lets moisture escape. If someone repoints an 1830s chimney with hard modern portland mortar, the mortar becomes stronger than the brick, and the brick starts taking the damage instead of the joint. We have seen that mistake on Morristown chimneys more than once, and it is expensive to undo. When we quote repointing on a genuinely historic house, we quote the right mortar for the masonry, not the fastest one.

Not all of Morristown is historic, of course. There is a lot of newer construction, plenty of condos and townhouses, and Morris Township wraps around town with mid-century and later housing. For a townhouse with a prefab firebox, this is a straightforward job. For a house near the Green with four unlined flues and original lime mortar, it is not, and we will tell you which one you have before we start.