Gave up on rotary brushes for 5 years, finally tried one again

I swore off rotary chimney brushes back in 2019 after one got jammed in a tight flue and I spent two hours with a pry bar and a lot of bad language getting it out. Stuck with stiff wire brushes and poly rods ever since, even when customers asked why the job took twice as long. Last month a homeowner in Akron had a chimney with creosote so baked on that my wire brush just bounced off it like a ping pong ball. Pulled out an old rotary head I had sitting in my van, hooked it up to my drill, and it chewed through that buildup in about 15 minutes. Still not gonna use one on every job, but for heavy buildup or glazed creosote, it's night and day different than what I remembered. Anyone else had a tool they hated for years then came back to and realized they were using it wrong the whole time?

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the_piper18d ago

That "night and day" part hit me hard. I had the exact same thing with my angle grinder, hated it for years because I kept using the wrong discs. Took me forever to figure out it wasn't the tool, it was me. The first time I used it right I felt like such a dummy. Now I always tell people to give tools a second shot after they learn more about them. Sometimes you just need the right setup and a fresh head.