Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => The Knowledge => OT Knowledge => Topic started by: Mrs Pingu on 10 December, 2015, 09:46:16 pm
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Due to our damp chimney probs I've been looking into reinstating some sort of fire in the hole.
Completely ignoring the aesthetic and other similar considerations, I want to know what's going to be best for our chimney in terms of a) drying it out and b) making least amount of new condensation. This assumes a closed wood burning stove (burning briquettes rather than damp wood) vs either a gas stove or a glass fronted high efficiency gas fire.
Also, do the gas stoves & fires have some sort of vent to allow draw up the chimney?
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For proper function and efficiency, a liner is recommended for wood-burners. When we had one properly fitted at the old house, they dropped the liner down the chimney from above, and then back-filled with vermiculite or some such magic fluff.
Anything you put in that results in fumes in the chimney will lead to moisture, especially gas I would have thought. At least you get the option to burn dry wood with a wood burner.
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Everything makes H2O, I have it in my head that gas would be worse but not sure why, possibly difference in chimney temp. Or I could be making it all up.
Gas would fit our lifestyle better (lazy sods in a 1 bed flat) but I'm not convinced it's best for the building.
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If there's going to be a liner, then the flue gasses aren't actually in contact with the chimney. It's just a big pipe-shaped heater...
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Maybe cos gas is mostly methane CH4 but there's no H in coal...
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there's no H in coal...
Fairly sure there is. Bake it off and you get coke...
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If there's going to be a liner, then the flue gasses aren't actually in contact with the chimney. It's just a big pipe-shaped heater...
Well ok, some page on the Internets reckoned that gas exhaust is cooler hence you can use PVC pipe through a wall, but that was the Internets. ...
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If there's going to be a liner, then the flue gasses aren't actually in contact with the chimney. It's just a big pipe-shaped heater...
Well ok, some page on the Internets reckoned that gas exhaust is cooler hence you can use PVC pipe through a wall, but that was the Internets. ...
I'm sure the internets know more about the subject than I do (which is limited to applied common sense). PVC certainly seems to be common on boilers, so that's a fair point.
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The liners can be insulated with vermiculite, but cam also be wrap insulated themselves. This makes them a bit wider to fit down the flue, but lessens the risk of loads of vermiculite escaping into another flue or your fireplace.
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Although the kids would love it if Santa came down the chimney accompanied by a snow fall.
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Don't modern installations use a balanced flu with the warm exhaust running down the middle and the incoming air down the outside, which is why the outer tube can be PVC. I would have thought if the intent is to warm the chimney to dry it out, neither gas or wood burning stove would be that effective. An open wood/coal fire would be effective, but messy.
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Probably the best (for the building) solution is to open the flue and leave it open, allowing warm air from the room to pass out of it - in other words ventilation. Not very energy efficient of course, but it's what we do in our cottage. And we're fortunate enough to be able to burn wood in an open fire occasionally, which certainly warms the chimney breast through.
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Don't modern installations use a balanced flu with the warm exhaust running down the middle and the incoming air down the outside, which is why the outer tube can be PVC. I would have thought if the intent is to warm the chimney to dry it out, neither gas or wood burning stove would be that effective. An open wood/coal fire would be effective, but messy.
Spot on. The gas exhaust flue is metal, the outer pipe can be plastic because it is for intake air.
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Don't modern installations use a balanced flu with the warm exhaust running down the middle and the incoming air down the outside, which is why the outer tube can be PVC. I would have thought if the intent is to warm the chimney to dry it out, neither gas or wood burning stove would be that effective. An open wood/coal fire would be effective, but messy.
Spot on. The gas exhaust flue is metal, the outer pipe can be plastic because it is for intake air.
And limited in length to (as far as my google-fu can tell) 6m, presumably for a fanned flue.
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Probably the best (for the building) solution is to open the flue and leave it open, allowing warm air from the room to pass out of it - in other words ventilation. Not very energy efficient of course, but it's what we do in our cottage. And we're fortunate enough to be able to burn wood in an open fire occasionally, which certainly warms the chimney breast through.
We're doing that at the moment. I need some extra heat in the living room though - it's got the smallest radiator in the flat (possibly because the previous owner had a ££££ burning open gas fire) and it's therefore the coldest room in the place. Brr.
Maybe things will be better when I've had the pointing redone and the water can escape back out of the wall. :-\
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Open chimneys leach heat out of the room. In the cottage we use the living room would be warm when the fire was lit and cold (not as cold as Aberdeen, but close) an hour later. With a woodburner installed the heat stays way longer. Magnitudes longer.
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We had a log-burner installed last year. Our external chimney stack had previously been taken down, back into the loft floor. They dropped a flexible steel liner tube down our old chimney and bridged the gap between loft floor and the roof tiles with stainless steel "double wall" tube.
We have a Burley wood stove which are claimed to be around 89% efficient when up to temperature. Since their operating temperature is many hundreds of degrees I imagine the steel tube in the old chimney must be doing a good job of drying out any damp. 89% efficiency is up there with modern Gas boilers (though I expect there are all sorts of caveats if I expect to achieve that figure). They use secondary combustion to ignite unburnt gases. The way logs burn in an efficient sealed stove is very different to how they burn in an open fire.
Burley call it "the fireball effect". The logs aren't burning as you'd normally expect, they just get so hot that it "squeezes" the gas out of them and you see the gas burning.
I was so impressed I took a video of the effect... Fireball 2ndary combustion (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiXBRSCE8vI)
The log just slowly turns to dust over a period of about an hour and kicks out 5kW (I have a very small stove which can turn out north-facing front room into a sauna if we leave the door closed).
You also have a 30Kg lump of iron acting as a radiator in the morning, many hours after the actual fire has gone out.
I clean the ash out my my log burner about once a month, because there isn't any ash left to speak of, possibly a few tablespoons of it. It burns logs to dust. They are very efficient.
Open fires are extremely inefficient unless you view them as an efficient way of getting rid of surplus wood rather than an effective way of heating a room.
Open fires are about 10% efficient and a really bad one, with a poorly matched chimney, can actually draw more heat out of the room than it puts back.
