Why does smoke come into the room when I use my wood-burning fireplace?
In Arden, tired open masonry fireplaces are the usual smokers. The 1980s and '90s homes in Royal Pines and Skyland were built with big open fireboxes and simple throat dampers that warp and stick with age — a damper that won't open fully throttles the draft, and an oversized opening spills whatever smoke is left into the room.
Worn dampers, drafty boxes
The tract-built homes across Royal Pines, Skyland, and Glenn Bridge came with generous open fireboxes and basic throat dampers, and thirty-some years on, those dampers warp, rust, and stop swinging all the way open. A damper stuck partway shut chokes the flue and holds smoke back into the room. The wide openings don't help — they pull more heat out of the house than they put in, and they spill smoke a smaller, sealed box never would. Confirming the damper opens fully is step one on nearly every Arden call.
The rest of the checklist
Beyond the damper, we look at a cold flue at startup, a winter's creosote narrowing the passage, downdraft, and house depressurization from other appliances pulling against a weak chimney. Any one of those turns a tired fireplace into a smoky one.
Turning a heat-loser into a heater
We inspect and diagnose, and on Arden's natural-gas mains a sealed insert transforms one of these drafty open fireplaces into a real heater that drafts cleanly and holds warmth. We pull the Buncombe County permit and we're 15 minutes south of our showroom. Call (828) 545-0525.
Fireplace help in Arden
We install and service fireplaces throughout Arden and the rest of Buncombe County — just 15 minutes south from our Asheville-area showroom.
Related questions
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- Why does my fireplace backdraft when the furnace or a bathroom fan is running?
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- Why doesn't my wood-burning insert draft as well as it used to?