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Fire & Water - Cleanup & Restoration

When Puffback Leaves Fire Damaging Soot in Your Grandy Home

4/20/2022 (Permalink)

Soot from Puffback If Puffback Strikes Your Pittsfield Home, Call SERVPRO for Cleanup

SERVPRO Offers Information, Advice, and Service Regarding Puffback and then Clean Up to Your Home

For homeowners who run oil-based boilers or furnaces in their Grandy home for heating, they should be well aware of the need for inspection and service on an annual basis. Your ability to listen for troubling noises that the unit is making or abnormal behaviors of firing and then get help can keep you from a severe mess to clean up in the future. In a phenomenon known as puffback, oil-burners are ignited and immediately burn off pooled oil in the combustion chamber, which can send a palpable wave of soot through the ductwork and vents of your home.

The lengths to which this fire damage can affect your Grandy home are directly correlated with the force of the blast. While, in some cases, this puffback could also cause damage to your heating unit altogether, you are almost always left with thick soot to clean up somewhere in your house. When the heated soot contacts cold corners of a structure, "soot tags," often mistaken for cobwebs, form. While this residue can be overwhelming to see at first, it is something that should be handled quickly. Lingering soot in areas of your home is not beneficial for your family to be around, and it is highly advisable to trust certified professionals to restore the damages created quickly.

Our SERVPRO technicians are well equipped to deal with fire damage restoration efforts, including the expertise necessary to successfully and completely clear up any presence of soot throughout your home and your ductwork. Our trained technicians deploy state-of-the-art equipment and cleaning products to ensure a clean-looking and smelling home upon completion of our service. The cleaning of ducts is a step that many homeowners rarely even consider. They can see a minimal way into the ductwork moving throughout their home. Yet, with any puffback scenario, this network going throughout your home will be hit the hardest by the soot damage.

While our SERVPRO professionals are well versed in ensuring that the full scope of the damage has been corrected, personal cleanup efforts might leave you overlooking this critical step. This can eventually send more soot through the system when the heating pump kicks back on again. To prevent an endless cycle of recleaning the same areas, consult with the appropriate repairmen to look into your oil-based furnace to ensure that it does not need servicing. Then, contact our team to thoroughly clean the soot from your walls, floors, ducts, and ceilings. You will feel "Like it never even happened."

While puffback can be an ongoing problem to underserviced heating units, it does not make the damage that occurs any less challenging to battle. Do not hesitate to give our experienced team at SERVPRO of Hampshire County a call. You can reach us anytime at (413) 324-1300.

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