restoring a real fire on my house - advise needed!

MummyOfTwo

Hi all, I have been avidly reading some of the threads on here with regard to real fires, ie coal or log burners. I live in a 1910 terraced three storey house with lots of its original features, and the last thing w would like to do is restore a beautiful fire in the sitting room. Currently it has a gas connection, with a flueless(:eek:) gas stove which i dont use as i feel they are a bit of a liability. neverless i have my gas man coming tomorrow to remove it and cap off the supply with a view to taking off the surround etc and having a good look at what we have there with a flue etc.

I have the offer of a small log burner but its a pot bellied thing and you cant actually see the flames. I have come to realise what i am probably after is quiet dancing flames on a winters eve with a glass of vino, as we have a full central heating system anyway so this would be a little supplementary heat in the evenings really.

I really like this type of set-up - can anyone advise how this is fitted etc?

http://www.machinemart.co.uk/shop/product/details/dorchester-cast-iron-fireplace/path/cast-iron-fireplaces

(i have a sweep coming out next week to cast an experienced eye over things i should add!)

Cardew

I think you are doing all the correct things - the main thing is to see if the chimney will need lining or not.

Depending where you live you can find some nice second hand(antique) fire places on ebay or http://www.friday-ad.co.uk/uk/for-sale/fireplaces-woodburners-N-1z141xt/No-60 albeit the really elegant ones cost a fortune.

hethmar

My god, the chinese do these things cheap dont they!

The sweep will be able to advise you, wait til he sees the system in the flesh.

MummyOfTwo

thanks for the replies

will no doubt have further questions after the sweep has been!

muckybutt

I personally wouldnt go down the open fire route, these are very unefficent as a good 90% of the heat will go up the chimney.

Go for the wood burner option much better imo

A._Badger

I rarely disagree with Muckybitt, but I do on this occasion. Stoves are definitely the fashionable choice but they have disadvantages - including, but not limited to, cost. They also usually force their owners to use more expensive fuels when they might, in some areas, be able to use housecoal.

A well designed open fire can generate a tremendous amount of heat and offers distinct aesthetic advantages over stoves, too. I can't remember which thread it was but another poster and I agreed here recently that we were very suspicious of this 90 per loss claim. Certainly, I have been able to heat large rooms from small fires. It depends very much on the design, but a good open fire can take a lot of beating. The case for replacing one with a stove needs some careful thought and calculation, I'd suggest.

MummyOfTwo

we did consider a stove to be honest, and kindly had the offer of a freebie, but once we really thought it out its just a heat to park in front of on winters eve. growing up we always had a coal fire and it didnt half kick out some heat!

currently the gas fire is out (finally!), and the gas man was rather shocked to see we still have our lead gas pipe! at the meter, some 7ish feet away, its copper so at some point under my new laminate floor copper joins lead. talk about bodge jobs, tis the story of this house i tell ya. we have to channel the pipe out of the hearth for it to capped off again a safe distance away from the new fire.

so i have had a feel about in the chimney - soot by the handful (the sweep will curse me), small fixed brick opening but all the brick behind just feels rubble-y and loose. plenty of soot everywhere so its been a fully functional fireplace at some juncture... will take a picture soon. i have a feeling this will be an epic project!

Russ123_2

A._Badger wrote: »

I rarely disagree with Muckybitt, but I do on this occasion. Stoves are definitely the fashionable choice but they have disadvantages - including, but not limited to, cost. They also usually force their owners to use more expensive fuels when they might, in some areas, be able to use housecoal.

A well designed open fire can generate a tremendous amount of heat and offers distinct aesthetic advantages over stoves, too. I can't remember which thread it was but another poster and I agreed here recently that we were very suspicious of this 90 per loss claim. Certainly, I have been able to heat large rooms from small fires. It depends very much on the design, but a good open fire can take a lot of beating. The case for replacing one with a stove needs some careful thought and calculation, I'd suggest.