Cleaning a steel tube will also be less hassle than cleaning an old chimney I expect.
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IF going down the open fire route should check flue lining. An unused sealed non ventilated flue will produce interstitial condensation.
CICO chimney linings retrofit new refractory lining via chimney breast.
http://www.chimney-problems.co.uk/
I am sure that there are other companies out there this is just one I know of.
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Open chimneys leach heat out of the room. In the cottage we use the living room would be warm when the fire was lit and cold (not as cold as Aberdeen, but close) an hour later. With a woodburner installed the heat stays way longer. Magnitudes longer.
I guess it depends on how much air is getting in to the room, to slow the circulation to leach the heat out. Our grate is a Baxi one - no back-boiler, but rather a pit sunk into the floor (which houses an ash-can), and a vent to the outside wall, with a flap valve on it operated at the grate. Open the valve to start the fire (increase the draught) then close once established. The ash can will take a weeks worth of evening fires. The fireback can still be so hot in the morning that a new fire can't be laid as the paper would char, and it does do a fair job of putting heat into the chimney breasts. But ours isn't the main form of heat, the GFCH is. We just like the atmosphere it gives. If it were the main then we'd open out the fireplace again and install a wood burning stove.
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An open fire is not under consideration here. Only a closed gas fire/stove or a woodburner, which would have to use briquettes as we don't have the storage to season wood.
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Spiral wound, flexible steel flue liners need to be replaced after a few years, as they can burn through. Considering the glass on a modern wood burning stove can reach over 1000ºc the flue liner has to take a considerable amount of heat.
Also if there is rain coming down the chimney it creates a very aggressive environment for steel when the water comes in contact with the products from combustion that line the chimney.
I built both our chimneys from scratch after taking down the existing ones when I took the roof off. They're made from two layers of precast elements that stack on top of each other and create a double lined flue. You could probably line your existing flue with the inner precast units I used and backfill with vermiculite. As both the precast clay liner and vermiculite absorb moisture, they would dry the flue out when you lit a fire in the burner.
It's essential that the wood fuel is seasoned correctly, as unseasoned wood coats the flue in tar, which can lead to a chimney fire....exciting, but not so good.
The units are called Isokern and are made from Leca type clay pellets with a cement binder.
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An open fire is not under consideration here. Only a closed gas fire/stove or a woodburner, which would have to use briquettes as we don't have the storage to season wood.
We used briquettes in ours - you might find some posts from me somewhere on the matter.
Anyway - they burn with thermonuclear heat, but quite quickly; it takes some getting used to because they're nothing like logs. The knack is to get a really small, but really hot fire, and keep it that way. Which means loading one or two more briquettes on, frequently. Wood burners are labour intensive.
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Wood burners are labour intensive.
And even morsø if you chop your own wood.
I put my back out last weekend splitting some large rounds which have been seasoning for a year or so.
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there's no H in coal...
Fairly sure there is. Bake it off and you get coke...
Depends on the coal. Anthracite is pretty much the same chemical composition as coke, just harder. Bituminous coal, which is the usual stuff, contains quite a lot of hydrocarbons. Still a lot less than gas per kWh of heat.
The composition of the coal affects how it needs to be burnt; anthracite needs lots of primary air (from under the firebed) whereas coal with a lot of volatiles needs this too. but also a lot of secondary air (air introduced above the firebed) to burn the hydrocarbon gases driven off by the heat. Wood only needs secondary air. because the stove basically cooks the wood to gasify it and the gases are what is burnt.
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Wood burners are labour intensive.
And even morsø if you chop your own wood.
I put my back out last weekend splitting some large rounds which have been seasoning for a year or so.
Hope you're back feels better soon Feanor, large rounds are bloody heavy work. I've been splitting 4 tonnes of fresh Beech for the last two weeks or so, with another 15 cubic metres to fell and split before christmas. Despite being a very dense wood, it splits like a dream when green and makes for one of the best firewoods.
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My parents have given me some large rounds which are very, very hard to split. It's more a case of knocking bits off the sides as they won't split through the middle. The smaller they get, the less tough they are. I think it's fairly old beech which has gone hard.
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It is far easier to split the wood when it is newly cut, before letting it dry.
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A hydraulic log splitter can make it a lot easier.
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I'm still no closer to deciding what to do :-\
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It is far easier to split the wood when it is newly cut, before letting it dry.
I think that's why they gave them to me!
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We have had our wood burner for two years now and it is now the main source of heat in the flat. The central heating is set to 15c but rarely comes on. The flat actually feels dry and warm now, something we never felt with radiators alone.
Oh and stove top cooking is nice as well.
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IF going down the open fire route should check flue lining. An unused sealed non ventilated flue will produce interstitial condensation.
CICO chimney linings retrofit new refractory lining via chimney breast.
http://www.chimney-problems.co.uk/
I am sure that there are other companies out there this is just one I know of.
Yup, CICO is the thing... we had a wood burning (well, multi fuel, actually) stove fitted about 10 years or more ago, and didn't line the flue. This was OK, but common sense said we lined it as it was a bit crappy, so we had ours done by CICO, and do not regret the £1800 spent for a moment. Obviously the process introduces moisture in the lightweight insulating concrete used, but then the stove will gradually dry that out, and keep it dried out. We own our house outright, and of course it adds to the value of the house, but you will need to consider if this is appropriate for your flat, which presumably is leasehold.
I'd be in favour of a woodburning stove, they really aren't much trouble. Easy to light, yes, there's a bit of ash to remove, but generally no grief, and the hotter flue temperatures over a gas fires will help to keep the flue nice and dried out. For solid fuel stoves of any sort, you need a better sort fo flue liner than you need for gas. I think its either a double layer stainless steel one, or something like the CICO. An additional plus point for us, for the CICO system, is that it structurally stabilised the chimney a bit. This may or may not apply to chez Pingu.
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Hmm, CICO stabilising the chimney might be a good idea as we do sometimes get bits of what I assume are the old lime parging https://www.spab.org.uk/advice/technical-qas/technical-qa-27-chimney-maintenance/ falling down the flue when it's windy and rainy. Having said that I'm just about to get the thing repointed to replace the cement pointing with breathable lime mortar at great expense so would putting an impermeable liner in be such a good thing? Also we're in Scotland so we own the flat, it's not leasehold.
