Stove - Hetas Installer or Building Control Certified?

welda

Yes good point leaving government out. Point is, there have been one or two posts here where members have had stoves installed and, they have been completely dissatisfied with quality of work ect. They have also been fobbed off by HETAS, that is when they manage to get through to them.

Seems like a no win situation, HETAS are hard work trying to get them to practice what they preach.

And I totoally agree about building control suit appearing at a house to sign off an installation, when the suit will no doubt have no clue what is a good or bad installation?

To make matters worse, these jobs worth have the [FONT=&quot]audacity to make one pay, are these people not already being supported via our council tax?

:beer:
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crphillips

There's load of crap plasterers, handymen, electricians, plumbers.....etc.

People just need to do what should be done with every other tradesman. Get a guy who comes highly recommended. Simplz

welda

crphillips wrote: »

There's load of crap plasterers, handymen, electricians, plumbers.....etc.

You forgot to mention welders, or are we in the "ect" :whistle:

Point is CPR, there are people out there who may not be in a position to access a recommended, in this case stove installer. They will however may steer towards a HETAS registered installer, who in turn may turn out to be utter pants at what he/she does, basically takes yer money and runs. Which leaves the now impoverished home owner turning to trade body, who in certain documented case's, appear to not be interested, which smacks of them in turn, only interested in money, not customer satisfaction, which in turn, leaves a bad name for the decent installation companies (btw who funds HETAS, I assume a quango?).

Perhaps a trade test/s every so often, ticket stamped and current, is the way to ensure someone like me can be sure of receiving a quality and safe installation for my hard pressed cash, not to mention me going to sleep at night with stove still simmering away having peace of mind, like NG gas, fire/fume take no prisoners!

And if I have issues, an industry body with backbone to take the cowboys to task or, my inheritors someone to sue for my demise :eek:

:beer:

crphillips

To be honest that's what trading standards are there for.

I'm fairly happy with the current system......if everyone did top notch installs i may have to try a lot harder to get work. We also wouldn't have so many installs of other peoples to pull out and re-install every year.

welda

[/QUOTE]I'm fairly happy with the current system......if everyone did top notch installs i may have to try a lot harder to get work. We also wouldn't have so many installs of other peoples to pull out and re-install every year.[/QUOTE]

I think it's fair to say in some circumstances the current system does not work. If it did work, then perhaps it would be easier to pick up work due to trade body weeding out the cowboys and putting them out of business, unless they buck up of course. Thankfully and to date, these rip out jobs you mention are there for you to do, not a demolition due to serious house fire!! Poor installation due to installer cowboys allowed to trade under HETAS banner. If I remember correctly, CORGI lost their contract due to being more money motivated than dealing with issues they were originally set to deal with, so who funds HETAS, or is this a secret?

To be honest that's what trading standards are there for.

What you're stating here is, HETAS are basically useless, so a disgruntled punter should head straight to trading standards instead? (assuming installer is hetas registered)

:beer:

crphillips

I don't see loads of outright dangerous installs although there are a few.......mostly it's simply incorrect materials used and an untidy finish or flue unsweepable.

Most of the dangerous ones are DIY or done by none HETAS tradesmen. If they're not HETAS registered then there's nothing HETAS can do about it as the only real power they have is to revoke their membership. Therefore it's a job for Trading Standards.

Even if they revoked their membership an installer could register with another outfit and carry on. I see an unbelievable amount of installs carried out by biggish outfits that aren't HETAS registered but it's not HETAS's job to sort these out.

welda

I did say "as long as they (installer) is HETAS registered"

One of those potential endless debates without an ending, one can only hope anyone having any work done, not nessessary a stove, will pick a good outfit :doh:

Doug_bea

crphillips wrote: »

When we first started to install stoves it took us a good while to find out what worked and what didn't.

You only get to know the building regs by doing the work. If your not doing it regular then you'll not remember the regs.

It was really only when we started to sweep chimneys around 3-4 years ago that we became aware of the issues with the way that most people install stoves (ourselves included) that we totally changed the way we installed them and changed the materials we used.

After sweeping around 20 stoves or so through the access door in a closure plate we soon realised that this was a dreadful way to install and maintain a stove and due to the issues with tar leaking out of the flue we pretty much decided to re-line every flue except those that were clay/concrete/pumice lined and could be connected to with a clay liner adapter.

We also changed the materials we used to line out the recess of a fireplace because we realised that plaster, fire board and cement based render doesn't stand up to the heat unless there's plenty of clearance between the stove and the recess walls.

My main point is that no matter how skilled the builder they simply don't have the experience of installing thousands of stoves and dealing with the problems they're causing by carrying out installs in the way they do.

Also HETAS installers that don't sweep chimneys are pretty clueless about the problems they're causing by installing stoves in the manner they do. A good 30 - 40% of the chimneys i went to every year weren't sweepable. Also some sweeps don't tell you your flue isn't sweepable so they'll pretend they've swept it and take your money. You've paid your money but are no less at risk of a chimney fire.

Fortunately for us we pretty much only sweep the flues that we installed so sweeping is always possible.

What do you use to line your fireplace recess if you don't use sand/cement/lime render or superlux or variant of?

crphillips

We use 20mm thick compressed vermiculite. Only thing we've found that has a long lasting finish that looks mint and withstands the heat.

Not easy to get hold of as a DIYer though as it's mega expensive online and only comes in small sheets as it's very fragile and difficult to post.

hethmar

Just to put my pennys worth in I noticed in a recent trade newsletter that a private DIY installer has in fact been arrested! and charged for manslaughter because of his dangerous installation of a wood burner.