DIY bottle brush. How to make a Christmas tree from a bottle brush. From a plastic bottle for a round chimney

We can say that a chimney brush is the main tool used for the hygiene of this structure. The device is somewhat similar to toothbrush for cleaning bottles, the principle and overall appearance are very similar, naturally only the sizes are much larger. The ruff consists of a main spire (also known as the central perpendicular), on which several circles of large “bristles” are made. Often thin steel wire is used, in some cases it is permissible to use only soft types wire.

Despite a general understanding of the cleaning procedure and an overview of the entire device, many are unaware of significant factors when purchasing finished products. It should be taken into account that the tool is not suitable for every type of channel. For example, for brick structures, a brush with hard “bristles” is suitable, where the “bitten” soot is “settled” quite tightly on the walls. If you are buying for steel pipe, purchase soft products, with soft wire or plastic, nylon. Otherwise, the rigid wire may damage the structure. As you can see, there are enough nuances in choosing ruffs and it is important to pay attention to them.

Brush for cleaning a brick chimney

Where is it sold and how much does it cost?

You can buy such a device at any hardware store. If you don't have it, you can purchase a brush for your chimney on the Internet; as a rule, the cost does not differ significantly. The average price is within 2,000 rubles.

How to make a homemade brush?

If the price seems too high for you, you can make such products yourself. The main thing is to determine exactly what shape you need and for which pipe. There are three main types of brushes:

The brush is a classic metal brush, shaped like a cylinder. Additional devices included in the kit can be a simple long rope, usually 5 meters, or a weight weighing up to 2 kg. with extension cord.
A regular brush equipped with steel or nylon bristles. Has a special handle.
Scraper. It saves the day when there are soot build-ups on the channels that the two previous options cannot cope with. Can be of any suitable shape.

From a plastic bottle

A homemade brush can be made from regular bottle from under water. Manufacturing stages:

In the center of the bottom, make a small hole.
A hole of the same diameter is made in the lid.
Next, cut the bottle into small strips and attach a pin with a hook to one side.
On the other side, a pin is also inserted, which are connected together.
Using nuts, compress the bottle and attach a weight to one side.

The process of making a plastic brush

This design is suitable for cleaning metal and ceramic channels.

From the broom

A chimney brush can be made from an ordinary plastic broom, which is now available in almost every household. Manufacturing stage:

Cut off the stalk.
Straighten the “stubble”; you can use a hair dryer. After straightening, we clamp it with a pin and washer.
From the side of the handle we wind a pin with a hook.
The structure is tightened on both sides, then a cable with a sinker is attached.

Excellent for cleaning wide channels.

From a metal brush for an angle grinder

A metal brush or brush can even be made from such a device. On at the moment the price is not that high, so we recommend buying finished product. If you decide to make a chimney brush with your own hands, remember that you will need two sheets, a threaded rod and nuts. Also, do not forget to use stiff wire or, in some cases, nylon wire as “bristles.”

A complex version made of metal cable

A cable can also be used to clean chimneys. The manufacturing process is much more complex and requires certain efforts and skills. You will need a cable, preferably 1 cm in diameter. An edge of about 10 cm dissolves into individual fibers. They bend in different directions, and in order to hold the shape to clean the pipe, two plates are taken and compressed. A counterweight should be attached to the bottom edge to break up lumps and soot build-ups.

Apparently based on this, it is not so easy to buy special pipe cleaners in the store; not all stores have them. That’s why people clean pipes with whatever they can, old brooms, tree tops, sticks, washcloths and other derivatives of “what is tricky.”

But there is another saying: whatever you get sick, cure yourself, and if that’s the case, then why not make a pipe cleaner from the same bottles that, when burned (for example), clogged the pipe.

Everyone always has plastic bottles, because they have long become a sign of civilization.

Brush from plastic bottle It’s easy to make, it doesn’t cost anything, it cleans pipes perfectly, and its design is so simple and primitive that you can make a new one every time and not clutter up your garage.

IN in this example used as cargo old pen from a brass door. The rope of the required length was purchased at the store.

Related link: To make a chimney sweeper I used top part bottles, which he cut to form peculiar ribbons. In order to more conveniently center the load and thread the rope through the lids, I drilled holes with a drill. Then he tied the rope to the load and threaded it through the lids.

During work, it turned out that the lower and upper parts of the homemade brush could move relative to each other, so rings from another plastic bottle had to be inserted inside the brush. The cut rings had to be cut to fit the diameter, and then secured with an ordinary construction stapler.

