Removal of old fireplace and bricks...help!

[Ck1005]

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone had any experience of trying to remove an old fireplace and brickwork. I've attached a picture - hopefully you can see it. I'm guessing it's maybe an old gas fireplace? Assuming the brickwork will be annoying to remove. I was trying to work out a rough idea of cost and just wondered if anyone had a similar experience or might have a rough costing idea.

Thanks for any help!

There likely is an old back boiler behind that fire so you’ll need gas man to cap it off and remove. As for the brickwork - big hammer and get rid of most of it yourself.

Definitely get the gas capped off by a pro first .
You could rent a lightweight jack hammer for 24 hours and knock that fireplace down much more quickly than with a hand held hammer.

Edit - the below was written assuming you meant normal chimney brickwork - I don't have my glasses on and hadn't seen all the detail of the picture. A hammer on the low-level brickwork that's clearly not structural is fine.

(End edit)

Do not remove the brickwork yourself with a big hammer!! That is terrible advice.

The brickwork there in the living room is probably structurally supporting half a tonne of brickwork upstairs vertically above it, which is in its turn supporting about a third of a tonne of brickwork in the form of the chimney on your roof.

Options are to either remove the whole lot including the chimney (very very expensive and not physically possible if it's a semi and the chimney structure is shared with next door) or get a serious non-cowboy builder to carefully put in an arch of steel girder support to hold up the higher level brickwork (very expensive, will require a party-wall agreement if you are in a semi) or replan your room concept to remove the fireplace but keep the brickwork as-is (this is what we did, turning the recess into a cupboard. Much more affordable)

We had large limestone type stones up to the ceiling and at the side in our old house. Had a builder out to remove stonework and then we had a plasterer out as there was the original chimney breast behind. If there's a gas fire, you'll have to get someone out to remove and cap off pipe, so it'll be easy for them to assess if anything else needs doing.

It was well worth doing. I can't remember the cost as it was years ago though.

I doubt the brickwork is structural. It’s just decorative. Very on trend in the 70s and 80s. Quite straightforward to remove.

It looks similar to ours, which came off quite easily.
We had the gas fire removed first, by our boiler man.
The brickwork was surface mounted & I carefully levered it off brick by brick with a crow bar. There wall was plastered behind it, so we just patched that up. There were even skirting boards behind,

OK, thanks! That is very helpful!

That is just decorative stone work and will have been added sometime after it has been plastered. It will come out easy with a hammer and cold chisel.

Its not structural at all. Get the gas fire capped off before.

there may be an old back boiler behind or a old fireplace but until you remove the fire it’s impossible to say exactly what is behind it.

easy diy job , just go steady and remove one brick at a time .👍

In fact if ,you remove it carefully then im sure someone would want it for maybe a small garden project? Would save you having to get rid of it yourselves.

facebook marketplace .

Definitely a back boiler my in-laws had the exact model. The rest of it looks like our house from the 80s

Ist step, get qualified gas engineer in to remove fire and gas supply and make it all safe.

Then, well, my guess would be it's decorative- at last, the stuff on the right. Looks very 60s/70s to me, when they did that sort of thing.

If it was me, I'd probably get an angle grinder ( and use all the safety gloves/glasses stuff) and remove first the stuff on the right brick by brick by grinding out the mortar between the bricks and gently knocking them out. If it's not keyed into the wall (which you should be able to see when you take out the fist one or two bricks) I doubt it'll be structural, but if in any doubt at all, get a builder or fireplace builder to take a look at it.
You may have work to do under the shelving bits, esp if you have a suspended floor (wood rather than concrete). And you'll need to plaster where the bricks were against the wall.

(If it has a back boiler behind the fire, it could be a pig to get out- for that you really would need a builder- is there a chimney? Or you could leave the back boiler there, and cover it over, but either way, if there is a chimney it will be likely to need a vent.)