Daydream thread... without the rose-tinted specs

rozeepozee

Better Days, wood burners are a hot topic around here as we have one as part of our design for the house.

Dave has seen our designs and I'm starting to realise they're grander than I had really appreciated. The architect obviously had greater aspirations than we do..... We are learning this now. As we build.... I'm amazed at how sanguine i am being about it - perhaps the move to the country has chilled me more than i care to realise, although i do shout a lot in the mronings when I'm trying to get three children out of the house and the builders have already been on site for an hour. Itsme's warning of "double the quote and that'll be more realistic" rings in my ears daily. I naively always thought a quote was a quote. the there are these sneaky, expensive things called amendments, or additions. Hey ho, it's only money.

Anyway, back to wood burners.... We are seriously considering a Broseley Evo 26. They are huge and expensive but there is a local grant available that brings it vaguely into budget. It will run all our radiators and heat the main living room (16kW of rad heating, 10kW to the room, hence the 26). It is the only model that is MCS approved, which means that there's a voucher from the government towards its installation in addition to the community grant that's a local thing. I have to admit that I would have preferred the Pioneer as it also acts as slow cooker. I have friend who has had a lot of woodburners in their day and says Clearview are by far the best they've had, but it has no back boiler and we need one that will heat a large room and rads.

The Broseley and some solar thermal should solve our hot water and heating requirements for the moment. OH is dead set on burning logs. Pyromaniac I'm way more practical and wonder how attractive loading it will be once the novelty wears off. We are therefore also planning on getting a thermal store so that if the woodburning part of it becomes too onerous, we can plug in an air source heat pump down the line. Because we've never lived in the house, we have no real idea what our requirements are going to be so we are relying on the views of "experts" (cough). We have heat loss calcs etc, which seems to be money for old rope (like a lot of things in this building malarky), but there we are.....

Renewable energy is a minefield. The government seems to have no idea what it's doing, or offering by way of incentive and it's very hard to do a costing of how much you can save in the next say ten years. Dunno what everyone else feels about this , but I've found it mine boggling. It doesn't help that I'm always trying to do a million things at once with small children pulling at the bottom of my legs though.

I had one of my rare child free days today and to prove how much more productive I am without children around, I spent 3 hours on the internet and telephone and got the initial quote for a sewage treatment plant of choice reduced by £800. No on pays me that kind of money any more for 3 hours work so I was damned pleased with myself, but missed the school sports day as a result. A little bit tear jerking as my 3 year olds came first and second in the nursery race Ahhh, it'll all be worth it in the end.....

rozeepozee

Oh my word! Sorry for the essay. I obviously needed to get all that off my chest! :rotfl:

Itismehonest

That "double" thing is Itsme's Rule #1,rozee

Well done on the money off the treatment plant :T:T

That's Itsme's Rule #2 "Get lots of quotes yourself & compare with what your builders etc. get quoted"
Sometimes they can do better - if it's a firm they do a lot of business with - but there are many times when you can get a better price yourself.

#3 is, unless you live beside a motorway make very sure you know what sort of vehicle, number of men will be delivering. They'll still come in from directions where they get wedged between walls or can't get round corners but at least you'll have told them.
It can also save a lot of faffing around if they can use something like a HIAB if you can fit one into your place.

#4 - Never rely on just one form of power or heating. Particularly in the country things go wrong & it's always the more populated areas that get sorted first so it pays to have back up.

I really don't know what to make of all these new eco/green things. I'm sure they'll be fine when they've sorted out what actually works well & where. Some of the new green energy companies are going bust & leaving people in schtuck so be very choosey which you use, I think.

Better Days - Make sure you have the chimney checked for its' draw etc. before thinking about getting a woodburner. In most places they'll be fine but in others an open fire (larger chimney & more frontal draft) still works best.
A previous owner tried one in one of our inglenooks & it was a total menace so we took it out & reverted to the old dogs & basket that it was originally built for.
There was also a problem with tar coming through on the bedroom above's wall which was cured once the flue was taken out & the air was allowed to circulate in the chimney again.

rhiwfield

Betterdays, wood should be under cover but should also be exposed to air. Garage may well be better for storing seasoned wood rather than green wood. Log stores can be made cheaply .

Woodburners, many are excellent and give heating flexibility, very important re power cuts when CH wont work. Can also be used for cooking. But unless you have free/cheap wood wont necessarily save money. Its been mentioned before but best money saving likely to be from best insulation.

rozeepozee

Insulation is our main thing, it's a no-brainer. Although we have had issues finding someone to come out to our far flung part of West Wales to install the external stuff we want.

alfie_1

There was also a problem with tar coming through on the bedroom above's wall which was cured once the flue was taken out & the air was allowed to circulate in the chimney again.

do you mean you took OUT the flue liner ?? how could tar stain your walls with a liner ? or did the actual brick work mortar have leaking/gaps before?
am i having a durrrrr moment....lol

Davesnave

Better Days, wood seasoning is something that can't be hurried, so takes about 2 years, but of course if you're buying logs in, they should already have been seasoned. Some do it better than others!

However, last winter, thanks to the poor summer before, very few suppliers in this area had decent firewood. Some of them, like my partner farmer here, Pete, couldn't reach the logs they had stored, it was that muddy. When they did get them out the logs were wet through. I vowed that we would never again be caught out, so recent work on our barn has given us a huge log-conditioning area.

Our log burner is old and not clean-burn, so it will be replaced when we do the place up. Pete has a very swish Morso with 180 degree glass, which he's very pleased with, but round here many folk buy the local brand, which is Woodwarm.

http://www.woodwarmstoves.co.uk/

Otherwise, many of the rest go for the Clearview, if the stocks in the stove shops are anything to go by. The Broseley range that rozee mentioned are well-regarded too and come in some natty finishes.

Itismehonest

Remember insulation works 2 ways. It keeps warmth in once it's there but also keeps cold in as effectively. I think people often expect a place to be warmer (without heating) just because it's insulated but it doesn't usually work quite that way.
The newest end of our place has 6" insulation in roof & floor & 4" in the walls. Great when heated artificially from the inside but the sun (when we get it) makes not the slightest difference.

Itismehonest

alfie_1 wrote: »

There was also a problem with tar coming through on the bedroom above's wall which was cured once the flue was taken out & the air was allowed to circulate in the chimney again.

do you mean you took OUT the flue liner ?? how could tar stain your walls with a liner ? or did the actual brick work mortar have leaking/gaps before?
am i having a durrrrr moment....lol

No. Chimney is 2'6" square at the top & opens up in steps to the inglenook. A bit like this.
I could easily scramble up & out if I had footholds. So a normal liner would be useless. There was a flue placed centrally in the chimney & held in place there. Then they used vermiculite to fill around it. The builder who took the plate down looked like Father Christmas when all the stuff came down :rotfl: Tons of the blooming stuff shot out onto the flagstones.
It could have been worse - it could have been a carpet.

There's no brickwork. It's all stone. The tar may have been there in the stonework for hundreds of years. I imagine possibly rain from the top caused the tar to leach through. Anyway, opening it up to the air (how it was built to be) sorted it.

alfie_1

ELEMENTARY DEAR WATSON....:D:D

see my durrrr moments dont last long.....with help..:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: