Hit 6,000 flue brushes used last Tuesday and it caught me off guard

I was cleaning out my truck and counted the worn out brushes in my scrap pile. Six thousand brushes is a lot of soot and creosote. Has anyone else kept track of how many brushes they've gone through?

2 comments

2 Comments

rowanjenkins2d ago

And you know what's funny, I never really counted until last year when I had to replace three in one week and it got me thinking. The real trick is to mark the handle with a notch every time you retire one, then you can't help but notice the pile growing. I ended up at 4,721 before I lost count and just started a fresh tally. The worn out ones make decent handles for small scrapers if you cut the bristle end off and file it flat, saves a few bucks over buying new ones.

the_evan2d ago

Notching handles is clever but counting paintbrushes seems like overthinking a simple thing. A brush is done when it stops laying paint right, no need for a tally system. That scraper trick is solid though, repurposing the handles beats tossing them in the trash.