Wood burning fire

Twig

With the price of electricity rising sooo much we have decided to have a wood burner installed. The chimney is being built as we speak and we should have the whole thing up and running by the end of next week.

We used to live in a house with an open fire that we put coal on but I have never used a wood burner before. I guess actually getting the fire started will be much the same but I was wondering what else can go on the fire - or more to the point what should we NOT put on it.

I imagine paper and cardboard (cereal boxes, loo rolls etc) will be fine but any other ideas or tips would be great !!!!

Thank you - I´m quite looking forward to christmas with a roaring fire

Thistle-down

Have you thought of having multi-fuel rather than just a wood burner? They are more versitile as you can chuck just about anything in it, including wood!

Twig

To be truthfull I´m not sure that what we´re getting is called a woodburner in English (we´re in Spain) It´s a cast iron box, with a glass door on the front, which is built into the chimney. It has a flu for the smoke and two outlets to duct heat to other rooms as well as vents in the front and a fan to kick the heat out.

Sorry to be a bit dippy :huh: - should I be able to put most stuff in this ????

Thanks

csarina

If it says its a wood burner then thats what it is, if you put too much paper and cardboard on it you will ruin the ash bed. The idea of a wood burner is to build up a bed of ash so when you put more wood on and open the vent the ash will set light to the wood. Its possible if you are careful to keep a woodburner alight all night and the heat from the cast iron case will give off heat for ages. I used to be able to slow cook in a le Cruset casserole on top of mine.

Its imortant that you do not take out all the ash when you clean it out but leave a layer to resart the fire.

Try googleing wood burning and see what you can find. We used to stack the ash and then spread it on the garden in the spring.

OddjobKIA

When the fire is burning well you can burn almost anything......

Here int he Uk there are laws about smokeless fuels on certain areas..

Just rememebr

The harder the wood is to cut down the harder it is to light but the longer and warmer it burns

Twig

thanks for the replys, I didn't know about the ash bed so that's really usefull to know

bestpud

My OH works for a timber frame company and the workers put the non-toxic off-cuts into bags which they sell for £5 a bag. They share the proceeds at then end of the year and the company are happy as they don't have to pay to dispose of it.

The bags they fill up are two tonne (sp?) sand bags so there is a lot of blocks in there - way over a tonne! For £5 that is a steal when my fil is paying £200+ for a tonne of coal!!

Soooo, it may be worth you checking around local companies that may have of-cuts and see if they do a similar thing? Do check they are careful about the treated wood though!

Hth

Twig

Thanks bestpud, the family of a friend of mine has a timber frame company - I would never have thought to ask her !

Beccatje

Twig wrote: »

To be truthfull I´m not sure that what we´re getting is called a woodburner in English (we´re in Spain) It´s a cast iron box, with a glass door on the front, which is built into the chimney. It has a flu for the smoke and two outlets to duct heat to other rooms as well as vents in the front and a fan to kick the heat out.

Sorry to be a bit dippy :huh: - should I be able to put most stuff in this ????

Thanks

paper and cardboard do leave quite a mess in ashes I find. And a lot of dust.
You may want to consider looking into burning coal. I'm not sure if that's available in Spain though. I live in Holland and pop over the border into Germany to buy our coal and it's cheaper than wood. but do make sure your burner has a cast iron inside before putting coal into it. Coal burns at a higher temp. than wood and if your burner is designed for wood only, you don't want to bust it.

I do make paper brickettes as well. (Apart from the extra ashes it works fine)
It helps me use up old newspapers and it's free!
I have people all around collecting the newspapers for me. It's a bit of work, and a few weeks of drying them out but it's free fuel after all.

Good luck!
there's nothing like a real fire to make you feel cozy.

Becca

purpleivy

You definitely need to find out your local planning laws about 'smokeless zones'. You can pay big fines here if you get it wrong. We looked into the possibility of a woodburning stove, but think we might have to go multifuel to comply with planning.

Scubabe

Oooooh Bestpud, what part of the country are you in? I'm after a fab deal like that, so if you're anywhere near Reading/Oxford/Swindon....