Level 1 sweep and inspection to the NFPA 211 annual standard - flue, crown, cap, and flashing checked and photographed
Chimney sweep logs do not sweep chimneys. They loosen some creosote - which then falls where a brush and vacuum still have to collect it.
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Before
AfterLevel 2 Inspection in Orland Park, IL
A Level 2 chimney inspection is a camera-assisted examination of every accessible interior and exterior chimney surface, conducted to NFPA 211 standards, and it’s the inspection type required any time a home changes hands, after a system malfunction, or following a chimney fire. In Orland Park, most homes we visit have had nothing more than a flashlight look-over passed off as an inspection – our process runs a video camera down the flue, produces a written findings report, and gives you a fixed price before any repair work begins. If you have questions before we schedule, call us at (708) 294-2571 – a live person picks up, 24 hours a day.
Emberly Chimney Cleaners has operated this way since 2009. Our name isn’t an accident: we built the entire company around the NFPA 211 Level 2 standard because we believe a camera scan and a documented photo record should be the default, not an upgrade you pay extra for. Clause 4 of our Haven Standard makes that formal: every visit produces a documented photo record, archived and available to the homeowner. Across more than 38,000 chimney inspections and chimney cleaning & sweep services, we’ve never handed a customer a repair quote before they saw exactly what the camera found.
This page is part of our Chimney Cleaning & Sweep in Orland Park service, and a Level 2 inspection is often scheduled alongside a cleaning – especially for homes in Orland Park’s older stock near 143rd Street and the Centennial Park corridor, where clay tile liners installed in the 1970s and 1980s are now showing their age.
When You Need a Level 2 Inspection
There are situations where a Level 2 is not optional – NFPA 211 specifies the trigger events clearly. But there are also practical reasons Orland Park homeowners schedule one before the code requires it.
- You’re buying or selling a home. Real estate transactions in Orland Park increasingly include a chimney inspection contingency. A Level 2 produces the written documentation a buyer’s attorney or lender can actually use – a verbal “looks okay” from a home inspector does not.
- You had a chimney fire. Even a small, fast-burning event – the kind you might not have noticed beyond an unusual roaring sound – can crack a clay flue liner. Spalling (the flaking and fracturing of clay tile) is invisible to a flashlight. A camera finds it.
- You’re changing fuel type or appliance. Installing a gas insert into a wood-burning firebox, or swapping a wood stove for a pellet appliance, changes the flue temperatures and condensation behavior enough that NFPA 211 requires a Level 2 before the new appliance is used.
- You haven’t had a documented inspection in more than 3 years. Orland Park sits in a climate band where freeze-thaw cycling hits chimney crowns and mortar joints hard. After three winters without a camera look, hairline cracks in the smoke chamber or liner that were minor are often structurally relevant.
- Your home is over 30 years old and has a wood-burning fireplace. Most of the original construction in the Heritage Hills and Orland Highlands neighborhoods dates from the late 1970s through the early 1990s. The clay tile liners in those homes were installed for lower-efficiency appliances. Many are now undersized for modern inserts, and a meaningful percentage show offset joints or deteriorated mortar between sections.
- You’ve noticed a smoke or odor problem. If smoke backs into the room during a fire, or if you smell combustion gases when the fireplace isn’t in use, something in the system is compromised. A Level 2 gives us the footage to tell you exactly what and exactly where.
Our Level 2 Inspection Process
Here is what actually happens when we arrive at your Orland Park home. Nothing is skipped, nothing is billed as a surprise afterward.
- Written price delivered before we begin. Before any equipment comes out of the truck, you receive a written price for the inspection itself. Haven Standard Clause 1 – “Have it in writing” – means the scope, the price, and what you’ll receive at the end are documented before work starts. No “we’ll know more once we’re in there” conversations.
- Exterior inspection – crown, cap, flashing, and masonry. We examine the chimney crown for cracking or spalling, check the cap for corrosion or blockage, and look at the flashing where the chimney meets the roofline. In Orland Park, we frequently find cricket failures – a cricket is the small diverting ridge built behind wide chimneys to redirect water – on homes where the original construction used thin flashing without a proper cricket at all. We document everything with photos.
- Interior inspection – firebox, smoke chamber, and damper. We inspect the firebox for joint integrity, look at the smoke chamber for corbeling gaps or deteriorated parging, and test the damper operation. Creosote class is assessed and noted: Class I is a light deposit, Class II is a harder, tarry buildup, and Class III is the glazed form that requires chemical treatment or mechanical removal before a liner can be safely used.
- Camera scan of the flue liner. A video camera goes down the full length of the flue. We’re looking at liner type (clay tile, cast-in-place, or flexible stainless), joint integrity, offset sections, cracks, missing mortar, and blockage. The footage is recorded and available to you – not just interpreted for you. If we find a cracked tile at the fourth joint above the smoke chamber, you see exactly that on camera before we tell you what it means.
- Written findings report with photos. When we’re done, you receive a written findings report that names what we found, where it is, and what its condition rating means. The photo record is archived under Haven Standard Clause 4. If you later have a question about what we found or why we rated something the way we did, the documentation exists to answer it.
- Repair options quoted in writing – before you commit to anything. If the inspection finds conditions that need repair – a deteriorated liner, a cracked crown, a failed smoke chamber – we quote those repairs in writing, with materials specified. We source liner components from manufacturers including Olympia Chimney and Copperfield, and those material costs are itemized. You decide what to do next. There is no pressure and no conditional billing.