Then I pulled the rope that was tied to the load and passed through the lid tightly so that all parts of the pipe cleaner were more tightly connected to each other, and then tied it in a knot.

My stove pipe is approximately 14 by 14 centimeters, so the diameter of the brush turned out to be 17.5-18 centimeters (with the bottle ribbons spread out). Of course, it won’t be possible to cover the entire chimney with such a diameter, but otherwise (if you make the diameter larger) it will be difficult to drag the brush up and down the pipe - it will stop. True, this can be corrected by making the load heavier.

Homemade brush for cleaning pipes and chimneys with your own hands - photo for the material

The walls of the bottles need to be cut into petals approximately 1.5 cm wide.
The petals should not be cut all the way to the neck. This will provide them with the necessary elasticity.
As a load I used a massive door handle made of brass.
It is necessary to drill holes in the plugs for the rope and the screw part of the load.
The sequence of assembling the ruff.
Stiffness rings.

This will help wash and clean dishes

Plastic tape cut from a plastic bottle can be successfully used in household for washing dishes, only for this you need to make a brush out of it. Plastic, as a material, has remarkable properties regarding food deposits on dirty dishes. On the one hand, it is hard enough to scrape off stubborn dirt, and on the other hand, it is not hard enough to damage the surface of kitchen appliances, be it steel, glass or enamel. To everything else, it should be added that it is easy to make such a brush both at home and in nature, as long as you have a couple of empty plastic bottles on hand.

Idea

The surface area of a 1.5 liter plastic bottle, from which you can spiral, is at least 600 sq.cm. If the width of the ribbon is about 5 mm, then its length will be about 12 meters. Not bad, right? This tape can be successfully used for gutters (see), or you can use it to wash dishes using your fingers as a template for winding ()

Job

All that remains is to wind the ribbon into a springy bundle that would not bulge during cleaning work. You can do this in different ways, but so that the bundle does not fall apart and its pieces do not puff up, I recommend doing it this way (). I would call it marine coiling, it seems that this is how the cable is attached when large ships are moored.

The fingers are used as the basis for the figure eight, and the ends of the ribbon are threaded several times from inside the two formed rings and tied together. Such a bundle is quite reliable, springy and compact for use as a brush for washing dishes. That's what we needed to get in the end.

The “fluffiness” of the brush depends on the total length plastic tape from which it is made. If you use only one half-brush (volume 1.5 liters), then the brush will probably be rather weak (). I think two bottles will be enough (). It is difficult to make a brush from a larger number of bottles using such a winding method - the span of your fingers is not enough))). I have several methods for making pipe cleaners, which I will talk about later, but this one is the most efficient of all. Another option, more powerful and end-mounted, with which I clean the inner surface of teapots from scale, can be viewed at

The chimney brush is a tool with long handle, a working element with metal or polymer bristles and an addition in the form of a weight. Manufacturing requires a minimum of time and physical investment, the result is universal design for high-quality maintenance of the chimney system.

Clogging of the smoke exhaust duct is caused by a number of reasons:

Soot accumulates due to the settling of solid particles of combustion products on the inner surface of the shaft.
Condensation forms, the cause of which is the lack of proper thermal insulation of the chimney, which increases the effect of soot and soot sticking.
Poor quality fuel is used. For example, prolonged burning raw firewood leads to intense clogging of the chimney system.
Resinous fuel resources are used - firewood, lumber and briquettes from spruce, fir, and pine.
Waste is burned in the furnace high content hydrocarbon in the form household waste from polymers - plastic bottles, polyethylene, rubber products.
The heat generator is operated in an incorrect mode, fuel is added in violation of the rules, and the ash pan is rarely cleaned.

One more possible reason chimney blockage is hidden in the design heating device, the essence of which is errors in the construction or installation of the heat generator, or incorrect structure of the chimney.

A clogged smoke line is fraught with negative consequences:

the passage for discharging the gas-containing flow becomes clogged, traction deteriorates;
The energy efficiency of the heat generator decreases, which is associated with insufficient traction force;
the presence of significant accumulations of soot contributes to the formation reverse thrust, And carbon monoxide may leak into the room.

The most dangerous situation is when soot in the chimney duct ignites with the formation large quantity sparks, this can cause a fire in the roof or neighboring buildings. To eliminate the problem, it is necessary to promptly remove carbon deposits and soot in the gas outlet channel using chemical compositions or homemade devices for mechanical cleaning chimney.