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Hmm, needs access point every 2 meters? Hahaha, that's not going to happen. We're talking granite here....
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My parents have given me some large rounds which are very, very hard to split. It's more a case of knocking bits off the sides as they won't split through the middle. The smaller they get, the less tough they are. I think it's fairly old beech which has gone hard.
When you hit it with the splitting axe, strike it at the edge furthest away from you and not in the middle of the round. That way you can run the split from the edge into the centre of the round.
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And when it splits unexpectedly, your axe will go through, the handle will hit the log and either be damaged or the end will kick up into your face.
Strike the log side closest to you, not furthest away.
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And when it splits unexpectedly, your axe will go through, the handle will hit the log and either be damaged or the end will kick up into your face.
Strike the log side closest to you, not furthest away.
Strike the log closest to you and you're guaranteed to hit your shin with the axe and make a bloody mess, but if that's your thing, don't let anyone stop you.
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No - not unless you are doing many many things wrong.
I had to chop 1-2 barrowloads of wood from age 13 until 19, every day.
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And my chainsaw is bigger than your chainsaw. ;)
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Typical. A couple of cyclists bragging about their Choppers...
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And my chainsaw is bigger than your chainsaw. ;)
No, didn't use a chainsaw until I was 19. Firewood for heating and cooking for a household, all cut by hand.
:P
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It's amazing what can be done with a couple of steel wedges and a 7lb sledge. ;)
PH
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We had a log-burner installed last year. Our external chimney stack had previously been taken down, back into the loft floor. They dropped a flexible steel liner tube down our old chimney and bridged the gap between loft floor and the roof tiles with stainless steel "double wall" tube.
We have a Burley wood stove which are claimed to be around 89% efficient when up to temperature. Since their operating temperature is many hundreds of degrees I imagine the steel tube in the old chimney must be doing a good job of drying out any damp. 89% efficiency is up there with modern Gas boilers (though I expect there are all sorts of caveats if I expect to achieve that figure). They use secondary combustion to ignite unburnt gases. The way logs burn in an efficient sealed stove is very different to how they burn in an open fire.
Burley call it "the fireball effect". The logs aren't burning as you'd normally expect, they just get so hot that it "squeezes" the gas out of them and you see the gas burning.
I was so impressed I took a video of the effect... Fireball 2ndary combustion (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiXBRSCE8vI)
The log just slowly turns to dust over a period of about an hour and kicks out 5kW (I have a very small stove which can turn out north-facing front room into a sauna if we leave the door closed).
You also have a 30Kg lump of iron acting as a radiator in the morning, many hours after the actual fire has gone out.
I clean the ash out my my log burner about once a month, because there isn't any ash left to speak of, possibly a few tablespoons of it. It burns logs to dust. They are very efficient.
Open fires are extremely inefficient unless you view them as an efficient way of getting rid of surplus wood rather than an effective way of heating a room.
Open fires are about 10% efficient and a really bad one, with a poorly matched chimney, can actually draw more heat out of the room than it puts back.
Cleaning a steel tube will also be less hassle than cleaning an old chimney I expect.
From a combustion point of view, you are always burning in the gas/vapor phase. Its a very complicated bit of thermodynamics/ chemistry where you are essentially taking the longer carbon chains and breaking them down into those that can burn hence you seeing that phenomenon of gas burning at the surface of the log
We used to have a similar cast iron fire and when I bought the house had some coal which left the obvious residue, we then found a source for some farmed beech which left almost no residue. It all depends on the mineral content in the wood as well.
The best fire I had by far was a gas fire that took the flue gases and put them through a catalytic converter which then threw it back out into the room. No heat wasted up the chimney, but of course that doesn't solve the current problem
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There is a fundamental misunderstanding about how wood burners work. Most people are familiar with gas central heating and radiators. These don't radiate at all, in fact, but heat the air around and above them and cause convection around the room, so it feels warm because the air is warm. Woodburners mainly radiate heat, although they do convect a little bit too. Heat from the fire heats you quite directly and gives rise to that lovely deep warming feeling you get. You can feel warm in a room with a wood burner going even though the air temperature can be quite low. This is a good reason to get a wood burner on its own, but if you're not on the gas grid and/or have access to free wood they become a sensible option.
They are not a sensible option if you live in an urban area and have to buy in wood and have access to mains gas. Just use gas.
Fortunately the fad for wood burners seems to be passing as quickly as it came and there will be quite a few stoves sitting as ornaments in urban homes while the occupiers turn the central heating up a notch. Wood prices can return to normal and we are seeing less townie wood scroungers in the woods this season.
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I'm not sure what the situation is with gas fires, but a wood burner wouldn't usually have any requirement for a power supply, so can operate completely independently of whatever else might have occurred (power cut, central heating not working, excessively chilly, etc...). If your central heating runs on gas it also provides you with an opportunity to balance your heating costs a little between the two fuels depending on cost, or other factors. I currently pay about 6 to 6.5 p per kWh for reprocessed wood fuels (as pellets), you would probably pay a bit more for smaller quantities, and logs/briquettes may be a bit more too. I've no idea how the cost of gas would compare, although I wouldn't be surprised if it is cheaper. If you burn reprocessed wood you won't be a townie wood scrounger, and it is certainly a lot less hassle than real wood and probably not much more costly either if you don't have your own supply.
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Typical. A couple of cyclists bragging about their Choppers...
Maybe they need one of these http://www.leveraxe.com/english/index.htm (http://www.leveraxe.com/english/index.htm)
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I've seen that and read the reviews. Before I watched a vid of a review I'd formed the idea that it was the sinclair C5 of the axe world; the review confirmed this idea.
a standard splitting maul, an axe and a chopping block are all that is needed; well, that and the space to make a mess in.