Before
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A Level 2 chimney inspection in Orland Park typically runs between $199 and $349 for a standard single-flue system. For details on how much chimney cleaning & sweep costs in 2026, see our Orland Park price guide. Here is what moves that number:
| Condition or Factor | Typical Price Effect |
|---|---|
| Single flue, standard two-story home | $199 – $249 |
| Two-flue chimney (common in older Orland Park colonials) | $279 – $349 |
| Inspection combined with a cleaning visit | Often reduces the total vs. two separate trips |
| Attic or crawl space access required for liner documentation | May add $40 – $75 depending on access |
| Real estate transaction requiring written certification | Included in base price – no separate documentation fee |
What the price includes: the camera scan, the written findings report, the documented photo record, and the written price for any recommended repairs. What it does not include: any repair work. Those are quoted separately, in writing, and you choose whether to proceed.
If you have a competitor’s written estimate, bring it to us. We offer a free second opinion on any written quote – not a vague reassurance that we’re cheaper, but an actual line-item review of what they proposed and what we’d charge for the same scope. Call (708) 294-2571 to schedule, or to ask a question before you book – we’re available 24/7.
What Orland Park Chimneys Actually Look Like Inside
Orland Park’s housing stock gives us a reasonably consistent picture of what the camera tends to find. The majority of wood-burning systems we inspect are clay tile liner systems built between 1978 and 1995. Those liners were typically installed in 9-inch or 13-inch tile runs, and after 30-plus winters of Chicago-area freeze-thaw cycling, the mortar between tile sections is often the first point of failure – not the tiles themselves. We regularly find a liner that looks intact on casual visual inspection but has open joints at three or four section transitions when the camera goes through.
The other common finding in the Orland Park area is smoke chamber deterioration. The smoke chamber is the funnel-shaped space above the firebox that compresses rising gases before they enter the flue. In older construction, that chamber was often built with stepped corbeling – a stair-step masonry profile – rather than a smooth parging coat. Stepped corbeling creates turbulence, reduces draft efficiency, and collects creosote faster than a properly parged chamber. It’s a condition that rarely produces an emergency on its own, but it consistently affects how well the fireplace performs and how quickly creosote accumulates, making soot removal more necessary over time.
None of this is catastrophic to discover. Identifying it early, with documentation, is the point. A cracked tile section found at a Level 2 inspection before a winter of heavy use is a liner repair. The same crack found after carbon monoxide has been entering a living space through it is a different situation entirely.
The Documentation You Walk Away With
After a Level 2 inspection in Orland Park, you receive:
- A written findings report naming each condition found, its location in the system, and what it means in plain terms
- A photo record archived under Haven Standard Clause 4, available to you on request
- Camera footage documentation of the flue liner condition
- Written repair options with itemized pricing, if any repair is warranted
- A written warranty on any repair work performed, backed by the 365-Day Done Right Promise
If your real estate transaction requires a written inspection report, that is what this produces. If your insurance company asks for documentation of chimney condition, that is what this produces. If you simply want a record of what your chimney looked like this year so you can track changes over time, the archive is there.
FAQs – Level 2 Inspection in Orland Park
How much does a Level 2 chimney inspection cost in Orland Park?
A Level 2 inspection in Orland Park runs $199 to $349 for most single-flue systems, and $279 to $349 for two-flue chimneys. The price includes the camera scan, written findings report, and documented photo record – no separate documentation fee for real estate transactions. Call (708) 294-2571 for a written quote before we arrive.
Is a Level 2 inspection required when buying a home in Orland Park?
NFPA 211 requires a Level 2 inspection any time a property changes ownership – so yes, if you’re buying or selling a home in Orland Park with a fireplace or wood-burning appliance, a Level 2 is the standard, though we also recommend an annual sweep for ongoing maintenance. A home inspector’s visual check does not meet that standard and doesn’t produce the written documentation most buyers’ attorneys or lenders want to see. We can usually schedule within a few days of your call to (708) 294-2571.
What’s the difference between a Level 1 and Level 2 chimney inspection?
A Level 1 inspection covers accessible surfaces with no special tools – essentially a visual check of the exterior and firebox. A Level 2 inspection adds a camera scan of the full flue interior and covers areas that aren’t accessible without equipment, including the full length of the liner. NFPA 211 specifies Level 2 for real estate transactions, after a chimney fire, and after any change of appliance or fuel type. At Emberly Chimney Cleaners, camera documentation is the default on every inspection – it’s not an upgrade.
How long does a Level 2 inspection take in Orland Park?
Most single-flue Level 2 inspections take 60 to 90 minutes from the time we arrive. A two-flue system or a chimney where attic access is needed to document liner routing runs closer to two hours. We arrive in uniform, we call or text ahead, and we give you a written price before the camera comes out. If you want to know the condition of your system before committing to anything, call (708) 294-2571 – estimates are free, and we don’t start work until you’ve seen the quote in writing.
Schedule Your Level 2 Inspection in Orland Park
If your fireplace is due for a camera inspection – whether you’re buying a home, haven’t had a documented look in a few years, or just want a written record of where things stand – call Emberly Chimney Cleaners at (708) 294-2571. We serve Orland Park and the surrounding southwest suburbs, our home base is built on doing this one standard correctly, and a live person answers every time. Written price before we start, documented photo record when we finish, 365-Day Done Right Promise behind the work. That’s the inspection you book when you want to actually know what your chimney looks like inside.
Written by Corrine Halstead, Owner at Emberly Chimney Cleaners Orland Park, serving Orland Park.