multi fuel log burner or gas central heating

buckrogers · 31 January 2008 at 8:10PM

hi
with the price of gas going up would it be cheaper to have a multi fuel log burner instead??

we have gas central heating at the moment with 9 rads
the fireplace in our sitting room was bricked up when they put gas central heating in and the boiler is in kitchen

so would we be able to have a multi fuel log burner in old fireplace and get one that heats the 9 rads as well at then same time, can this be done even tho we have a gas boiler in kitchen??

any thoughts much gratefull

Cardew · 1 February 2008 at 10:32AM

Whilst it is possible to get this done - a combination of log burner and gas boiler both feeding into a Radiator CH system, I would strongly advise against it.
I have a similar system, with a Baxi open fire and a conventional gas CH system, that was installed when I had this house built. Had I known the complications, I would have just had gas CH and a normal open fire(without connection to the CH system)

Without getting into the detail, if you have a multi fuel system heating a water CH system there are important safety considerations to be considered. The water can boil and boiling water in a closed system is a potential explosion, so you have to have quite elaborate safety systems in the event there is a power failure.

Anyway from an economic point of view, I very much doubt that a multi fuel log burner would be cheaper to run unless you have access to very cheap fuel and if that were wood, you would get through masses.

I suggest a simple burner or open fire in the old fireplace might be a compromise; although you better check that the flue and chimney are OK - they might need lining.

buckrogers · 1 February 2008 at 2:37PM

thankyou for your reply

samtheman1k · 1 February 2008 at 3:17PM

What you could do is get a multi-input thermal store (such as the Gledhill Torrent I think it's called) that can take a indirect water feed from either the gas or the wood burner. This will store the hot water and will be heated from either the wood burner when it's on, or from the gas when wood isn't available. Can also attach to a solar heater aswell if wanted.

dekh · 8 February 2008 at 2:08PM

When we moved into our house 10 years ago. The Corgi man condemned the gas fire in the dinning room. At that point I looked at having an open fire/back boiler linked to the combie boiler - it's a nightmare of plumbing and prone to problems. And quite costly to install -at least it was then, can't see it being cheaper now!

Because we already had Gas CH we decided that we would try open fires. Luckily the gas fire was just tacked onto the original surround. We did get the old fireback and back boiler replaced with a new fireback and it works a treat.

We then decided to pull the gas fire out of the front room and use it as an open fire too. No back boiler so we just got second hand metal front bit and new firegrate from wilkinson. Works a treat.

In the evening we have the fire on in one room and the CH off or down real low.

Neither of our children have alergies I put it down to the open flues

We are in a smokeless fuel zone so:

The down side...
You have to clean the ash out, have a metal bin to put it in, transfer this to the wheelie bin when it's cold.
You have to rebuild the fire.
It takes half an hour to get real heat from it.
You have to source the fuel, coke is roughly twice the price of coal - (we can only burn coke) if you are non smokeless you can burn coal. You commonly see the bags for sale at a garage. This is hugely expensive. We get Supertherme from CPL 5 hundredweight a shot. This is probably costing about £200 a year. 54 deliveries about £50 each (You need somewhere to put it - we got a coal bin from CPL that holds 5hw for £40 it sits outside the bag door and the man with the lorry fills it.)

If you are not in a smokeless zone you can burn coal it's much cheaper. If you have a ready supply you can burn logs possibly free possibly not.

Both logs and coal will spit hot embers on your carpet - much more than coke.

We recently looked at putting a log burning/multifuel stove in. The stove was expensive - the flue/chimney has to be lined, this was expensive.

We've been to a couple of places with wood burning stoves on holiday. You see those big bags of logs at the garage for about £4 (last time I looked) through that in 1 evening no problems.

The stoves can kick the heat out but the logs burn real fast! This may not be all stoves though and closing dampers etc helps.

Pros
Open fires look great.
No dry throats
No need for a shredder
Everyone warms there !!! against it when they come to our house

You no longer live in a hermetically sealed environment.

But cost effectivley I can't see any benefit to a stove - open versus gas? jurys out I can't do the math as the gas price goes up so fast. And our gas bill's still more expensive after double glazing/loft/cavity wall insulation than it was before.

Actually I dread to think what it would be without the fires

BTW we have a 9 month old and a 4 year old so our whole house is warm

buckrogers · 10 February 2008 at 12:28AM

thanks dekh for all the info
decided now as you say would not work out any cheaper, so will stick to gch

dekh · 10 February 2008 at 11:00AM

Happy to help

One other pro: When our CH boiler had a gas leak and Transco capped the whole supply - which would have cut off gas fires as well. We still had an alternative source of heat.

multi fuel log burner or gas central heating

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