Fireplace installation in a penthouse Gas/Woodburning

The contractor is far less the issue than the building. First off, coop or condo? If coop, and there are no other fireplace units, you're really going to have fun getting this through the board. If condo, it's a far better possibility, but again, still will require building approval as you're going through the building membrane. In addition, some situations (because of code) will not allow wood burning at all, and your only option will be gas.

You have to do ALOT more homework first regarding your building and its allowances before you concern yourself with other issues.

Of course you need to talk to your building but you also need to see what the city codes are. Remember that you could asphyxiate yourself or burn the building down. I would do all the research first so that you can present the idea in an informed way to the building. I want, I want is only a very small part of the equation.

I can't imagine why you couldn't have a gas fireplace installed no matter what--even w/ a coop board. It's much less of a big deal than a kitchen renovation, say. The hardest thing is running the gas line, and you seem to have that location figured out.

I was very much again gas fireplaces until we learned that our original wood burning fireplace, with 40 foot chimney, in our grand 1920 house, was not working properly and would need to be completely removed...or, we could install gas. I was very, very skeptical, but agreed. Now I would never choose a wood fireplace (which is very polluting, by the way, if you care about the air quality). Gas has SO many advantages, starting with, you can turn it on and off at will instead of babysitting dying embers. The top of the line models today are so lifelike, I've had a few guests who were shocked when I told them it was gas.

Contractors: Start looking in the nearest suburb area (LI or Westchester or Jersey) for a dedicated fireplace store and ask if they have installed in your boro & have plumber with the license. You really want somebody with experience to do this, especially the plumber, but there's an electrican involved too.

Hello

Thank you for your comments. I appreciate them. I am in a condo and there are wood burning fire places in all the penthouses except two. The sponsor never asked the remaining two penthouses if they wanted them installed when the building was being built. I think that gas may be the way to go but I have to look into if a gas line can be installed .

Just to add a few points. Certainly if there are wood burning fireplaces in other units, you're probably able to do the same. NYC requires that the firebox be an NYC DOB approved unit (it will have an NYC "MEA" number). Each unit has different specs for the flue, etc. You'll be much better informed if you can find out which fireboxes were installed in the other PH units. Of course you can use a gas-only firebox, but it's much easier to find the right one if you already know a wood burning version that works.

I have an interesting infrastructure question. We recently discovered that all the woodburning fireplaces in our pre-war building (in which every apartment has a fireplace) appear to have been equipped with a gas line at inception. We are researching whether these gas lines were meant to be log starters? Anyone have any insight? The issue has arisen with the discovery of a gas fireplace in one of the apartments that has been there as long as anyone can remember. No DOB record anywhere of the gas fireplace. Is is possible that it was original to the building?

You might see if the NY Real Estate Brochure collection at Columbia has an early document for your building, which might list amongst the amenities whether 'log starters' were included (marketers would have delighted in showing how Madame might not have to dirty her hands, in a post-servant household).

https://dlc.library.columbia.edu/nyre

@Aaron2 - Awesome website. I found the flyer (as well as NYT advertisement). No mention of the feature in question, but the potential is exciting. I will report back, because it would be amazing if all of our fireplaces have gas-at-the-ready.

What you also need to do is have an engineer or fireplace inspection service check you flues. If they are meant to be for gas fireplaces they can't handle wood fires.

Just received that report 1/2 hour ago. Very bad news for the gas burning fireplace that had been quietly hiding for decades.

The building's offering plan (1925) specifies that each apartment shall have a wood-burning fireplace and makes no mention of log-starters and a recent inspection and cleaning of the fireplaces building wide revealed that during the 97 years the building has been online, the wood-burning fireplaces have been put to great use. Were they capable of easily being converted to gas-burning fireplaces, we would have to make a building-wide determination to repurpose the chimneys, because, as you (30yrs) note, you cannot use the same chimney for both gas and wood fireplaces. Building-wide agreement on that repurposing would almost certainly be unattainable, but it was nice to enjoy the hope for the minute I had it.

@ mcr: Thanks. I love the Columbia collection, although navigation can be a challenge. Terrific resource for original floorplans.

I'm guessing that the individual fireplaces in your building vent into common flue(s) at some point in their travel upwards, which would prevent individual conversions? (I don't think shared flues are permissible under current code, but was more typical earlier). If each flue is distinct all the way to the roof, it might be possible to reconfigure the flue for gas (although probably very expensive).

It is extremely unlikely you'd be able to reach a unanimous agreement to convert original WBFs to gas.

The very small handful of folks I know who are lucky enough to have NYC apartments with WBFs are fiercely protective of them. WBFs are increasingly rare in NYC - it is no longer legal to install them or even reinstate ones that have been 'decommissioned' (blocked up or converted).

A WBF is a coveted amenity and a value-add. Say what you will about the merits of gas -- there's nothing that can compare to the cozy appeal of a real wood fire.

Aaron2,
I don't think that is correct. AFAIK each fireplace needs it's own dedicated glue up to the roof.

@30yrs - Whether each FP in our building has its own flue is under investigation. Unfortunately it appears that the recently discovered gas-burning fireplace had tapped into another apartment's chimney. Investigation continues as to whether this is true, and, if it is, how this could have ever happened. A lot is not making sense right now, and a camera investigation is in order. Definitely not signing up for another term on this board . . ..

