vermiculite smell

astroman145

hi this is my first post and a very important one to me so any help would be appreciated. i live in a semi-detached house in wicklow and we share a chimney stack now these chimneys have design faults as they were never built properly.in the last few years whenever my neighbour lit the fire we could smell smoke moreso in my daughters bedroom. also on our landing it got worse whenever the wind blew in a certain direction till it got so bad my daughers had to be moved out of their room.we told our neighbour of this via text as we cannot talk to them they got a stove in and put a flue liner in the chimney hoping this would remedy the problem.the smoke continued as i don,t think she got the chimney cleaned prior to this and it actually set off the smoke alarm in my daughters room. the person who installed the stove then put vermiculite into the gap between the chimney flue and liner to solve the problem .when this was put in there was a smell for a few days and i was told it was the insulation expanding and the smell would go away.it did for a while but now its back and stronger and i would like to know is this smell or fumes of this vermiculite dangerous and what can i do .thanks

Spear

Try the construction forum instead:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=876

astroman145

do i have to move this thread to the construction forum or rewrite it ?

Spear

You can just copy and paste the post from here to a new thread there. We tend not to move threads from here.

Wethers5

Hi astroman, I read your post about a smell after your neighbours chimney was lined, did you ever find the cause of the smell? Was it the vermiculite? We currently have a similar problem - horrible acrid chemical smell, and am anxious to find out if the smell is dangerous?

astroman145

hi sorry only getting back to you now as it turned out the builder who lined the chimney went in and took apart some of the chimney breast then plastered the inside of the chimney surround and this seems to have done the trick as no more smells have come into my daughters room since .but i,m in the process of talking to an engineer who has dealt with a similar problem on our estate and i,m hoping to borrow a meter to see if any gases are still present as the smell might be gone but it could be carbon monoxide which is a lot worse .as soon as i find out i,ll let you know .

Wethers5

Thanks for your reply. Please let me know if you find out anymore.