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Hmm, CICO stabilising the chimney might be a good idea as we do sometimes get bits of what I assume are the old lime parging https://www.spab.org.uk/advice/technical-qas/technical-qa-27-chimney-maintenance/ falling down the flue when it's windy and rainy. Having said that I'm just about to get the thing repointed to replace the cement pointing with breathable lime mortar at great expense so would putting an impermeable liner in be such a good thing? Also we're in Scotland so we own the flat, it's not leasehold.
Parging? Luxury, when I was a nipper, we .... no parging on ours! Hence the desire to line it!
Ah, I wondered about the Scottish ownership situation, and owning a flat, just as I typed that bit.
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Hmm, needs access point every 2 meters? Hahaha, that's not going to happen. We're talking granite here....
Eh? Ours has a single access point outside, but that's as much for sweeping it the easy way as anything. Best to get a CICO person in to look at it, if you are thinking that way.
Dunno about folk saying about the cost of wood. Admittedly mine isn't the main source of heat, its additional, and backup, and for use on miserable damp days, but I've never paid for wood, it just sort of happens. I know used pallets aren't the finest wood source, but when its free, and you work for an organisation that gets tons of paper delivered on nice clean non-returnable pallets, they'll do nicely, thank you.
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I read here https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.solidfuel.co.uk/pdfs/lining_old_chimneys.pdf&ved=0ahUKEwj_n8Df3NjJAhUJPhQKHXMQDhIQFgg-MAU&usg=AFQjCNH6oSFRsLMdLuYwBh7swyWDG2KDIw&sig2=ivpqMNdlXDOcl9bN-jpiZQ that they need to put something in the flue every 2 meters to make sure the rubber sausage that they pump the lining round is centered in the flue.
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I think if I was having a burner installed again I would go for a multi fuel one, coal and wood. Almost certain that involves a different liner to a wood only stove.
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Not necessarily - coal doesn't burn as hot as wood. The main difference is in the arrangement for air supply; coal needs a lot of air from below. My stove is ordainarily a multi-fuel one but, because it's been installed as a "room sealed" device, it can only be used with wood. This is because the outside air supply is only for the secondary air. In fact, the primary air control on mine has no effect whatsoever.
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Multi fuel stoves have always struck me as an impossible compromise. Coal needs a grill with airflow from underneath, wood needs a solid bottom and an ash bed. I've never seen a really successful compromise although am prepared to be enlightened.
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Our wood burner has a lever on the side. Turning it origamis the grill from open to closed.
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Ours isn't even that hi-tech. it has a grate with a reasonable airflow, which is shut-offable, but still leaves the holes in it, so if we want to definitely burn just wood, we don't bother to empty the ashpan, hence there is a solid bed of ash. If we want to burn coal (pretty rare, but its easier to keep going overnight with coal) we empty it properly. It has primary, secondary, and tertiary airflow controls. We always leave the tertiary one fairly well open, as this is what allows it to digest its own snot and you can see the combustion take place around the tertiary air inlet holes, burning nice and clean.
Ours is not an expensive one, its a Hunter of some sort, but its a clean burn one.
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We have a Charnwood Country 4, which can be easily upgraded to burn coal, about £100 for the multi fuel kit. Afaik its the chimney liner that needs to be different to a wood only burner, but I am no expert.
Cracking stove by the way.
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Totally non plussed here.
I was led to believe from school days that coal burned a lot hotter than coal, yet it is being claimed the opposite is true?
Links please
PH
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We have a Charnwood Country 4, which can be easily upgraded to burn coal, about £100 for the multi fuel kit. Afaik its the chimney liner that needs to be different to a wood only burner, but I am no expert.
Cracking stove by the way.
I can do the same. I'm led to believe that wet coal = sulphuric acid = dead flue liner
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Totally non plussed here.
I was led to believe from school days that coal burned a lot hotter than coal, yet it is being claimed the opposite is true?
Links please
PH
You may wish to edit this.
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Sorry, can't be bothered to read all the contributions to this thread, but in answer to the original post, a wood burner is a simple solution. You drop a purpose-made flexible flue down the chimney and fix it to the wood burner. Professional installation is best. Burner (good one) and installation should cost £1500. You may want to raise the lintel on the fire place to give the burner more room (+£200). The flue liner acts as a super hot radiator, drying your chimney. Case solved.
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Coal is a no, no.
You, the rest of us and the environment would be best served if you sourced your fuel from well managed and fast grown local coppiced woodlands.
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Many of the contributions seem to be about chopping wood anyway ;)
I'm leaning back towards the wood stove (although I did briefly wonder about the possibility of getting an additional tall thin radiator installed under the sloping ceiling next to the dormer instead) but have decided not to set anything in stone until I see how the gable end repointing works, that my neighbour has just agreed to go halves on, go....
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While you're waiting for the shocker report, try not to panic when you get it though, I recommend to the forum Lars Myttings' "Hel Ved"
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Norwegian-Wood-Chopping-Stacking-Scandinavian/dp/0857052551
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Shocker report?
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Sorry my dyslexia playing up......, re-poining works.
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Aah, I thought you knew something I didn't!
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He's not going to repoint it during the winter is he ?
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<googles> Oh feck, good point.
I asked the surveyor for his impartial opinion and he thought that my firm has a good reputation in the industry and that they would take account of the weather at the time, but being as the scaffolding is hired in I'd probably rather push them back a bit to be sure.
Thanks for pointing (haha) that out.
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And if he tries to give you any baloney about it'll be ok as theres a little bit of cement in the mortar to make it go off quicker, tell him to "sling his hook", as that's not a lime mortar.
That's a big full stop too.
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Stoves installation is stupendously expensive if you don't have a chimney and you need a stainless steel flue up the outside of the house. However, you do get unusually effective heating because the stove isn't trapped in a fireplace, giving very effective convection, and you can also have a metre or so of plain vitreous flue between the stove and just before it goes through the wall, which gives off lots of extra heat. The other benefit of a through-the-wall installation is that you can have it room-sealed with no sucking of cold outside air from around doors and windows. I have a 5kW stove which happily heats the entire house due to a fortuitous internal layout (staircase off the living room, which allows heat to rise up the stairs) and reasonable insulation. In cold weather, hardwood consumption is about 17-18kg a day. If I light it at breakfast, by 5pm it's generally so hot indoors that I allow the stove to die down.
