The lesson plan
Twenty minutes at the woodpile, every visit
Creosote is a habit you can see on a flue wall. A household that burns dry wood hot sweeps cheap; a household that banks damp, smouldering loads pays for glaze every autumn. The sweep takes an hour and the lesson takes twenty minutes, and the lesson is the part that compounds — the same curriculum at every Smokewell visit, kid included.
The meter through the split
Moisture read on a freshly split face, not the weathered end. Under twenty percent is firewood; over twenty-five is a creosote subscription — we show you the number and mark the stack that fails.
The seasoning rule
Split, stacked and covered on top only, eighteen months for the Pynewood hardwoods. We date-tag a row of your own stack with you, so next winter’s wood is this winter’s argument settled.
The top-down burn
Big rounds on the grate, kindling above, the fine stuff on top, lit at the top. It burns clean from the first minute instead of smouldering wet for an hour — the single habit that moves a flue from second degree back to first.
What we do
What a visit carries
The sweep — $184, card and lesson included
Full brush behind a sealed hearth on HEPA extraction, smoke test, draft reading, and the creosote graded on a written card — first degree flaky, second degree plates, third degree glaze — because the degree sets your interval, not the calendar. The Level 1 inspection NFPA 211 asks for rides along every year, and the woodpile lesson rides along free, forever.
The scan — $334, Level 2 on camera
A rod-mounted camera down every foot of flue, recorded and measured, for the sales, the fuel changes and the after-fire checks the standard names — and a Level 3, the rare opening of masonry, is scoped only from what the camera films. The footage is yours to keep, the defects are measured not guessed, and no Smokewell reline — rigid 316Ti stainless, insulated, draw-tested — has ever been quoted from anything but your own walls on film.
The masonry — crowns, dampers, pointing
Crowns chipped to sound masonry and poured new with a drip edge that throws water clear of the brick, throat damper plates freed and seated, top-sealing dampers fitted where the plate is past saving, smoke chambers parged smooth, joints re-pointed in mortar matched to the Hollow’s lime. The work the weather actually works on.
What the lesson buys
The Hollow, burned properly
Tarwick Hollow & the Pynewood roads, 2025 — 2026
Hearths, stacks and woodpiles
Six visits from last season, photographed at the card. The woodpile in half of them is the point — a sweep and a habit, bought together.
Two outfits swept this chimney and sold us something each time — a cap, then a “treatment.” Smokewell swept it, graded it second degree, and then spent twenty minutes showing me why: my own wood, metered at twenty-eight percent, was painting the flue. We split and re-stacked that afternoon with their date tags on the row. Two seasons later the card reads first degree, the sweep costs the card price and nothing else, and my son runs the meter himself now like it is a game he wins.
Before the first fire
Questions the woodpile answers
The five every Hollow household asks by the second visit. If yours is not here, the shop line runs seven to five and answers in plain words.
How much difference can burning habit really make?
More than any product we sell. Damp wood smoulders cool, the tar in the smoke condenses on cold flue walls, and that condensate is creosote — second and third degree are manufactured a load at a time. Dry wood burned hot from the top deposits a fraction of it. We have watched flues go two grades cleaner in a single season of nothing but better wood.
How do I read the moisture number correctly?
Split the log fresh and push the meter pins into the split face — not the weathered end, which dries first and lies. Under twenty percent is seasoned and ready; twenty to twenty-five is workable if you burn it hot; above twenty-five the log is watering your flue. We meter three logs from different rows, because one log is an anecdote and three are a stack.
What is the top-down burn, and why does it matter?
Big rounds on the grate, kindling above them, the finest stuff on top, lit at the top. The fire matures downward through dry fuel with the air wide open, so the flue gases stay hot and rise instead of condensing. It is the cheapest creosote control ever invented — it costs nothing but the willingness to stack a fire differently.
Will you still sell me a reline if I need one?
When the camera says so, and only then. A cracked clay run that cannot be swept safe gets a rigid 316Ti stainless liner, insulated and draw-tested, quoted from the footage and itemized to the fitting. But four scans in five leave with the original flue and a woodpile prescription, and the honest card is the one we would rather write.
What does the lesson cost?
Nothing, ever — it is not a course and there is no workbook. It is twenty minutes with our meter and your wood at the end of a sweep you already booked, on every visit for as long as you are a customer. Households that take it sweep cheaper, which if we were purely mercenary would be bad business. We think of it as the warranty.
Sweep season runs September to the thaw — the lesson runs with it · (555) 070-8824 · sweeps@smokewell.example
Book the sweep and the lesson
Tell us the house, the hearth, and what your woodpile looks like — covered on top only is the right answer, and we will say so. The sweep with card, Level 1 and lesson is $184; the Level 2 scan is $334 with the footage yours to keep. sweeps@smokewell.example