Preparedness for when

Ches

My condolences Kittie.

Nargleblast

kittie Whatever scientists may say, Shakespeare had it right when he said "There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy"

May you continue to receive comfort and support when you need it, as you have so often given the same to others.

[Deleted User]

Oh KITTIE love that's so beautiful, I love that he's still with you and still making you happy it's the sign of a true and lasting love. He'll always be there for you for as long as you love and remember him and that will be forever won't it my dear?

ivyleaf

kittie I'm so glad your dear husband has shown you that he's still around and okay, and that you're having so much support from those who love you xx

siegemode

Kittie thanks so much for sharing your visits, beautiful. Your posts have helped put things into perspective for me and OH, thank you:)

siegemode

Hi all, hoping someone can help regarding wood burners/stoves/solid fuel heating.

In our quest to become debt free we are looking to move house. It's not downsizing but trying to find somewhere possibly our last that will give us the space to become slightly less dependant on the system/utilities.

Luckily we live in an expensive area and by moving to another county have the ability to pay off the mortgage and aim to do this as soon as we find the right property. It will still only be 2/3 beds but hopefully with an open fire and/or woodburner.

As we are struggling to fit all my requirements:odreams perhaps we need to look at installing a woodburner. With this in mind are there any considerations we should be aware of or restrictions, costs, pitfalls etc.

OH is starting to get a tad frustrated as I turn everything he finds down due to the kitchen being too small or badly laid out along with the lack of independant heating etc.

OH wants to get on with it and move, me however wants to wait for the perfect place which I am convinced is out there and will present when the time is right.

Nellie_the_Viking

HI Siegemode, I've just come out of long lurkerdom because I can offer some advice on woodburners. I had one installed just over a year ago, and it is without a doubt the best addition that I have made to my house.

I moved into a 3 bed victorian semi with semi-efficient central heating, single skin walls and no easy way of fixing wall insulation without spending a fortune, so I wanted a way to keep it warm, and boy does it do that. The cat says it is his favourite piece of furniture and regularly looks into it and at me in a disdainful way which clearly says "stupid human, make the heat box be orange".

My town has a conservation area which I am just outside of so I don't have restrictions on what I can burn. If you live in or near a conservation area it is worth checking with the council as you may only be allowed to burn smokeless fuel which is a little more expensive than plain logs/rafters/whatever else you can beg borrow or steal (Mrs Lurcherwalker is an expert on this). If not, then you can set light to anything that pleases you

You will need to include the cost of not only the stove, but a suitable hearth if you don't have one and a chimney liner. I had to have my old victorian fireplace opening up to get the burner in, so there were some costs for replastering etc but I got a quote from a woodburner shop/fitter and they included taking out the old one, opening up, installation, all the parts and making good. I paid around £1800 for everything. It was a big investment but my energy bills have gone down substantially and I cadged the roof of a house being redone for my first load of wood so that was free.

There are lots of different brands out there. I wanted something really simple so went with a well known Danish company (Morso) who produced super efficient little stoves. I've got the smallest version because my sitting room is fairly small. You will need to know the dimensions of the room in which you are installing when you choose a stove (width,depth and height) so you ( or they) can work out the size of heat output you actually need. If you have a capacity too small then it won't heat the room properly, if the capacity of the stove is too great then you will bake and be uncomfortably warm.

It there is no established fireplace that isn't a problem as a flue can be installed internally or externally, even in a new build, without a chimney.

They do come as freestanding or inset into a wall so something can be found to fit most spaces and suit most tastes.

I'd be inclined to go and have a look at your nearest wood burning stove showroom and see what you like. You will have a choice of woodburning or multifuel - the multis tend to cost a little more but to give you more flexibility (I can burn wood, coal or just about anything in mine and can adjust the mechanical settings for air inlets etc easily by pulling the lever.).

I've got no regrets and 2 of my friends have just had them installed on the basis of seeing mine going.

I hope that helps. Good luck.

BHB

HI Siegemode, Also you need to consider where you will get your fuel from and where you are going to store it.


We were, until last year, just burning pallet wood that we sawed up with a table saw. We found a couple of companies on the local industrial estate that would willingly let us have them for free.


But, due to a bad back, this year we have had to buy some fuel. We bought a pallet of wood briquettes, a pallet of kiln dried hardwood and a pallet of peat briquettes. Its a lovely combination - but cost us £700 for the 3 tonnes.


Having said that, it has kept our cottage toastie and the immersion hasn't been on since November.


We have a small 1800's cottages. The woodburner is rated at 8Kw and to be fair is way bigger than we need for our small house. The built in backboiler heats a tank full of water in about 2 hours. as well as heating the whole house (No radiators - just by convection)

We probably could have got away with 2 tonnes for the winter, but have been a bit non MSE and had it going practically non stop.

BHB

[Deleted User]

SIEGEMODE I'd second visiting the nerest showroom and get an idea of which models of stove you like the look of. Ours is a CLEARVIEW INSET (Multi fuel) STOVE and is fitted flush into the fireplace recess. When you have found your new home the installation engineer will come and visit and help you work out exactly the right model of stove for your room size. The range of sizes and heat outputs is enormous but they'll see you get the right one for your needs. We only burn wood on ours, and yes we are opportunistic scroungers and will take any untreated wood we can get be it roof beams, trees that have fallen or need cutting, the old decking from the pub, the wooden cradles that new gas main pipes arrive in the road on, building site wasteage or old pallets, even deadwood from the local woods, it all burns well and is free for the gathering or the asking. The next most important thing you'll need is a dry storage area with lots of airflow to keep your cut logs in until you burn them. We've scrounged 12 of those big wooden crates/cradles that paving stones or big rockery stones are delivered to building sites in. We stack them 2 high and have felted the tops to keep the wood dry. We have our logstore in the side passage sheltered by the side of the house, so can leave the fronts of the cradles open and the wood stores well there. You need to season newly felled wood for at least a year to let it dry out before you can burn it and we always have at least 3 years worth of wood at any given time in various states of drying. We also make papier mache logs from newspaper in the warmer months and dry them in the greenhouse and polytunnel and they are super for getting the fire lit, saves waste and having to recycle the paper too. The woodstove is one of the best things we've ever invested in, we've has it for 10 ish years now and it's so lovely to sit by on cold evenings and warms the whole house to the point of not needing the central heating, so it also saves us quite a lot of money too.

Frugalsod

Hi Siegemode have you considered something else? I found this which could be very useful for you. It details how to make a rocket mass wood burning heater.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/paulwheaton/rocket-mass-heaters-4-dvd-set

It is basically details on DVD on how to make your own. It might actually do a lot of what you want.