Another fireplace thread

Scam said:
Would you really :rolleyes:
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yea i would because i've only ever seen a fire surround bolted to the wall in showrooms. in order for it to not look daft you really need the opening in place.
Scam said:
I think we’re both right, upon closer inspection a lot of the pictures we’ve used as reference do have the hole opened........
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this is the proper way to do it. the way your suggesting is just silly. but obviously that's just my opinion.
 
Thekwango said:
yea i would because i've only ever seen a fire surround bolted to the wall in showrooms. in order for it to not look daft you really need the opening in place.

this is the proper way to do it. the way your suggesting is just silly. but obviously that's just my opinion.
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The proper way to do it is to have an actual working fire place. Anything other than a working fire is a variant of a decorative item. Therefore it is irrelevant whether there is a hole or not.
 
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dlockers said:
The proper way to do it is to have an actual working fire place. Anything other than a working fire is a variant of a decorative item. Therefore it is irrelevant whether there is a hole or not.
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Well yes, but if going for the decorative look, having an opening, imo, looks far better than just the surround bolted to a flat wall.
 
We're having fun knocking out the plaster/lining to make our surround fit flush. Yes, lots of arguments previously on here about what to do in the middle. We're not knocking it through. Girlfriend's idea was to stick very vintage mirror sticky stuff (looks like vintage glass) to add some depth and make it less obvious it's not knocked through.

Wondering why the heck there's holes in some of the breezeblocks though, and some are really crumbly? Reckon we can just stuck some expanding foam in there and forget about it? None of the holes go through, it's like they're hollow bricks or there's just another layer behind or something :confused:

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Did that all with a bolster chisel and lump hammer this morning. I'm now dead.
 
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The holes will be for ventilation perhaps although rather poorly done as it doesn't directly connected with the flue
 
sja360 said:
The holes will be for ventilation perhaps although rather poorly done as it doesn't directly connected with the flue
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They don’t appear to go anywhere. They’re more like massive holes in the breeze blocks. I can stick my finger in and hit more breeze block, it’s not like it goes all the way up. Reckon expanding foam is forceful enough to break the blocks more?
 
Scam said:
They don’t appear to go anywhere. They’re more like massive holes in the breeze blocks. I can stick my finger in and hit more breeze block, it’s not like it goes all the way up. Reckon expanding foam is forceful enough to break the blocks more?
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Why would you use expanding foam in there for breaking breeze blocks?

I would grab an SDS drill and use the drill & hammer function to break them down
 
sja360 said:
Why would you use expanding foam in there for breaking breeze blocks?
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No it’s not my intention to break them more. I was just checking it’s not forceful enough to do so, since some areas around the holes are really crumbly.
 
Looks like someone may have had a similar idea to yourself w.r.t to opening it up, and drilled some peep holes?

Stick a finger in and see what happens.

I wouldn't foam them up, just whack some mortar in or however you are planning on finishing up.
 
I was about to post in here with other questions but thought I should show an update pic for you. We finished our tiled hearth.. simple backer board cut down, leftover black metro tiles from the bathroom. Had lots of fun trying to cut out the holes for the fireplace to sit in (the "legs" have little lips that stick out on the bottom). Initially drilled but that got difficult because we don't have any tile nippers or file.. so cut lots of shapes around it instead. Fun. Not grouted yet. As you can see the decorator started yesterday and stripped 90% of the old paper off the walls and started filling and fixing. Made a nice mess of our tiles, lol.

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And so to my question regarding our dining room fireplace. What would you do here? We had slate leftover from the guy doing the front garden so he kindly cut it to shape. We're just going to put an old log burner in it or something for display (not working). Or wine storage etc. We bought all the gear from Wickes to put down some self-levelling concrete but my other half is now thinking we can take that back, get the money back and not bother with the effort. Could we just put some sand down or something to sit the slate on? It needs to be raise a bit to match the flooring, otherwise we'll pull the edge of the flooring off with the weight on it's edge.

Current situation:

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With the slate down to see what it looks like:

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We'll be putting some beading around the edge of the wallpaper to finish it. And I think the decorator was going to sort out the chimney walls but I can't remember what he said he'd put on it. I guess that should be done before we put the slate down.

What would be the easiest thing to do with the base?
 
Scam said:
We are total idiots here. Please do elaborate? :p
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Make some muck up, slop it down, then whack your stone on it. Jiggle it and done.

You can get mix in the bucket mortar which'll be fine.
 
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