Sensible thoughts?

DdraigGoch

I'm considering whether to invest over £1,750 in having a wood fired boiler fitted which will hopefully provide enought water for background central heating and a bath every couple of days, and the attendant fuss, mess and cost of acquiring/storing/transporting/loading/cleaning/etc sufficient dry logs or whether to try and find one of those old-fashioned bath geysers, preferably a modern equivalent thereof.

Which, green considerations apart, would you go for, and why?

I just can't make up my mind!

Thanks for any help.

Frugaldom

Hi DdraigGoch

I'd tend to go for the longterm investment by way of the wood burner for hot water and background heating, as it also provides warmth and somewhere to make a cup of tea & slice of toast during power cuts. There are also grants available towards this form of heating as the longterm political view seems to be that oil & gas heating systems will eventually be phased out completely. It probably won't be in our lifetimes, but I've read various reports suggesting same. Have you space to plant out willow as a longterm investment and eventual free source of biofuel?

One question I need to ask, though; why don't you have an electric immersion heater and hot water tank fitted rather than just the wall mounted water heater? Either way, pipework will need to be installed.

As a completely 'convenience' orientated answer, I'd have the old fashioned water geyser as well as the log burner, that way you don't need to light the fire in summer every time you decide you want a bath. If you could pick up one of these with the power and capacity to fill a bath, it might save you a lot of work.

DdraigGoch

Thanks for the thoughts.

I've just been offered a central heating boiler which I shall investigate the possiblities of changing the jets over to propane, so that I could have one of those tall tanks outside to fuel it. I don't know if this is either possible or sensible. Equally, I don't know if I'd need to install a tank/header tank etc.

Are there any plumbers out there who could tell me what I need to know and willing to share the information?

I've been given a small copper tank today so I would just need to buy an immersion coil and get that wired/plumbed in, I think. I'm wondering if that would work in the summer..... instead of a fire ....

Thanks for reading this.

Steph998

OH has just fitted a multi fuel stove in our holiday home, which burns either coal or logs. Obviously when burning coal this produces greater heat...red glow as opposed to flame. One of your first considerations is to calculate your room sizes, and then convert this into the amount of BTU's (british thermal units) you will need for the correct size of boiler output.

Propane boiler off an upright tank would cost a fortune by the way.

DdraigGoch

Thank you for your advice, Steph998. I'm not actually looking for central heating, just enough water to fill a bath! [Repeatedly topping it up with hot water over the period of about an hour and a half ] I already run my house on a log fired stove [20Kw] and a log fired cooking range, but am just looking for one small water heating device.

I agree that it's small only when compared to a whole house central heating solution

My BTu rating for the house is astronomical and we economise by using just a small part of the house in the winter.