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Had a play with my brother's stove last night... (where's the pyromaniac smiley?), and feeling how long it's taking the GCH to warm up the room (got home and switched it on before 2pm and the thermometer still says 15.3°C, brr!) :( am thinking about this a bit more seriously now...
He was using those compressed woodchip briquettes (they look like a giant piece of cat litter) which seemed to be quite easy to use.
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We use those briquettes, but not exclusively. Mixed with ordinary logs. I rather like them.
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Just to clarify on an earlier question, coal and coke can burn much hotter than wood, to a point where, if uncontrolled, you can damage the stove. And you ought to check that the flue liner is the right spec before using coal. Wood is nicer, though, being both greener and providing ash that is easy to incorporate into the garden.
All this technical stuff is easily found on websites for stove suppliers.
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Can I ask what sort of prices people are getting their stoves and installation done for? I've phoned a couple of places today and they've given me ballpark figures of £4500 for the basics, and that's not even Aberdeen prices! Even with recycling the scaffolding there for the pointing. Seems excessive to me.
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Ours (Morsø Squirrel) involved rebuilding the fireplace including lintel (there wasn't one) and a nice chunky wood beam and stone hearth. It set us back £3k.
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Yeah my brother paid £1400 for the chimney lining, preparing the fireplace and a black steel insert (stove was bought 2nd second hand) so I thought my quote seemed huge in comparison, not even as expensive a stove as a Sqrl. Had 2 quotes of that magnitude as well!
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We didn't have a flue fitted as the installer assured us that we didn't need it and it complied with regulations.
Good luck finding a reasonable quote, Mrs P!
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Haha, judging by all the leaks in this place there's no way i'd trust it unlined :-\
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Wow, that's a lot of money !!
Don't buy a secondhand Morsø Squirrel, as they have a reputation for cracking after being moved and re-installed.
BTW, if anyone's coming to Denmark with a car, second hand Morsø stoves are going for a song. I bought a good used 3440 for £300.00
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Wow, that's a lot of money !!
I thought so!
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Our Morsø S10 plus installation was about £3k, from the place in Stonehaven.
There was no existing lum, so it was a stove pipe up through the ceiling and through a void space, and then penetrating the tiled roof with some flashing kit which seems water-tight.
(The buggers did hack-saw through one of my cable ducts in the void space, cutting several of CT-100, Cat6 and alarm cables in the process.)
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Wow, that's a lot of money !!
I thought so!
Is that for one of those spiral wound steel liners and vermiculite fill ?
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Wow, that's a lot of money !!
I thought so!
Is that for one of those spiral wound steel liners and vermiculite fill ?
This is the quote, it was just an over the phone job so not bottomed out with a site visit or owt.
(https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1524/23608812694_565f085618_z.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/BYekuJ)Screenshot_2016-01-07-20-50-50-1 (https://flic.kr/p/BYekuJ) by The Pingus (https://www.flickr.com/photos/the_pingus/), on Flickr
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Our Morsø S10 plus installation was about £3k, from the place in Stonehaven.
One of the £4.5k estimates was from Stoney.
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The installation via the auld lum may be more expensive, I don't know.
What I do know is that I would not go back, and that if I were transported back in time and told it would be 4.5k instead of 3k, would I still sign on the dotted line?
Yes. Yes I would.
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I need to throw money at the bloke from Kirriemuir to make it worth his while for a trip up. It's gotta be less than 2 grand for a bung ;)
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I need to throw money at the bloke from Kirriemuir to make it worth his while for a trip up. It's gotta be less than 2 grand for a bung ;)
<Cough> HMRC </Cough>
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I need to throw money at the bloke from Kirriemuir to make it worth his while for a trip up. It's gotta be less than 2 grand for a bung ;)
<Cough> HMRC </Cough>
It's OK, apparently the info i'd been given by a colleague was in error and this bloke does actually come to Aberdeen, so no bungs needed ;)
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I was thinking about getting the liner etc installed when the scaffolding etc is up, but my bruvva reckons I should wait til it's all finished and I can see it's dry or I will have steam all over the place..... ??
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Get the burner fired up.......or.......
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I must admit I wasn't convinced by the steam argument, although I do need to get this latest leak fixed. Having done some more reading though I'm moving away from the idea of insulating with vermiculite, given its propensity for absorbing water.
Am pondering a CCTV flue survey. When I poked my head up there last night I could see a clay liner, though I guess this is only part way up or where does the mortar keep coming from. And the flue changed direction, unexpectedly disappearing off the opposite way to what I expected.
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If you've got access to a yoof with a go-pro, a bit of string and a torch you can do your own survey and save quids.
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A yoof onna roof, presumably
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Oh I dunno, I think Vermiculite fill would be a good idea, as you'll get notice when your steel liner eventually disintegrates and the Vermiculite blocks the remainder of the liner. Really, the last thing you want is a hole in the liner with no fill as that could cause you lots of trouble down the line.
If it was mine, I'd get up on the scaffolding, stuff a liner down it and backfill with vermiculite, install the burner, stick a pot on it and flaunch it and light it up, making sure it's fired correctly with well seasoned wood.
I wouldn't use kiln dried because of the environmental issue, and also because a lot of kiln dried timber comes from Russia. So not are you negating any carbon offset with the forced drying, but you're also adding 1600km+ and a trip in a container ship to the pollution. Luckily I own several small Birch, Beech and Hazel coppice, so it's easy for me to say that.
<cough> Even though I have a lousy splitting technique, I still manage OK. </cough>
So really, you'd do well to get Lars Myttings book, reading it and following the firing instructions and try to source a quality supply of local coppiced hardwood. Initially you may have to buy kiln dried to start burning now, but if you've got the space dry it yourself for next year. It takes a bit of effort, but if you care about carbon offsetting, it's the only way to do it. Even so, it won't ever be carbon neutral, as you've still got to transport it from somewhere, unless you plant way more than you consume.
If you have a steel flue liner, stay clear of kiln dried Oak and Sweet Chestnut, as they become highly acidic after being kiln dried and are best air dried.
