Found a way to clean out a really tight flue bend without a rod...

Last month I had a job with a 90 degree bend that was too tight for my standard rods and I spent 20 minutes trying to get the brush through with no luck. I grabbed some heavy duty paracord and a small weighted bag from my truck, tied the brush to the bag and dropped it down from the roof to pull the brush up through the bend backwards... Has anybody else used a drop line for those impossible angles?

3 comments

3 Comments

brown.susan14d ago

Oh man, that's slick! I had a similar headache with a chimney once where the offset was just brutal. I ended up using a shop vac with a really long hose taped to a skinny PVC pipe to pull a string through, which then became the drop line. It took forever but once the string was in, it worked like a charm for the heavier brush.

luna_wells5714d ago

Yeah that shop vac trick is genius for getting a string through tough spots.

bailey.xena2d ago

shop vac trick" is literally the only reason I haven't burned my house down trying to wire a ceiling fan, lmao. I tried that method @luna_wells57 after watching a YouTube vid at 2am and ended up with the string wrapped around my ankle and the vacuum hose tangled in the dog's leash. Honestly though, it worked way better than my first attempt which was just me yelling at the wall and hoping the string would magically find the hole. The shop vac is a lifesaver for anything where you gotta fish a line through a dark, awkward space. I swear it's half the reason my tool bag is so heavy now.