I am kinda new to NY fireplaces but I believe it isn't necessarily bad news for the gas fireplace. You can't put a WBF in a chimney meant for the gas fireplace, but I do believe that you could do it the other way around. You might want to talk to an NFI-certified tech on this point. I'll DM you more about this...
ali r.
{upstairs realty}

Thanks Ali. It has been confirmed that the gas fireplace had tapped into neighboring apartments chimney. The under-the-radar gas fireplace was installed on an interior wall that had no fireplace at all before the covert gas fireplace was installed. Short-term bummer for the gas fireplace, but the good news is that the apartment can likely legally vent it if it can get approval to build a code compliant duct for that purpose within its own walls that would terminate into open air behind the building at a sufficient distance from windows, etc.

@30: I have seen construction where multiple fireplaces had individual flues up to a certain point in their ascent, then merged into a common flue. This was early (1830s) house construction, and not in NYC, so quite possible that more sensible heads prevailed here. Also, when looking at floor plans of units with WBFs, you typically see a lot of unusable space behind or adjacent to the FP, implying individual flues from lower floors that are on their way to the roof, individually.

But, I also had friends in a Park Slope brownstone who found out that their neighbor's plumbing line to a 3rd floor bathroom ran through one of their flues, which, judging from the interior photos of the flue, was certainly large enough to be a combined flue from the lower FPs.

Moral of mcr's and my stories: Boards, owners, etc. need to specify requirements and standards about how construction is done, promptly inspect the results, and demand remediation if something is amiss. Unfortunately a can being kicked down the road often doesn't make much noise.

The richest man I know personally was buying buildings in Park Slope in the 1970s/1980s for 2X RR. If that was the financial situation back then, you can imagine the type of cost savings people would engage in for capital projects. And not care about zoning, build codes, safety, etc.

As someone with 2 Ivy League degrees in Engineering, I'll say that you would probably be surprised at exactly how large a flue would need to be to get proper draw from a first floor fireplace to above the roofline without a draft inducer.

>As someone with 2 Ivy League degrees in Engineering,

Wow

Isn't it about time for another name change now that everyone realizes you're a troll?

Also, every time there is any sort of bend, it is the equivalent of adding X feet to the length of the flue in terms of computing opening cross section size.

Is there a specific dollar value one can put on an apartment of any size with an existing woodburning fireplace?

30--this is absolutely correct. High floors are ok (though wind can be a factor, hence the use of t-cap chimneys on some of these old buildings). Lower-rise structures originally built for single families are usually best for decent natural draw.

Closing the loop on this for our building: Per engineer's report, every fireplace in our building that was there at the inception has its own flue; every flue was designed for WBFP and could handle a GBFP; every fireplace was equipped with a gas line as a log starter; while theoretically every such fireplace could be converted to a GBFP, any such conversion would have to be permitted and approved by DOB, with all that entails. Three professionals the board consulted (flue expert, engineer and architect) do not recommend allowing such conversions and recommended decommisioning the gaslines for those fireplaces that have not used them. We have not identified a single shareholder with a legitimate original WBFP who was aware that these gas lines existed, save for one, whose WBFP was converted at some point in the past to a GBFP (this GBFP is different one than the one that started the building-wide investigation). Now in the process of making sure that converted GBFP is up-to-code. Fun stuff!

MCR, thank you for the update; for the confirmation that all the flues, as I suspected, designed for WBFP could handle GBFP; and for the behind-the-scenes look at all that a diligent board member does.

@mcr: Thanks for the update. Fascinating bit of architectural / construction history.

Regarding being a diligent board member, the integrity of the ventilation in the building has been a long-standing interest of mine, and I'm not sure I would have gotten any traction on the building-wide survey but for a new ally in the building - a well-heeled new shareholder who also cares and was not going to let the issue be covered up. It was their renovation that uncovered the surreptitious gas fireplace, the improper ventilation of which had literally resulted in smoke in the hall on one floor. The gas fireplace had tapped into an old fresh air duct to access the the neighboring apartment's chimney, which then allowed smoke from the chimney to come back back through the duct (depending on the air pressure) and into the hall, along with the carbon monoxide that the gas fireplace was venting. The managing agent's inclination was to just cover the whole thing up, and it all may result in a law suit. Those who know about this issue are, understandably, not happy and trying to figure out how to hold those who have known about it for years accountable. For my part, I am trying to figure out what my duty as a board member is in all of it, being on the board and knowing that a law suit is brewing. I support holding those who knew accountable, but I am not sure what the damages are, etc. As I said, fun stuff!

This reminds me of when I discovered that a unit's dryer had for years been vented into the kitchen exhaust stack. I got a bunch of "what's the big deal?"

My impression is that there were a lot of extremely sketchy renovations done in the city post WW2 boom / pre 2000ish yuppification of all of Manhattan.

My friend was recently renovating a loft downtown and found that 40-50 years ago when a building went up next door blocking the lot line windows, apparently the artist loft types just .. drywalled over the opening where the windows had been. Upon tearing into the drywall that had started to warp, he could touch the neighboring buildings brickwork..

steve123, wow

>>>Is there a specific dollar value one can put on an apartment of any size with an existing woodburning fireplace?<<<

This is actually a great question--not dissimilar to the value of views consideration. I recall years ago Noah from Urban Digs did a great writeup on valuation differences based on views. Would be interesting to know if there's a similar formula for rare amenities such as WBFs.

I think that burning wood could be very dangerous to one’s health.

https://www.lung.org/clean-air/indoor-air/indoor-air-pollutants/residential-wood-burning#:~:text=Wood%2DBurning%20Emissions%20Threaten%20Lung,air%20quality%20indoors%20and%20outdoors.

>>I think that burning wood could be very dangerous to one’s health.<<

Everything is bad for you ;-)