Masonry repair
Sweep & inspection
Caps & crowns
Flue relining
Gas fireplace serviceLevel 1 sweep and inspection to the NFPA 211 annual standard - flue, crown, cap, and flashing checked and photographed
Chimney sweep logs do not sweep chimneys. They loosen some creosote - which then falls where a brush and vacuum still have to collect it.
Famco Crown Repair: The Marietta Owner’s Guide
If you’ve got a Famco chimney crown that’s cracked, spalled, or letting water into your masonry, we stock the repair materials to fix it right, and we do this work across Marietta weekly. Installed Famco crown repair in the Marietta area typically runs $450 – $900 depending on the crown size, how much of the old surface needs removal, and whether we’re doing a full recast or a resurfacing with a crown coat system. Most Marietta homeowners discover the crown has failed after a rainstorm, when they notice water staining on the ceiling near the fireplace or a white mineral streak bleeding down the outside brick.
The chimney crown is the concrete slab at the very top that sheds water off the brick. When it cracks, water doesn’t just sit on top, it works down into the chimney chase and attacks the mortar joints below. Here’s what every Marietta homeowner should know about Famco crown repair before they pick up the phone.
Key Takeaways
- We repair and recast Famco-style crowns and stock compatible crown coat materials on the truck.
- Installed repair in Marietta runs roughly $450 – $900, with a written price before we start.
- Water cracking is the number-one failure mode, especially with our freeze-thaw cycles in Cobb County winters.
- Every Famco crown repair carries our 365-Day Done Right Promise in writing.
Which Famco Models This Applies To
Famco manufactures a broad line of chimney caps, chase covers, and crown products, but the crown systems we most often repair on Marietta homes are the poured concrete crowns paired with Famco multi-flue caps and the prefabricated crown forms used on masonry chases. The compatibility gotcha here is that Famco caps are sized to sit on a crown with a specific overhang, typically 2½ to 3 inches beyond the brick on all sides. If your existing crown was poured too small or has crumbled back at the edges, a new Famco cap may not seat correctly, so we often recast the crown and set the cap in the same visit.
If you’re not sure what you have, look for a stamped label on the underside of the cap or on the chase cover. No label? Measure the outside dimensions of your flue tile and the overall crown width. That tells us whether a factory Famco replacement crown form fits or whether we should form and pour a custom crown to match. For most Marietta homeowners, the honest answer is that a custom crown using a Famco-compatible crown coat system outlasts a factory crown form, especially on older chimneys where the brick dimensions have shifted over time. We’re an independent shop, not a Famco distributor, so we recommend what fits your chimney, not what’s convenient to sell.
Styles & brands we work with





Signs Your Famco Crown Repair Is Failing
- Hairline cracks across the crown surface. This is how it starts. Water finds the crack, freezes overnight in a Marietta winter, and the ice widens it a little more each season. Left alone, hairline becomes structural.
- Spalling, or chunks of concrete flaking off onto the roof or ground. This means water has been working into the pores of the crown for a while. The surface is actively breaking apart, and you’ll see small concrete chips around the chimney base or in the gutter.
- White mineral streaks running down the brick. That’s efflorescence, which is a polite way of saying water is moving through the masonry and depositing salt on the outside. It tells you the crown isn’t shedding water anymore.
- Water stains on the ceiling or wall near the fireplace. By the time water shows up indoors, it’s traveled through the crown, into the chase, and down to your framing or drywall. This is the point where repair costs go up because we’re often fixing the crown and the interior damage path.
- A cap that wobbles or has shifted off level. Famco caps sit on the crown. If the crown has delaminated around the edges, the cap loses its stable seat and can sit crookedly or even lift in a strong wind. A crooked cap funnels water under itself instead of away from the flue.
See the difference
Before
After
Before
After
Before
AfterReplacement Cost & What’s Included
For a standard masonry chimney crown on a Marietta home, you’re looking at $450 – $900 installed. That range covers the work the way we do it: remove the damaged top layer, build a proper form with the correct overhang and a drip edge, pour or trowel the repair material, apply a Famco-compatible crown coat to seal the surface, and then re-set your cap. The spread depends on crown size, whether we’re doing a partial resurface or a full recast, and how much of the old material has to be chipped out first.
Here’s what we mean by a written price before work starts: you get a line-item quote that shows the material cost, the labor hours, and the total. No “well, it ended up being more” at the door. Every Famco crown repair we do in Marietta is covered by a written guarantee and a free second visit if the repair fails within 365 days. That’s the standing commitment, not a promotion.
| Crown Repair Type | Typical Installed Range in Marietta |
|---|---|
| Resurface with crown coat system | $450 – $600 |
| Partial crown rebuild (edges and corners) | $550 – $750 |
| Full recast with new form and drip edge | $700 – $900+ |
DIY or Call Us?
What you can safely do: walk around the chimney with binoculars or from a safe roof vantage point and look for visible cracks, missing concrete chunks, or a cap that’s sitting off level. Take photos. That helps you make an informed decision. What we’d caution against is climbing on a roof with a bucket of patching compound and trying to skim coat the crown yourself. This is height work on a sometimes steep Cobb County roof pitch, and a crown that isn’t prepped correctly just delaminates again in eighteen months. Also, if the damage has reached the point where the crown is letting water into your chase, a surface patch won’t stop what’s already moving through the masonry.
Cory Mitchell and our crew have seen enough Marietta chimneys to know what a failed crown looks like from the ground, but we’ll always give you the photo proof before we recommend anything. If you want to talk it through, call (762) 249-4619 and we’ll walk you through what you’re seeing.
FAQs
A properly poured and sealed crown in the Marietta climate should last 20 to 30 years before it needs anything more than a crown coat reapplication. The freeze-thaw cycles we get in Cobb County, especially December through February, are what cut that lifespan short when the crown wasn’t poured with the right overhang or wasn’t sealed correctly in the first place. If you’re getting cracks at the 10-year mark, the original crown likely never had a proper drip edge. Call (762) 249-4619 and we’ll take a look.
Yes, most cracked crowns can be repaired, not replaced, as long as the concrete underneath hasn’t crumbled away entirely. We remove the failing surface layer, fill the cracks, and apply a crown coat system that flexes with our seasonal temperature swings. Full replacement is only needed when the crown has lost its structural lip or the damage goes deep enough that the whole thing needs to be recast. We’ll show you photos of what we find before we recommend a direction.
Most Marietta crown repairs happen in a single visit, usually 3 to 5 hours including setup, demolition of the damaged layer, and application of the repair material. If we’re doing a full recast, we may need to leave the form in place and return the next day, but the after-coating and cap reset typically happen on the same trip. You’ll know the timeline before we start, and you’ll get live arrival tracking so you’re not waiting around.
We keep Famco-compatible crown coat, crack filler, and forming materials on our trucks, and we also work with DuraFlex, HeatShield, and Gelco products so we’re not limited to one manufacturer’s solution. If your chimney has a specific Famco cap model that needs to be re-seated after the crown work, we can source or match it. This isn’t a special-order run for most standard Marietta masonry chimneys.
Ready to get the crown fixed before the next rain? Call (762) 249-4619 for a free, written estimate. We’ll get you on the schedule, show you exactly what’s wrong with photos, and send you a digital invoice you can pay from your phone. No vague windows, no mystery pricing.
Written by Cory Mitchell, Owner, Hadley Chimney Marietta at Hadley Chimney Marietta, serving Marietta and nearby areas.