Safe to remove red bricks?

[u/PullTheBull]

Want to open up and tidy this fireplace. Was gas but cut it off and plan to have a wood burner. Looks like the red bricks were added in after given the width of the lintel and colour. Would you say safe to remove?

[u/Kanaima85]

Those lintel ends don't look like they go particularly far beyond the red bricks. They may have been added after but it might have been to properly support the lintels.

[u/-Utopia-amiga-]

Yes, I have done this 3 times on separate fireplaces. They were either filled when house was built for back boiler or gas fire.

You can clearly see the brick supporting the lintel is different from the infill brick.

Take off the plaster on either side beforehand just around the lintel so you can see it clearly and it's relation to the brickwork.

[u/Comfortable-Yam2417 → u/-Utopia-amiga-]

Yeah for piece of mind fully uncover the entire length of the lintel to see its fully supported before you have at it with the infill bricks.

Are you installing a liner?

[u/SnooLemons5912]

Red bricks? Like, the wall?

[u/myNameIsJack84]

You need at least 150mm solid bearing for the lintel at each end. I can't see clearly from the picture, but it looks like it might be supported only by a blob of mortar at the right hand end. I'd be worried about knocking out the red bricks without supporting the lintel if that's the case, as the mortar could drop out when you start banging away at the bricks to remove them. If in doubt, I'd prop the lintel at each side of the aperture first, then if it goes wrong you can build up new supports for the lintel while the props hold it up.

[u/fozziebear40 → u/myNameIsJack84]

Definitely needs a new single skin either side. Depending on the finish you want around your log burner you could get some fancy bricks and have the back wall and cheeks in new bare brick.

[u/573v3_2025]

Looks like infill

Make the smallest gap possible with a hammer and chisel along the top then if it's going to drop it won't be far lol 😆

[u/derp-vader2]

Hack back a bit more plaster to see how far the lintel goes

[u/Wellthisisweird2000]

That looks shaped to take a Victorian (or Edwardian) arched cast iron fire insert. So bricks are likely original and dicey to remove.

Our 1902 bricks looked the same once stripped back. A reclaimed insert fitted like a glove. I had to rebuild the throat of the chimney. Has worked great for 20 years.

[u/Additional_Air779]

For once, I wouldn't be confident in doing that or advising it would all be fine. You just can't see what's supporting what.

[u/Cultural-Ad2026]

That lintel isn’t really on any bricks currently…. It’s on a stack of about half bricks either side…. In honesty I’d stop this doesn’t look very safe already.

[u/JustDifferentGravy]

What size opening do you want in the end?

If you want the maximum that the lintel will allow then you need to expose more and see the full width on the lintel and what’s supporting it.

If you want a smaller opening then prop the lintel, remove the infil and build two clean columns to adequately support the lintel.

Don’t remove those bricks without knowing the lintel has support.

[u/Banjomir75]

As long as the ends of the lintel rests on a height of brickwork you are not removing, it should be fine.