I wouldn't put it off any longer and just get on with it. The leaks will hopefully be fixed when the pointing is done in the spring. What you need now is lots of heat to start drying it all out or it will just get worse and you'll end up rotting some timber somewhere if you leave it.
You'll need to fire a lot when you have a leaky stack though.
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what about an insulated liner?
Oh, and chimneys seem to do lots of weird things. You might be able to see the path of the chimney on the outside wall if sulphates have passed through the stone. The granite may not be porous enough though.
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I don't think it'd be a good idea to get a liner installed just now as when the pointing gets done the flaunching for all 4 pots up there will be too, and they're going to inspect the coping at the same time in case it needs a seeing to. I assume if they need to take it apart that'd be my liner getting in the way.
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Shouldn't do. Its just screwed into a register plate under the pot. Once the Vermiculite is in place and the stove installed, you'll be able to take the pot on and off easily as the flue liner doesn't go up inside the pot.
It'll be self supporting anyway.
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Traditional masonry bloke suggested the stove fitter doing the liner while the scaffolding is up. He said yes to vermiculite but recommended mixing it with mortar so that if it gets wet it doesn't slump. :-\
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The steel liner won't last forever. If you put mortar or anything else in to stiffen the vermiculite, you'll have a hell of a time fitting a new liner when the time comes.
The liner is quite thin steel, like a tin can, but wound in a spiral. Eventually it gets eaten away by the hot flue gasses and if you're unlucky to get rainwater in the liner regularly, rain and soot combo is very acidic.
You can always top it up when you get the other stuff done to the stack in the spring. If you've still got water running down the inside of the flue or walls after that work has been done, your builder has missed something major.
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I thought it seemed a bit permanent too. Will see what the stove dude says when he comes for a nosey.
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Just had a thought whilst trying to go to sleep ::-)
Have a look at Leca, which is an expanded clay aggregate that's used for insulating limecrete floors, growing medium for green roofs and loads of other stuff. My walls are insulated with 300mm of it behind lath and plaster and I've filled the void under the suspended timber floors too. It absorbs a bit of moisture but dries out quick and doesn't ever change in hardness.
Your chimney guy may not have heard of it, but thinking about it a bit, I'd use that instead of Vermiculite in a damp chimney as a fill.
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Ta.
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Well, my brother's stove installer is coming for a look tomorrow. I spent some free time this week reading the wood burning geek section of the Green Living forum and today having a hard look. I think it's possibly going to be a Morso 04, a Charnwood C4 or the Defra Sqrl, unless he says any of them aren't going to fit.
My brain freaking hurts nao.
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The Morsø Ø4 looks nice.
Dad's got a small one like that and it's a really lovely stove.
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Clearview Pioneer was heavily recommended but it's the most expensive of the lot and apparently not the best customer service so I discounted hat one already.
I looked at the Morso O4 instructions, and they are *very* extensive, though I must admit they scared me off a wee bit!
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They use a Norwegian developed method of lighting, where you put the logs at the bottom and light the kindling on the top. It means that, as wood contains a huge amount of combustible gas, more of the gas gets burnt off at start up instead of it just flowing up the flue and adding to the pollution. You need a fair amount of kindling for that though, but once you get the hang of it, it works really well as you don't need to put cold logs on kindling to get a fire going and end up filling the house with smoke.
I think the key to getting Morsø stoves or any other stove going really well, is to use properly seasoned wood (any wood, btw), putting a couple of bits in et each fuelling and allowing a fairly thick 2-3cm bed of embers to build up during the firing. Using smaller bits of firewood works much better and gives better heat than a single great lump.
At the end of the day I don't put any more wood on to try and get it to burn through the night, but close the air vent down (but not off) when the wood has turned to glowing charcoal. In the morning the stove is still lukewarm and there's still embers in the ash that I use to start a fire in the morning before we all go out for the day. You need a blowpipe for that, mine's a bit of copper tube about 2' long.
Living in a thatched timber house, the last thing I need it a chimney fire during the night and fuelling up and closing off the vent before bedtime is a really good way of coating the flue with tar, which can lead to a violent chimney fire and burn the house down.
I like a fire, just incase you were wondering.
I've heard that you can get Spruce and Larch up your way for pennies, as they can't sell it for some reason.
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I've heard that you can get Spruce and Larch up your way for pennies, as they can't sell it for some reason.
The chap that sold me our stove (a Jotul F100 which is brilliant) warned me off using soft wood as he said it gave off a lot more tar than hard wood and cited a local farmer he goes to every three or four years to renew the chimney liner as the chap only burns old pallets. I've often wondered how true this is as it is much easier to get hold of soft wood, and in Scandinavia they all seem to burn just softwood with a bit of birch on their stoves.
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If you want to keep the flue clean the best thing to do is run the fire really hot every now and then, rather than just ticking over.
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Will that get the flue hot enough at the top to get rid of the tar? - I assume that the hear causes the tar to vaporise.
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Softwood does contain a lot of tar, so does Birch bark and it's extracted on a commercial basis in Sweden and Norway. But the key to a wood burner is having the air always fully open when your firing, so that it gets burnt off in the stove along with the gas, by the high heat you end up firing at. If you're worried about it mix woods together, but high heat using seasoned wood is the way to burn cleanly.
Having the air fully open all the time and controlling the heat output with the quantity, type and size of wood is something I've been doing for a while and I've found that it keeps the glass clean on my Morsø 3440, which is a tricky burner to use. I sweep out the pipe connecting the burner to the chimney flue regularly, as this keeps the heat output of the burner high. A 2mm layer of dry soot in the pipe reduces the heat output greatly, as it acts as an insulator. I burn a lot of wood though and went through about 20 cubic meters last year.
If you've got a metal flue liner, which we had in our old house, the liner expands enough when it gets hot to break the soot/tar layer off, but we didn't have vermiculite in the chimney and the pipe vibrated alarmingly when the burner really got going.
As for pallets, I don't think they use seasoned wood to make them with, so the guy might be burning wood with a high moisture content which has a low heat output.
