Chimney sweep, inspection and repair in Inkster

The southwest side

Before 1940, most of Inkster's Black families lived in the southwest part of the city, south of Michigan Avenue and west of Inkster Road. Many of them worked at Ford's Rouge plant. In the 1930s Ford's Inkster Project put money, materials and labor into fixing up houses there, more than 150 of them under its 1938 program.

A recent state historic survey calls this the Dancy-Ford neighborhood. The houses are mostly small: one-and-a-half-story Craftsman bungalows, Minimal Traditional houses and plain front-gabled houses, clad in siding or brick veneer. A chimney on one of them has had close to a hundred years of weather, and most have been patched by more than one owner along the way. We check the crown, the top courses of brick and the flue, and tell you what's original and what's been redone.

Watsonia Park

East of Inkster Road, between Annapolis, John Daly and Stanford, Watsonia Park Subdivision No. 2 was platted in 1925 but mostly built in the 1950s and 1960s. Black architects and builders, John W. Bingham and Edward M. Burke among them, put up houses there. Many are long brick ranches with Contemporary touches like wide overhanging eaves.

Ranch roofs are usually low-pitched, and a low roof holds snow longer than a steep one. As it melts, water sits against the uphill side of the chimney, right at the flashing. When one of these houses has a stain on the ceiling near the fireplace, that's one of the first places we look. Our guide on whether to call a roofer or a chimney company explains how to narrow it down.

North of Michigan Avenue

The blocks north of Michigan Avenue are more built up, mostly with small ranches and Minimal Traditional houses. The chimney on a house that size often does two jobs, venting the fireplace and the furnace or water heater. A cleaning and inspection covers every flue in the chimney, including the one you never think about.

Open joints above the flashing

In the photo, someone pushed black sealant into the mortar joints just above the flashing to stop a leak. It holds for a season or two. The joints under it are still open, and water finds the next one over. We clear the old sealant, repoint the joints and reset the flashing, and show you the photos before we quote.

Getting to you

We work across Inkster on Michigan Avenue, Inkster Road, Middlebelt, Cherry Hill, Beech Daly and Annapolis, and pair Inkster visits with jobs in Dearborn Heights, Westland and Garden City. Book online and pick a 3-hour arrival window, or call for same-day availability when the schedule allows.