Craft Quantities
Plan & Takeoffs

Quote check

Check a chimney breast removal quote

Paste the quote you were given and enter your measurements. Every line is read against the job: what the quote leaves out, what it adds, which quantities sit outside the computed range, and what to ask. Quantities only — never prices.
  • 76Lines the job needs
  • 11Measurements
  • QuestionsNever a verdict

How the quote is read

Each line of a chimney breast removal quote is matched to the line of the job it names, or marked as something the Chimney breast removal takeoff does not measure — labour, removal, hire, fees, or anything else. Work the takeoff lists as part of the job but gives no quantity for is read as that work, not as something the quote adds.

The job’s own figures come from 11 measurements — breast width, how far the breast stands out, hearth in front of the breast, floor to ceiling, band made good round the breast, room length, room width, doors in the room, windows in the room, scaffold run under the stack, height to the working platform — run through the same calculators as the takeoff, so the two give the same figure for the same job.

Reading a chimney breast removal quote

A chimney breast quote prices a piece of demolition and a piece of structure that only an engineer can settle. Worth asking whether the support for the stack above is a firm figure or provisional until the engineer's design arrives, whose fee that design is, and whether the building control fee, the inspection of the brackets or beam before they are covered, and any party wall notice to a neighbour sit inside the price or are left to you.

Two quotes for one breast differ most in the making good. Worth seeing named whether the wall is plastered or dry-lined, whether the ceiling and the floor across the old hearth are made up ready for one finish, and whether the room is redecorated wall to wall or patched. Capping the pots needs access at roof level, so whether a scaffold is priced, and whether the cowls, the vent indoors, carting away the soot and rubble, and a registered engineer disconnecting any gas fire are each included, is worth settling before any work starts.

Three steps

  1. Give your measurements. The page opens on a typical job so it has something to show.
  2. Paste the quote's lines as they came, or add them one at a time. Leave the prices in — they are taken out, never read.
  3. Read the report: what is left out, what is added, what sits outside the range, and one list of questions to send.

Your quote

The chimney breast removal quote you were given

Paste from an email, or open or drop a PDF, Excel, CSV or text file, or a photo of the quote. Amounts of money are taken out before anything is read — this page compares quantities, never prices.

Nothing you paste or open leaves this device.

or one the job needs:

The reading

What the quote says, against the job

Chimney breast removal · Breast width 4 ft · How far the breast stands out 14 in · Hearth in front of the breast 18 in · Floor to ceiling 8 ft · Band made good round the breast 11.8 in · Room length 13 ft · Room width 12 ft · Doors in the room 1 · Windows in the room 1 · Scaffold run under the stack 14 ft · Height to the working platform 23 ftBreast width 1.2 m · How far the breast stands out 0.35 m · Hearth in front of the breast 0.45 m · Floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Band made good round the breast 0.3 m · Room length 4 m · Room width 3.6 m · Doors in the room 1 · Windows in the room 1 · Scaffold run under the stack 4.2 m · Height to the working platform 7 m

  • What it leaves out

    Every line the job needs that nothing on the quote reads as, with the quantity your measurements produce.

  • What it adds

    Lines this job's takeoff does not measure — labour, removal, hire, fees, anything else — each named for what it is.

  • What sits outside the range

    Quantities above or below the computed range, by how much, in the quote's unit or converted and shown.

  • What to ask

    One list of questions, in the quote's order, ready to copy and send. Questions, never a verdict.

Paste the quote above, or add its lines one at a time. The reading appears here as each line is read.

Outside what this takeoff measures

7

Nothing in the reading measures these. Whether the quote covers each is worth asking in its own right: a scope missing from a quote tends to become a cost after work has started. Why each is left out is on the takeoff.

  • The support's design
  • The stack above the roof, removed or rebuilt, and the neighbour's half where a stack is shared, with the notice or agreement that cutting into a party wall brings in England and Wales under the Party Wall etc
  • A back boiler or gas fire's replacement
  • The floor finish over the made-up floor
  • Removing an asbestos flue liner, flue pipe or fire panel that the survey finds, which is specialist or licensed work outside this page's rows
  • The breast in the room above
  • Moving cables, sockets and pipes off the breast beyond disconnecting them and reconnecting them nearby, which is listed as work and not measured

The reference

Every line the reading looks for

For Breast width 4 ft · How far the breast stands out 14 in · Hearth in front of the breast 18 in · Floor to ceiling 8 ft · Band made good round the breast 11.8 in · Room length 13 ft · Room width 12 ft · Doors in the room 1 · Windows in the room 1 · Scaffold run under the stack 14 ft · Height to the working platform 23 ftBreast width 1.2 m · How far the breast stands out 0.35 m · Hearth in front of the breast 0.45 m · Floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Band made good round the breast 0.3 m · Room length 4 m · Room width 3.6 m · Doors in the room 1 · Windows in the room 1 · Scaffold run under the stack 4.2 m · Height to the working platform 7 m. Each is the calculator linked under it, run with those measurements; a range is that calculator at both ends of one choice, not a margin for error.