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Stove dude has been, discussed the dog leg in the flue (the fireplace has obviously been moved) and whether to move it back or not (not, cos I don't want to lay new carpet as well, and it would be in a really odd place), laughed at the vermiculite & mortar idea and the extortionate first quote ("Ten grand Dan" was his quip so it sounds like I got away lightly with 5).
He said all the stoves on my list were do-able and good so we agreed he's gonna quote for a Squirrel :)
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I've heard that you can get Spruce and Larch up your way for pennies, as they can't sell it for some reason.
http://www.flamingfires.co.uk/which-wood-burns-best.htm ?
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I've heard that you can get Spruce and Larch up your way for pennies, as they can't sell it for some reason.
http://www.flamingfires.co.uk/which-wood-burns-best.htm ?
I disagree with some of those assessments. For example, willow, properly seasoned, burns really well. Oak, split with a hatchet to pieces with a cross section of about 3cm, is a sort of super-kindling, igniting quite quickly, rapidly reaching a high temperature, and sustaining much longer than the more usual softwood kindling.
I haven't used a lot of larch, though. I have always used spare pallets as a source of kindling with no problems.
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I've seen that list before, too.
It puts Holly as poor, but it has the highest kWh heat output of common Northern European fire woods, according to The Norwegian Forest and Landscape Institute. ( The Norwegians do the testing for EN certified stoves and they clearly know their wood from their trees, meh!)
And its write up of Oak is hokum, they must have been on the loony soup when they tested that one.
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A Badger has a much bigger firebox - think convenience - than a Squirrel, for similar nominal output (about 5kW). My Badger heats a whole 3 bed semi quite easily, although it is reasonably well insulated and has outside air (no sucking cold combustion air into the house - absolutely worth it).
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A Badger has a much bigger firebox - think convenience - than a Squirrel, for similar nominal output (about 5kW). My Badger heats a whole 3 bed semi quite easily, although it is reasonably well insulated and has outside air (no sucking cold combustion air into the house - absolutely worth it).
It is usually considered more efficient to run a low kw stove at a high output than a high kw stove at low output, so getting too large a stove could lead to less heat from your wood, and more smoke. It's worth doing the maths. My Clearview (4kw, I think) heats the whole house a bit, but on really cold days we do need the gas central heating as well.
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They use a Norwegian developed method of lighting, where you put the logs at the bottom and light the kindling on the top. It means that, as wood contains a huge amount of combustible gas, more of the gas gets burnt off at start up instead of it just flowing up the flue and adding to the pollution. You need a fair amount of kindling for that though, but once you get the hang of it, it works really well as you don't need to put cold logs on kindling to get a fire going and end up filling the house with smoke.
Our Dunsley Yorkshire stove has a double burn. It passes the gas back over the fire so it burns it off before it goes up the flue. Mind you it's a 15kw stove so too big for most uses, it has a back-boiler though so at least 50% of that heat goes to the heat store and thus to the radiators or to provide hot water for showers and baths.
Maybe their smaller stoves also do reburning of gas ?
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They use a Norwegian developed method of lighting, where you put the logs at the bottom and light the kindling on the top. It means that, as wood contains a huge amount of combustible gas, more of the gas gets burnt off at start up instead of it just flowing up the flue and adding to the pollution. You need a fair amount of kindling for that though, but once you get the hang of it, it works really well as you don't need to put cold logs on kindling to get a fire going and end up filling the house with smoke.
Our Dunsley Yorkshire stove has a double burn. It passes the gas back over the fire so it burns it off before it goes up the flue. Mind you it's a 15kw stove so too big for most uses, it has a back-boiler though so at least 50% of that heat goes to the heat store and thus to the radiators or to provide hot water for showers and baths.
Maybe their smaller stoves also do reburning of gas ?
I think Clearview were one of the first to use this secondary burning using pre-heated air, but it is quite common now. It produces more heat, less smoke and clearer glass.
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They use a Norwegian developed method of lighting, where you put the logs at the bottom and light the kindling on the top. It means that, as wood contains a huge amount of combustible gas, more of the gas gets burnt off at start up instead of it just flowing up the flue and adding to the pollution. You need a fair amount of kindling for that though, but once you get the hang of it, it works really well as you don't need to put cold logs on kindling to get a fire going and end up filling the house with smoke.
Our Dunsley Yorkshire stove has a double burn. It passes the gas back over the fire so it burns it off before it goes up the flue. Mind you it's a 15kw stove so too big for most uses, it has a back-boiler though so at least 50% of that heat goes to the heat store and thus to the radiators or to provide hot water for showers and baths.
Maybe their smaller stoves also do reburning of gas ?
Been looking at getting a stove with a back boiler, how big is your hot water tank ?
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They use a Norwegian developed method of lighting, where you put the logs at the bottom and light the kindling on the top. It means that, as wood contains a huge amount of combustible gas, more of the gas gets burnt off at start up instead of it just flowing up the flue and adding to the pollution. You need a fair amount of kindling for that though, but once you get the hang of it, it works really well as you don't need to put cold logs on kindling to get a fire going and end up filling the house with smoke.
Our Dunsley Yorkshire stove has a double burn. It passes the gas back over the fire so it burns it off before it goes up the flue. Mind you it's a 15kw stove so too big for most uses, it has a back-boiler though so at least 50% of that heat goes to the heat store and thus to the radiators or to provide hot water for showers and baths.
Maybe their smaller stoves also do reburning of gas ?
Been looking at getting a stove with a back boiler, how big is your hot water tank ?
300 litres. Heated by the back boiler and an oil boiler. It also has a loop for solar hot water that I haven't got round to buying yet and ports for an electric immersion heater (not fitted).
Run the stove full blast all day and it can get this up to 85 deg C even on a cold day. The stove is auto damping though if you close the vents so you can avoid this at the cost of a sootier burn.
Domestic hot water is mains pressure via a plate heat exchanger on the heat store and the central heating pumps the 300 litres round the radiators.
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I found the Woodburning subforum of this place full of useful information : http://www.thegreenlivingforum.net/forum/index.php
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A Badger has a much bigger firebox - think convenience - than a Squirrel, for similar nominal output (about 5kW). My Badger heats a whole 3 bed semi quite easily, although it is reasonably well insulated and has outside air (no sucking cold combustion air into the house - absolutely worth it).
