An old hand told me my brush angle was trash in 2018

I was sweeping a flue for a guy named Mike out in Oak Park and he watched me set up for a minute before telling me I was gonna wear out my rods twice as fast with how I angled my brush. He showed me this 15 degree tilt going up instead of straight on and it cut my cleaning time by 20 percent easy. Has anyone else had an older sweeper call them out on something small like that?

3 comments

3 Comments

joseph_bailey15d ago

Man that Jerry sounds like a legend. I had an old timer named Pete call me out on my brush angle too, and once I adjusted it the whole job felt way smoother. My arms definitely thanked me after a few weeks of using that tweak.

mitchell.thomas15d ago

Wait, he just watched you set up and then hit you with that? That's brutal but honestly kind of awesome. I had a similar thing happen to me back in 2017, an old timer named Jerry caught me jamming my brush too hard on a downstroke and he just shook his head and said "you're fighting the flue, kid." He showed me how to let the brush do the work with a slight wrist flick and I swear my arms stopped hurting after that. Did you notice a big difference in how smooth the brush moved after you changed that angle?

charlie19815d ago

Jerry sounds like he knew his stuff but that's not exactly how brushing works. The flue is for smoke, not the brush stroke. You want to feather the edge, not flick the wrist, or you'll just leave ridges. Did your arms actually feel better or did you just get used to the ache?