Soot Down My Chimney

[Ric.ror]

When ever the wind is bad what looks like soot lands in my fireplace leaving the fire covered
Now I only had the chimney swept s few days before Christmas and I NEVER use the fire so where is the soot coming from?
I must add that next door have some kind of solid fuel fire as they have logs in the back garden and sometimes smoke coming through their chimney
Could this be relevant?

[The Builder]

How old is the house, Ric?

[Ric.ror]

I think it's a 50s semi

[The Builder]

A 50s semi would usually have a clay liner rather than the old-fashioned stone flues which tended to hold soot.

Just a guess, but possibly there's some caked-on soot that escaped cleaning, but is now breaking up. Perhaps have another clean.

[Clanad]

Ageeing with Builder I think you'll find that if your fireplace is original and of '50s vintage the mechanism inside of and directly above the actual fireplace opening is an area and mechanism called the smoke shelf and damper (at least here in the U.S.) which is made of steel and easily holds quite a bit of soot. There's probably a "T" handle on the front of the fireplace that moves in and out adjusting the damper from closed to full open. Absent that, the adjustment handle could actually be inside of the fireplace opening near the top.

I'd expect that if you move that vigorously even more soot is going to fall, although the smoke shelf is fairly flat and may not empty into the fireplace.

Most chimney cleaners, even the better ones, simply don't clean that area very well, since their motivation is to remove soot within the chimney itself to help prevent fires (hence the clay liner which are actuall sewer pipe here) and it's rather difficult to reach effectively...