It is usually considered more efficient to run a low kw stove at a high output than a high kw stove at low output, so getting too large a stove could lead to less heat from your wood, and more smoke. It's worth doing the maths. My Clearview (4kw, I think) heats the whole house a bit, but on really cold days we do need the gas central heating as well.
Yebbut the Squirrel and the Badger are basically the same nominal output, as I said.
The Badger works quite differently; the secondary (and tertiary) air is pre-heated and drawn in through holes in the baffle plate. The Squirrel is a very traditional design and just draws in secondary air from the upper door vent. The Badger needs a bigger firebox for all the gases to burn efficiently and this also means you can fit bigger pieces of wood in there, which means less chopping and sawing. It doesn't mean you should actually load it up to the baffle plate and if you do it will tend to over-burn unless you reslly shut down the air, which is not ideal as it mucks up the glass. I use a Morso flue gas thermometer and keep it in the "ideal" zone, although how accurate it is, I don't know.
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A wee tip regarding tarred-up glass on woodburners...
The asphaltine-ish tarry residue that builds up on the inside of the glass of a wood burner over the course of time can be difficult to remove.
As has been covered already in this thread, this can be minimised by keeping the burn temperature up.
But there is always a sooty burn period as the thing starts up.
But it's nice to have the glass clean.
I initially tried all the usual glass cleaners and domestic solvents.
None of them were of any use.
Mechanical scrubbing was useless too.
Solution:
Muck-Off pink stuff bike-cleaner = totally excellent.
A world apart from any of the other cleaning products I had to hand.
It actually worked as a solvent for the residue.
Quick spray, leave for 1 minute, then mild mechanical scrub with a scotch-brite pan scourer ( one of those things that are a sponge on one side, and a plasticky scourer on the other) and it's like new.
Wipe the black liquefied yuck off with a paper towel, rinse and repeat if required.
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Second vote for a large fire box. I've got one of the cylindrical Morsø burners too and the box is too small, which is a royal pain in the butt, it does burn really well though.
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I've read that you can use a bit of the ash on some damp paper to clean the glass, but if that doesn't work I'll know to try Muc-Off.
When I eventually get the thing that is, still waiting on the quote....it will be summer by this rate and I won't want the thing on.
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Bit of ash and some vinegar, not malted!
Well you could use malted it would work but your house would smell like a chip shop :)
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My Clearview stove must be getting on for ten years old now and still has the original glass. I don't clean it often because the design burns off any deposits within twenty minutes of lighting the fire, but I do clean it if the corners are a bit mucky and we are trying to make the lounge look good for visitors. (Don't want them to see how we really live!) For that I just gently rub with the sponges we use on non-stick pans and the glass is clear in a few minutes. No detergents or anything else.
The only reason the glass gets grubby at all is because we turn the fire down very low to smolder through the night, and that way it burns less clean and does not have the heat to burn deposits off the glass.
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Oh hurrah, I finally haz quote :)
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From the smiley, I'm guessing the number of zeros on the end is reasonable?
I've just had to accept a quote for the replacement of the fence around Feanor Towers, which did not survive the last storm.
The number of zeros was somewhat disappointing.
Once again, it's being undertaken by Roy Cowie ( By Appointment, supplier of verge-trimming to Brenda etc etc ).
I reckon I need to give them a fancy plate too, at these prices.
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Yes, much more like it. I just haz to decide between squirrel or swift and brick or 'plaster' opening. Currently thinking sqrl & brick. Pingu Towers isn't really minimalist enough to worry about the plaster effect.... :facepalm:
Yeess, Aberdeen =zero central
Not going for a moat, drawbridge and gun emplacements then? ;)
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So, what's the damage then ?
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Me? Approx 3 big ones including a floating oak beam mantle and a slate hearth. It's not going to be til the end of April unfortunately, so I predict we will be having a heatwave in May ;D
One of my colleagues is getting someone else to install a stove next week for around £2.5K, but their installer only sells Boru stoves. Which given they don't seem to exist on whatstove.co.uk I wasn't about to rush to follow suit on. "That's the only brand he sells so he must rate them" she said. Err, ok then. Nothing to do with profit.....
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That's a bit better, but I've got to ask, what's a floating Oak beam ?
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Y'know, like these http://www.castfireplaces.co.uk/mantels-and-surrounds/wooden-fireplace-beams/oak-fireplace-beam-with-brackets
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Thought I would briefly resurrect this thread for an update.
This year I'm finding the %rh is much lower, so much so that I thought my dehumidifier had died last week, it's just too low for it to be running properly. Currently sitting at 49% which is pretty good for here, considering I've just finished cooking. The washing I'm drying in the hall is drying much more quickly than before....
Pingu has pretty much been sitting around in shorts and t-shirts every evening though :D
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Just thought to give an update on our Charnwood 6 stove.
We had the multifuel grate removed in August when the unit was serviced and the lum swept which in turn produced literally a handful of soot.
Since then there is a noticeable improvement in the amount of heat and the length of time the stove stays going. Pre August the stove was stone cold at 6am. The other day I rattled the ashes, threw on some kindling and gave it full air and at 10-30am it took off again. Awesome. We frequently cook supper on it and have a kettle on it full time to save on washing up water. If we open up the living room doors it basically heats the house.
Pleased? Just a tad... ;)
PH
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Thought I would briefly resurrect this thread for an update.
This year I'm finding the %rh is much lower, so much so that I thought my dehumidifier had died last week, it's just too low for it to be running properly. Currently sitting at 49% which is pretty good for here, considering I've just finished cooking. The washing I'm drying in the hall is drying much more quickly than before....
Pingu has pretty much been sitting around in shorts and t-shirts every evening though :D
That's promising. How's the gable end doing ?
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Not bad. Sometimes it feels a bit damp up in the loft on the wall, but there's no water running down it. I have wondered about getting the elephants foot caps on the other chimneys swapped for a 'hat'.
That discoloured/damp patch in my lounge alcove is still there though :-\