Famco Chimney Liner & Rebuild Nationwide

Famco Chimney Liner & Rebuild in Lawrence: What to Know First

We provide independent Famco chimney liner replacement, repair, and full chimney rebuilds throughout Lawrence, NY. Most Famco liner jobs we take on are done in a single day, sometimes two if we’re rebuilding brick at the top. The price you get on the phone is the price on the invoice, and before we recommend anything you’ll see the camera footage yourself. Call (516) 604-2573 for a free estimate.

Call (516) 604-2573

This page is for Lawrence homeowners who have a Famco liner in the flue and want straight answers about whether it needs work, what it will cost, and how we go about it. If you’ve been told by someone else that you need thousands in masonry work, read on before you write that check.

How Famco Products Fail - and How We Fix Them

Famco makes solid stainless steel liners. They’re not the most expensive name on the shelf, but they do the job when installed right. The problems we see in Lawrence aren’t usually the steel itself failing. They’re the install, the connections, and the way Long Island weather works on the exposed top section. Here’s what we actually find, house by house.

• Famco flexible liner kinking at the first offset in the flue. Lawrence chimneys built in the 1950s and 60s often have a smoke shelf offset that catches a liner if the crew didn’t size it right. The symptom is weak draft and smoke rolling back on cold starts. The kinked section chokes the flue. We pull the liner, inspect it, and if the steel is still sound, we re-route with proper sizing. If it’s crushed, we replace it with a correctly measured Famco or DuraFlex liner.
• Corrosion at the top termination cap connection. This is the most common Famco issue we see in Lawrence. Salt air off Reynolds Channel and the Atlantic works on the joint where the liner meets the cap. The stainless holds up fine elsewhere, but that connection takes rain, salt, and freeze-thaw cycles. Owners notice rust streaks down the crown or water in the firebox. The fix is a new top plate, a fresh cap, and resealing. It’s usually a same-day job.
• Tee connections at the furnace or boiler flue loosening over time. Famco liner runs that serve oil-fired heating equipment in Lawrence basements have a tee at the appliance connection. That joint works loose from vibration and thermal cycling. You’ll smell oil exhaust in the basement or notice soot around the connector. We resecure the tee, inspect the liner interior, and reseal. If the liner has oil residue glazing inside, that’s a cleaning before it becomes a fire load.
• Liner that was undersized for the fireplace opening in the first place. We see this a lot in older Lawrence homes where someone threw a 6-inch Famco liner into a fireplace that needed an 8-inch. The fireplace was built for open burning, and a narrow liner starves it. You get smoky rooms, back-puffing, and a fireplace you can’t use without opening a window. We calculate the flue size from the firebox dimensions. If it’s wrong, we replace it with the right size. No patch job fixes an undersized liner.
• Cracked crown and collar letting water down along the liner exterior. The Famco liner itself stays watertight, but the concrete crown around it ages. Once water gets between the liner and the old clay tile, it works its way down into the smoke chamber and shows up as water stains on the ceiling below. We rebuild the crown with a proper overhang, seal the collar, and if the water sat long enough to damage the clay tile, we talk about whether a full liner replacement is actually needed or if the clay is still serviceable.

Our Famco Chimney Liner & Rebuild Process

Here’s how a Famco liner or rebuild job goes when you call Top Hat Chimney in Lawrence. There’s no mystery part where the price changes.

1. 1
   You call, a person answers. That’s Wendell or one of the crew, and sometimes that call is at 9 p.m. on a Sunday. We ask basic questions, schedule a time, and give you a real arrival window.
2. 2
   We inspect and record. The sweep who shows up looks inside the flue with a camera. You watch the footage. If the liner is fine, we tell you it’s fine. If it’s not, you’ll see the exact spot and we’ll explain what it means.
3. 3
   We size and decide parts before any work starts. Famco makes good steel, and when a Famco liner can be repaired with legitimate Famco parts, we use those. When an aftermarket part is genuinely better for the situation, we say so and show you the difference. No hidden swaps.
4. 4
   We do the liner work or the rebuild. Liner replacement is typically same day. A partial rebuild of the crown or the top few courses takes one day. A full chimney rebuild, from the roofline up or further, is a two-day job most of the time in Lawrence.
5. 5
   We test the draft and the flue before we pack up. A liner that fits but doesn’t draft is not a finished job. We fire test where possible and camera the finished run.
6. 6
   The 90-Day Done Right Promise goes in writing. If anything we touched isn’t right within 90 days, one call brings us back at no charge. Every job gets it.

What Famco Chimney Liner & Rebuild Costs in Lawrence

Here are real price ranges for the Famco work we do in Lawrence. Every exact quote is free, and it’s the same number when the work is done.

• Famco liner repair (loose tee, cap reseal, top plate replacement): $225 to $475. Most of these are done in an hour.
• Partial stainless liner replacement (single-story flue, furnace or water heater): $950 to $1,650 depending on flue length and access.
• Full fireplace liner replacement with Famco or equivalent stainless: $1,800 to $4,200 depending on flue height, roof pitch, and what we find in the smoke chamber. Steep Lawrence rooflines add labor.
• Crown rebuild and collar seal (no liner replacement): $650 to $1,300 depending on crown condition.
• Partial masonry rebuild (top 5 to 10 courses plus crown): $2,200 to $4,800. If we’re rebuilding brick, we match the existing house brick color where possible.
• Full chimney rebuild from roofline up or lower: $4,500 to $9,000 depending on height, brick match, and scaffold needs. Most Lawrence rebuilds in the Five Towns area involve some brick matching on older brick.

What moves the price is flue length, roof access, brick match for rebuilds, and whether we have to remove a section of old clay tile first. We’ll walk you through the quote line by line. Call (516) 604-2573 for an exact number before you decide anything.

Why Lawrence Homeowners Call Top Hat Chimney for Famco Work

We’ve been in business since 1999. That’s over 29 years, and plenty of those years were spent working chimneys right here in Lawrence and the Five Towns area. Wendell Pike has been inside enough Lawrence chimneys to know which houses still have the original clay liner and which ones have been patched one too many times. If the job doesn’t need doing yet, he’ll tell you straight.

We also work with DuraFlex, HeatShield, and Gelco. So if the right answer for your flue isn’t a Famco liner at all, we’re not going to push one. We’ll tell you what the chimney actually needs and back it with a 90-day guarantee in writing. You’ll talk to a live person when you call, the tech shows up in uniform with a real arrival window, and you’ll get a free second opinion on any written estimate from another company. Seniors and veterans get 10% off, always.

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