Forty years ago my father-in-law lent me his old set of rods to clean our chimney. I still remember his warning, "keep twisting clockwise as the rods go up the flue – it keeps everything together". He even tied a clothes line to the brush in case it fell of. He was that tight he couldn't bear the thought of loosing a thing. In the end he did though, he died on the bog and his missus copped the lot!!……………….
…………….. but I digress. Soot acts like weightlifters resin – you can really get a good grip as you twist and push. So good in fact that I twisted an amount of skin from the palms of both hands – very painful. I have never swept a chimney since.
Rik