Features of mechanical cleaning of a chimney from soot using a brush

Before starting work, the preparatory stage is performed:

close the vent, firebox door, and cleanout hatches;
all of the above points are equipped with an elementary filter in the form of a dense damp cloth;
open all the valves and views of the furnace completely.

The vertical part of the chimney is processed using a brush with a core to weight the tool. The structure is equipped with a long cable or a rope, rope or strong cord is used. It is recommended to choose a rope 2-3 m longer than the height of the pipe in order to secure the outer end to the base of the shaft, otherwise there is a risk of dropping the device into the channel due to the gravity of the core.

To clean the vertical section of the chimney, the device is lowered down the channel, pushing and rotating with a rope in different directions. After the structure with the load and the brush is at the bottom of the shaft, they lift it back up, making the same movements using a rope. If the tool does not pass due to dense layers of soot in a certain area, the cable is lifted and sharply lowered into the pipe to break through the blockage.

Cleaning the horizontal channels of the flue is carried out using a brush with a rigid handle. Most often, the device is equipped with a solid or stacked rod, the length of which is selected in accordance with the parameters of the plane being processed. Since the rotary chimney units have special doors, moving along them, it is easy to clean all horizontal sections. If there are no turning openings, use a brush with a cable. Performing circular and rotational movements, the structure is pushed deep into the channel and back.

How to make a ruff yourself

Although a chimney brush is not a product in short supply in Moscow and other regions of the country, most owners of private houses prefer to make this device with their own hands.

A homemade brush for cleaning chimney pipes is made taking into account the specifics of the application. To service metal and asbestos-cement smoke ducts, you should make a brush with a polymer brush. To clean a brick chimney shaft clogged with years of soot, you need to make a solid device from metal raw materials.

Steel wire manufacturing options

To make a brush for cleaning a chimney with your own hands, you need following materials and tools:

a coil of spring steel wire with a cross section of 1-2 mm or a piece steel cable diameter up to 10 mm;
threaded pin – 60-80 mm length, 1 pc.;
washers for bolt – d50 mm, 2 pcs.;
nuts – 2 pcs. regular, 2 pcs. cap with ring;
hammer;
pliers;
chisel;
wrench 14.

Sequence of work:

The wire is cut taking into account the cross-section of the chimney. In the case of a cable, blanks are made 10% shorter than the diameter of the pipe.
At the center point of each element, the fibers are pulled apart to make a hole and placed on a pin. The wire is simply wrapped around the rod.
The stud is equipped with steel nuts and washers, clamping the structural elements.

For greater strength, flexible elements can be secured by welding.

When deciding how to make a chimney brush with your own hands, you can choose another product option in the form of a spiral brush. In this case you will need lathe or a homemade rigid structure for tensioning the rod. To make bristles, steel wire d1-2 mm or cable is suitable, and a twisted rod is made of steel wire with a cross-section of 6 mm.

Steps for making a spiral brush:

The required number of pieces of the required length are made from the cable.
Steel wire d6 mm is folded in half, one end of which is welded, and a loop is twisted on the other.
The structure is fixed in the machine. It is necessary to tighten the rod between the chuck and the tailstock well and give correct position his veins.
Next, the blanks are placed in the gap between the cores, evenly distributed along the entire length of the tensioned rod, and fixed with hot-melt adhesive.

When the spindle rotates, the rod twists into a spiral, firmly clamping the wire bristles between the wires.

How to make a homemade brush from a plastic broom

To do this you will need the following materials and tools:

nylon broom, cord;
hairpin – up to 10 mm;
washers – d5 cm 2 pcs.;
nuts – 2 pcs., one of them with a ring.

Remove the broom from the handle, bend the bristles to the sides, fix the position of the product, heating it with a hairdryer. Make a hole in the center of the broom holder with a drill or a hot nail, thread a pin through it, and secure it on both sides with nuts and washers.

Brush made from plastic bottles

You need to prepare:

plastic bottles with a volume of 1.5-3 l;
cable, metal wire d2 mm;
knife, scissors.

Cut off the top of one bottle; this will be the base of the polymer brush. The bottom part of several containers is removed, the body is cut into strips vertically up to the neck. The blanks are placed on the base, and the strips are secured in several bundles using wire. The base is fixed to the cable.

The nuances of using brushes

To clean the horizontal cavities of the chimney, the brush is equipped with a long rod. A device with metal bristles is recommended to be used for removing soot and soot in vertical pipes. If you have to work on processing horizontal or inclined channels, you should use a brush with a polymer brush.