How to Care for a Propane Fireplace

Fireplaces can be a great addition to almost any home. Snuggling up by a warm fireplace with a good book or your favorite T.V show on a cold day is a quintessential winter activity. However, not only can fireplaces provide comfort, but they can also help lower your heating bill and serve as an interesting interior design point. Despite all of their positives, many people don’t want to deal with wood in the home or the maintenance required for a regular fireplace. Thankfully for these people, there is an alternative, a propane fireplace. Propane fireplaces can be an amazing way to have the positives of a fireplace without having to deal with the hassle of a wood fireplace. So how do you care for a propane fireplace, and how does it differ from a wood fireplace? Let’s take a look.

 

Clean Often

One of the most important things that you need to do to care and maintain a propane fireplace is regularly cleaning it out. Although propane fireplaces may not require as much cleaning as wood fires do, they still need to be cleaned out regularly. Soot stains and other debris are still present in propane fireplaces, so it's important to clean everything up. When cleaning, first start with the glass, cleaning off any debris on both sides. Next, make sure that you clean the interior, getting out any dust or dirt that may be on the inside of the fireplace. Lastly, you may need to clean off the gas logs in your fireplace, wiping off soot, or other debris from them. Cleaning and maintaining a propane fireplace is a much easier task than cleaning and maintaining a wood fireplace, but it still needs to be done regularly if you want a safe and efficient heating source.

 

Regularly Inspect

Every year before wintertime, you should have your propane fireplace inspected. There are many small issues and hiccups that your propane fireplace could experience, so it's best to get inspected routinely. A qualified technician should look at it every year, ensuring that the fireplace is safe to use and has nothing wrong with it. If you wait too long to have your fireplace inspected or neglect inspecting it all together, problems may compound, resulting in a large repair bill. In worst case scenarios, your propane fireplace may be unsafe to use if it has lots of problems going on. Propane fireplaces are usually extremely safe to use, as long as you keep up with regular maintenance and inspections.

 

Check Vents

Another thing you’ll have to regularly do to care for a gas fireplace is to check the outside vents. At least monthly, you should ensure that nothing is blocking the outside vent that air is filtered through. During the fall and winter months, many things could potentially block a gas fireplace outside the vent. Blockages could be done by fallen leaves or even by a bird’s nest. There are plenty of opportunities for debris to block your gas fireplace’s vent, so ensure that you regularly check to make sure it is unblocked. You want the smoke and other particles from your fireplace to be adequately filtered out of your home, making this a very important step of maintaining your gas fireplace.