In this article, we’re looking at ways to clean your gas fireplace with a special focus on the fireplace burner.
Your gas fireplace serves an important function. This is becoming more evident when the cold season sets in. Before then, such a fireplace lies dormant waiting for the right time to be put to good use.
Closing up a fireplace until when it’s needed won’t be enough. Some level of maintenance is necessary.
Maintenance in this sense refers to the cleaning of your fireplace. This is where the fire lights and burns to warm your home. As it burns continuously, it accumulates soot which needs to be cleaned out.
So, how do you begin?
What Dirt Accumulates in a Fireplace?
To better understand how to go about cleaning your fireplace burner, you’ll need to understand how dirt accumulates. Apart from soot accumulation, dust and debris are common deposits you’d find in and around your fireplace.
Animal or pet hairs, as well as dust, are among the most common dirt that needs to be cleaned.
Cleaning Frequency
Cleaning frequency is crucial when it comes to maintaining a gas fireplace burner. A lot of people wrongly assume that such cleaning tasks won’t be necessary when it’s not heavily used.
However, the reality is, you’ll need to have your gas fireplace (burner inclusive) cleaned each month.
Such cleaning frequency is a little price to pay as long as it keeps your gas fireplace burner in perfect working condition. You won’t need to incur maintenance expenses for repairs among other things.
Supplies And Tools Required
To perform a thorough cleaning job, certain basic tools are necessary.
Without these tools, cleaning jobs will be far from satisfactory. Supplies and tools needed include a soft cleaning brush, a vacuum cleaner with a hose attachment, and some warm water.
You’ll also have to need a new paintbrush as well as a fireplace glass cleaner. It’s important to note that cleaning a gas fireplace burner isn’t a task performed in isolation.
In other words, you’ll need to cover or clean your entire gas fireplace as dirt might be settled on such surfaces as well.
Safety First!
Before cleaning begins, it’s necessary to first put off or turn off your gas control valve.
This cuts off any gas supplies to prevent accidents. For a gas fireplace that has been recently used, you’ll need to wait out until it’s completely cool before starting any cleanup.
An additional precautionary action to take includes observing your gas pilot.
The pilot light should be completely off. This is very important as it helps cut off the gas supply as well as enabling any previously released gas to properly dissipate before cleanup work commences.
Gas Fireplace Burner Cleanup Process
This process includes the area under focus which is the gas fireplace burner. However, other key components of the gas fireplace need to be included.
They include the door, the fireplace box, as well as the hearth and mantle.
Let’s take a look at each of these starting with the gas fireplace burner.
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The Gas Fireplace Burner
The cleanup process is quite easy and shouldn’t pose any difficulties if done systematically. So, using your soft cleaning brush, dirt and debris settled on your gas fireplace burner unit should be brushed off.
This action should be carefully done with a focus on the vent holes.
While brushing gets rid of the dust on the gas fireplace burner, it doesn’t completely remove such. In other words, there will be some dirt remaining. This is where your vacuum cleaner comes in handy.
With one end connected to the vacuum cleaner, the vacuum cleaner attachment is used to clear off loose dirt, cobwebs as well as insects harboring within the burner spaces.
This process does a lot to clean your gas fireplace burner. However, there are times when stubborn dirt clings to such burners. Removing such tough stuck-on dirt will require patience.
Using your soft cleaning brush, continuously clear out such dirt until it’s completely off.
Your vacuum cleaner will still be needed for another round of cleaning. This final round of cleaning the gas fireplace burner will require running the vacuum cleaner attachment over the gas fireplace burner.
This will help pick up any loose dirt or debris.
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Cleaning the Gas Fireplace Box
Cleaning the gas fireplace burner alone won’t do much good when other important components are ignored. The gas fireplace box is one such area that needs to be focused on.
Dust, cobwebs, and insects are common with fireplace boxes.
These are best cleaned using a vacuuming machine. Cover every corner of the gas fireplace box with your vacuum cleaner attachment. Some fireplace boxes hold lava rocks while others are fitted with glass stones.
Whatever they are, run your vacuum cleaner attachment over these structures to clear out dirt and debris.
For those fitted with rocks, you’ll need to take into account the size of such and make adjustments where necessary. In other words, you need to keep smaller-sized rocks from being sucked into the vacuum cleaner.
Placing some covering such as a piece of nylon net over the vacuum cleaner attachment mouth should serve this purpose.
Here, the rocks don’t get through this covering but the dust does. This achieves the aim of cleaning while ensuring the fixtures remain the way they are.
The gas fireplace door is another important component that needs to be focused on. Such doors are often made of glass. Some older designs may be made of metal.
To have this cleaned, you’ll need to understand that particulates resulting from combustion cause the glass doors to become cloudy.
Fireplace cleaners are sold at local stores for this purpose. It’s necessary to use such cleaners and not a window cleaner or lye-based oven cleaners. Fireplace cleaners come with their use instructions.
Generally, these are sprayed onto targeted surfaces and allowed to sit for some time (as recommended by the manufacturer) before wiping with a clean cloth.
Cleaning a glass fireplace burner follows the process outlined above and shouldn’t be done haphazardly. How well a gas fireplace burner is maintained determines its efficiency.