How the ranges are taken

Where the choice is cutting waste, the ends are the site’s own allowances: 5%, the tight buffer of a crew with a planned set-out, and 15%, the wider one a first-timer orders. Where the calculator decides between patterns or materials, the ends are the options it offers. Where it adds nothing for loss, the range runs from the net quantity to 15% over it.

A minimum — the fewest hangers a spacing allows, the least airflow a room needs — has no upper end. A single figure carries an allowance the material itself needs, such as a lap, and names it.

What a reading like this cannot see

  • It does not know your prices, your market, or what the work ought to cost.
  • It does not know the building — the access, the condition of what is there, or what has to happen first.
  • It cannot check a lump sum, because there is no quantity in one.
  • A line it reads as missing may be priced under another name. A quantity outside the range is not evidence of anything. Each is a reason to ask a question.
  • Two quotes are not comparable until their scopes are.
  • It is not advice, and it is no substitute for a second quote.

The full takeoff

Every quantity for this job, with its working

The Chimney breast removal takeoff runs the same calculators on the same measurements and shows what sits under each line here.

Open the takeoffEvery quote check

  • Base, allowance, order

    Each line's quantity before and after its allowance, and what to buy.

  • Every allowance editable

    Change a waste figure and the order follows, with its source named.

  • Into a project

    Add the whole job to a workspace with your own prices.

Frequently asked questions

What quantities does a chimney breast removal job need?
It depends on the measurements, so this page asks for yours. At the size it opens on — Breast width 1.2 m · How far the breast stands out 0.35 m · Hearth in front of the breast 0.45 m · Floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Band made good round the breast 0.3 m · Room length 4 m · Room width 3.6 m · Doors in the room 1 · Windows in the room 1 · Scaffold run under the stack 4.2 m · Height to the working platform 7 m — the lines come to: Backing and finish coat on the wall, 53.8–58.9 kg; Plasterboard (drywall) for the hole in the ceiling, 1 sheet; Skim coat on the boarded ceiling, 3.07–3.36 kg; Wall paint for the room, 6.63–7.62 L; Ceiling paint for the room, 2.88–3.31 L; Skip (dumpster) for the rubble, 1.61 m³. In imperial units — Breast width 4 ft · How far the breast stands out 14 in · Hearth in front of the breast 18 in · Floor to ceiling 8 ft · Band made good round the breast 11.8 in · Room length 13 ft · Room width 12 ft · Doors in the room 1 · Windows in the room 1 · Scaffold run under the stack 14 ft · Height to the working platform 23 ft — they come to: Plasterboard (drywall) on the wall, 2 sheets; Plasterboard (drywall) for the hole in the ceiling, 1 sheet; Joint compound (mud) for the wall and ceiling board, 1 x 4.5 gal box; Joint tape for the wall and ceiling board, 58–63.5 ft; Wall paint for the room, 1.82–2.09 gal; Ceiling paint for the room, 0.78–0.9 gal; Skip (dumpster) for the rubble, 2.21 yd³.
Which line on a chimney breast removal quote varies the most?
The Wall paint for the room: 6.63–7.62 L for a job measured Breast width 1.2 m · How far the breast stands out 0.35 m · Hearth in front of the breast 0.45 m · Floor to ceiling 2.4 m · Band made good round the breast 0.3 m · Room length 4 m · Room width 3.6 m · Doors in the room 1 · Windows in the room 1 · Scaffold run under the stack 4.2 m · Height to the working platform 7 m, depending on how much is allowed for loss over the net figure, up to 15%.
What does a chimney breast removal quote often leave out?
The reading names every line of the job that nothing on the quote reads as — any of the 7 lines the takeoff measures. The takeoff also lists 7 things it does not measure, shown under the reading, and each is worth asking about: a scope missing from a quote tends to become a cost after work has started.The reading names every line of the job that nothing on the quote reads as — any of the 6 lines the takeoff measures. The takeoff also lists 7 things it does not measure, shown under the reading, and each is worth asking about: a scope missing from a quote tends to become a cost after work has started.
Can I paste the quote exactly as it came?
Yes — from an email, a PDF or a spreadsheet, one item to a line. Amounts of money are taken out before anything is read, headings and totals are skipped, and each line is shown with what it was read as, so a misreading is one correction. Quantities in the other unit system are converted and the conversion is shown; a count of boxes is never compared with a count of tiles.
Does this check the price as well?
No. It reads quantities, never prices, and this site publishes none: an installed price moves with the market, the season, the access and the specification, so a figure for what the work ought to cost would give you confidence in a number nobody can defend. A quantity against your own measurements is checkable, and every figure here links to the calculator that produced it.