Overlooked Fire Hazard!

Recently a neighbor of ours had a fire in their home. That is what prompted me to write this article. An often overlooked fire hazard is the build-up of lint in a dryer vent or exhaust. The dryer vent in most homes is a 4” tube, usually made of flexible material for the part between the dryer and the wall and rigid material inside the wall and up in the attic. As your clothes rotate in the heated dryer, small pieces of lint are blown into this tube. These can adhere to the sides of the tube and build up in thickness slowing down the drying process as well as creating a fire hazard.

 According to the U.S. Fire Administration for every 1,000 fires caused by lint build-up 1.8 lives are lost, over 30 people are injured and damages to the home average over $9,600 (see URL below for more information).

Not to be missed is the fact that the dryer will not work at its peak performance when the vent is clogged and will cause it to take longer to dry your clothes and drive up your utility bills. This was happening in our home with Suz telling me that something was wrong with our dryer. Our home is 6 years old and cleaning the vent didn’t occur to me until our neighbor’s fire. I bought a lint cleaning device, ran the powered brush up the vent and vacuumed out a bucket full of lint. Now we can dry clothes in half the time.

As a service to our community, I’m offering to clean vents of widows and single women at no cost. When I do this, for your comfort, I will bring another person with me, probably someone from our church. This takes about 30 minutes and as soon as I’m finished we will leave. There are no strings attached no cost, no sales pitch, and no obligation, just allow us to show God’s love to do this and expect nothing in return. You can contact me at 817 988 0149, email me at ronnie@RGodfreyHomes.com or call First Baptist at 254 897 2351.

The equipment that I use: http://www.linteater.com/ and the URL mentioned above.

http://www.usfa.fema.gov/downloads/pdf/statistics/v13i7.pdf