Wood burning stoves>

pinkmami

No the architect is not the fitter. The fitter is the one that knocked the nook & will be lying the concrete down & fitting the slate tile & the stove & the fire board. All-in-one bloke along with his son. That is why i chose them & I also know them personally. I think I'll go with my instincts & opt for the Charnwood 8. 5kw not enough & 12 too much.

redlady_1

Decision made - now dream about those hypnotic flames which you will spend your life staring at, instead of the TV! Not long to wait now:-)

Unity

pinkmami wrote: »

No the architect is not the fitter. The fitter is the one that knocked the nook & will be lying the concrete down & fitting the slate tile & the stove & the fire board. All-in-one bloke along with his son. That is why i chose them & I also know them personally. I think I'll go with my instincts & opt for the Charnwood 8. 5kw not enough & 12 too much.

Enjoy your stove then , it is very MSE in more ways than one. When you are sitting comfortably in front of it - you won't want to leave it, so you'll go out less and spend less :rotfl:. Simples .

AGBAGB

Ours is a Town and Country Thornton Dale. Our gas central heating kicks in early morning and gets the house warmed up. I light the stove and with the room doors open it heats the whole house for the rest of the day and evening. If I feed it enough the central heating doesn't kick in again even in the recent cold snap. More details here.

If you have central heating as well, then look at it a different way. Burn your stove at max. output, therfore giving the efficent / clean burn. If thats not enough your central heating will kick in on the really cold days.

It might be that 12kw will stop your heating coming on when its below zero out. But you could be under burning (less efficent / smokey) for the majority of the season when its 0 -10 degrees.

Think about a 3kw electric fire and heat from that in one room, now times that by 4. 12Kw will be toasty.

IMO Log burn is best done as a cycle. So load it up and it will burn hot/ max output for say one hour, as the fuel is used, the output will drop over the next 1-2 hours. The average output over the cycle will be less than the maximum rated. By leaving it longer before refuling so their is only a few embers left the average output can be reduced further. This is the clean and efficent way to burn.

If you have 12Kw you will have to use it for the first part of the cycle, or throttle the fire down, belch smoke and soot up the chimney.

Conclusion - It's dificult to pin down, there's loads of variables BUT - if its oversized you have more problems than if it undersized. Its easier and cleaner to run a smaller stove at near maximum output than it is to run a big stove at lower outputs.

Probably doesn't help you decide but might help you er on smaller being the right side of caution. Rather than the usual intuitive side that says bigger is best, "I can always turn it down".

AGBAGB

I'll have to write faster in future, looks like youv'e made a good choice.
Welcome to world of woodburning.

hethmar

Sorry, dont follow why your inglenook chimney void would have to warm up. If the liner is insulated with 50mm rock wool wraps - as it should be and your flue is fitted properly with a good register plate, then the size of the void wouldnt be relevant? May be Im not following your line of thought?

And yes, lime mortar guys

hethmar

AGBAGB wrote: »

s.

Conclusion - It's dificult to pin down, there's loads of variables BUT - if its oversized you have more problems than if it undersized. Its easier and cleaner to run a smaller stove at near maximum output than it is to run a big stove at lower outputs.

Probably doesn't help you decide but might help you er on smaller being the right side of caution. Rather than the usual intuitive side that says bigger is best, "I can always turn it down".

Absolutely right - you should think about becoming an installer

The other point is, turning the stove down to slumber mode all the time means the flue gases will meander up the chimney giving them time to deposit resin on the flueway - more probs.

Do get the chimney swept at least twice a season to avoid resin build up. And its SO important to use the right seasoned woods. We have seen flues where just a pencil can be pressed in from the top where resin/tar is so thick. Once in that state, its a fire waiting to happen and can be quite distastrous.

A._Badger

hethmar wrote: »

Sorry, dont follow why your inglenook chimney void would have to warm up. If the liner is insulated with 50mm rock wool wraps - as it should be and your flue is fitted properly with a good register plate, then the size of the void wouldnt be relevant? May be Im not following your line of thought?

And yes, lime mortar guys

Because the void of inglenook has to heat before hot air circulates into the room. It also tends to traps hot air.

Get a thermometer and test it for yourself. The inglenook temperature is always warmer than the rest of the room - often by quite a margin.

With large inglenooks, this matters, as anyone who has one will confirm, I'm sure.

hethmar

But badger, if you have the correct insulation installed around the liner very little heat will escape into the void. You DO have the liner insulated dont you?

crphillips

I'd tend to agree with Hethmar.......The more space around the stove the quicker it should heat the room as the heat won't imediately hit the masonry of the firplace and be absorbed. It's very negligable though. A room requires the same amount of heat not matter the construction of the fireplace........the only way it would effect the overall heating required is if the register plate wasn't insulated or was a poor fit.