Mr.Badger, how are you sir?

We were in agreement and for the O.P interest here is the thread

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=3378856

If anyone is interested and would like an update i have used my All night burner grate and without fully banking it up at night i managed to keep it in for 9 hours - All in all i am very please :j

I would say that with an openfire it is all too easy to fall into a 21st Century mindset and expect immediate results. They take alot of work and practice but eventually when you have mastered it they are so much more rewarding than a gas appliance and you wont mind not having the convenience of "flick of a switch" heat.

Good luck with your restoration

Ben84

I'm not a fan of open fires either, I think the efficiency is very low. They make a lot of radiant heat, but at the expense of sucking lots of air out the house so making it harder to heat the space with convective heat. You don't have to choose between radiant or convected heat though, not all radiant heaters suck the air out the house when turned on.

I will admit though, I am very 21st century mindset. I have one of those radiant gas fires with the teak case and white bricks inside that takes about 15 seconds to light and has a high/low setting. What can I say, it won't ever make it on to the Christmas card pictures or interior design shots, but it's cheap to run, doesn't suck huge amounts of air up the chimney in use and really I'd rather worry about the next chapter of my book than if the coal is running out. As always, do what makes you happy.

There are of course modern gas fires that look prettier than mine and still have the important feature of being easy to use and very efficient, so you can still have a good looking sitting room too. It's not all function over form.

TiredGeek

The one thing everyone fails to mention is that drafts and ventilation is good for you and the house!

Air going up your chimney sucks more air into the house - obviously - which keeps the place fresh and mould free, a much better living environment for the human.
Yes, it takes more money to keep the place warm, but it keeps the damp down, stops the place smelling stale, and makes it a nicer place to be. Fires look nice also. In the long term, running a fire and it's associated drafts is probably no more costly than repairing damage caused to the structure of the house due to damp and stale air.... since having a fire every few nights we've not had condensation on the windows, before it was always there.

I replaced the open fire in my house with a multi fuel stove so I can bung on whatever comes my way, wood, coal, peat, pallets....
The open fire we had was either poorly designed or I did something very wrong as it actually cooled the room down when lit! The stove makes a big difference by radiating a lot more heat from the case whilst still sucking air from the other rooms

Ben84

TiredGeek wrote: »

The one thing everyone fails to mention is that drafts and ventilation is good for you and the house!

Air going up your chimney sucks more air into the house - obviously - which keeps the place fresh and mould free, a much better living environment for the human.
Yes, it takes more money to keep the place warm, but it keeps the damp down, stops the place smelling stale, and makes it a nicer place to be. Fires look nice also. In the long term, running a fire and it's associated drafts is probably no more costly than repairing damage caused to the structure of the house due to damp and stale air.... since having a fire every few nights we've not had condensation on the windows, before it was always there.

I replaced the open fire in my house with a multi fuel stove so I can bung on whatever comes my way, wood, coal, peat, pallets....
The open fire we had was either poorly designed or I did something very wrong as it actually cooled the room down when lit! The stove makes a big difference by radiating a lot more heat from the case whilst still sucking air from the other rooms

The stove will take some air from the house and push it up the chimney, but in smaller amounts than an open fire. You can have too much of a good thing and being forced to ventilate the house rapidly whenever you try to heat it is the problem with open fires. To be fair, my open flue gas boiler/fire send a reasonable amount of air up the chimney too, but not enough to be a problem. I prefer to open the windows and get fresh air during the morning when I'm active then heat the house later in the day with the central heating when it's colder and I'm less busy doing things and moving around less.

Central heating and insulation isn't a bad thing in my experience. My centrally heated house with insulation isn't damp, stale, mouldy and making everyone ill. Frankly, I've never felt better since I got out of my old house with open fire, draughty crittal windows and minimal insulation that was always cold, damp and mouldy. The draughts were huge there, in fact we had windows that couldn't be closed, so no shortage of air flow and we were still struggling with mould all the time.