What Does Your Lakewood Fire Do?
A line on the smoke, the smell or the flame is plenty. We call back from San Pedro with a few questions about when it happens.
Lakewood ZIP Codes and Neighbors
Find yours, or one of the bordering names, and mention it when you describe what the fire is doing.
Ramsey Fixes for Lakewood
What we most often find behind it here: a remodel, new window or added fan that changed the air in one house out of a row of matching plans. Each card below lays out that work for Lakewood.
Chimney Sweep in Lakewood
Choked flues are a common reason a fire smokes into the room, so we brush the whole run until smoke draws upward again.
How it helpsChimney Inspection in Lakewood
Draft trouble usually leaves clues in the flue, the damper and the crown, and a Level 1 look finds most of them.
How it helpsChimney Repair in Lakewood
Leaks, loose bricks and cracked crowns change how a chimney draws, so each repair starts with finding where air and water get in.
How it helpsFireplace Inspection in Lakewood
Smoke rolling out the top of the opening tells us where to look, and the inspection covers the firebox, damper and smoke chamber.
How it helpsFireplace Repair in Lakewood
Spilled smoke has a cause, from a stuck damper to an oversized opening, and each one gets its own fix.
How it helpsChimney Level 2 Inspection in Lakewood
Video goes down the full flue to find cracked tiles, gaps and offsets that a flashlight from the firebox will never reach.
How it helpsChimney Cap Installation in Lakewood
Wind coming off the water can push smoke back down an open flue, and the right cap blocks the gusts, rain and birds.
How it helpsChimney Flashing Repair in Lakewood
Water stains beside the chimney breast usually start where the roof meets the brick, and resealing that joint stops the drip.
How it helpsChimney Masonry Repair in Lakewood
Salt air eats at soft mortar, so we repoint joints, swap spalled brick and recast crowns before water works behind them.
How it helpsChimney Rebuilds in Lakewood
Leaning or shaken stacks get rebuilt from the roofline up, or from the footing, with the flue sized to draw properly.
How it helpsFireplace Cleaning in Lakewood
Soot on the glass doors, ash under the grate and a smell that lingers get cleaned out of the firebox and smoke chamber.
How it helpsGas Fireplace Cleaning in Lakewood
Yellow, sooty flames and a faint smell when the logs light point to dirty burners, misplaced embers or a blocked vent.
How it helpsGas Fireplace Repair in Lakewood
Flames that die after a minute, a pilot that will not hold, or a clicking igniter usually trace back to one small part.
How it helpsFireplace Remodel in Lakewood
Rebuilding the face, hearth or firebox is a chance to fix a smoky opening too, so the new look also draws properly.
How it helpsFireplace Inserts in Lakewood
Drafty, smoky open fireplaces can take a sealed insert that heats the room and vents through a liner sized to its own outlet.
How it helpsPellet Stove Repair in Lakewood
Hoppers that stop feeding or fires that die with pellets left often trace to the auger, igniter or a choked vent.
How it helpsWood Stove Repair in Lakewood
Leaky door gaskets, cracked baffles and weak draft explain most wood stoves that smoke, run away or die overnight.
How it helpsGas Logs in Lakewood
Switching to gas logs lets you light the hearth on no-burn days, with no ash, no splitting and no smoky mornings.
How it helpsReading a Lakewood Chimney
Nearly every house here went up in a few years around 1950 to 1953, to one plan repeated many times. That helps: a fireplace layout is well known, and seven decades of remodels are often what explains why one now smokes and another next door does not. Sea air and seven decades of sun have aged crowns, mortar and metal caps. Just southwest, in Long Beach and Signal Hill, the Newport-Inglewood Fault passes by, and cool May and June clouds keep the old masonry damp for much of the morning.
What Owners Notice
Smoke in your fireplace when the identical house next door burns with no trouble at all.
What the Tests Turn Up
A remodel, new window or added fan that changed the air in one house out of a row of matching plans.
Local Air and Wind
Seven decades of sea air and sun wear on this masonry, and morning cloud keeps it damp in May and June.
Houses on These Streets
In Lakewood the chimneys we test belong to small tract houses built almost all at once from about 1950, mostly detached and owner-occupied.
Start With the Symptom
Is the Lakewood hearth acting up again?
Say when the trouble shows: lighting up, on windy nights, with the hood on, or the morning after. That account points us toward a sweep, a damper, a cap or a pressure problem before we arrive.