wood burner condemned

aliby21

Hi all,

(probably more a vent than anything but) I moved into my house a couple of months ago, been looking forward to using the woodburner, got the sweep in today and he has told me it is unsafe and I need a new one. Peeved is an understatement, the woodburner was a big feature of the house for me and is less than two years old, but apparently it was a cheap and nasty one + not put in well + not operated properly.

anyway, my head is spinning a bit and not sure what to do next. How much research did everyone do before deciding on what burner to get? The sweep has said he can install a new burner for me, and shown me a pic of one he can do at a special price, which is a temptingly easy option. especially as a quick look on the net has left me befuddled with the options that seem available.

as I said, this is probably more a vent than anything, but any comments welcome!

michaelgordon

have you had a second opinion on this, could the sweep just be trying it on 2 years dosent really sound that long

StuC75

anywhere that you can get a second opinion? How well do you know the sweep?

alleycat`

What stove is it?
What exactly is wrong with the install?
What is he proposing to do to resolve the issues?
What stove is he offering to replace it with and at what cost?

Is he HETAS registered or is he proposing to get the council to sign off the install?

He might be right but when he is offering to sort it out he isn't impartial, so always best to get a second opinion.

aliby21

thanks everyone. yes, I guess a second opinion would probably make sense. Though having had a coffee, calmed down and gone and looked at it again, the problem is a crack across the top of the burner, from where the flue pipe come out to about half way across. So I guess that is a fairly insurmountable problem.

The existing stove is a bela vista mulitfuel; the sweep has offered a Hunter cleanburn, installed, for £1000. He is a HETAS registered installer.

alleycat`

Fair enough, if the cast iron has cracked then it probably is kippered.

People able to weld Cast Iron are now few and far between.

Looking online at prices the bela vista is about £600, i doubt a hunter is a huge amount more but it is a brand I've heard of before and seen in use.

I assume he is offering a herald 5?

aliby21

thanks alleycat, so that seems to be saying that the (knackered) one I have now and the one he is proposing to put in (the cleanburn lovenholm) aren't that different (not the difference between 'cheap and nasty' and 'top of the range' that I was getting the impression was the case). Think I will find a shop and at least go and have a look at some different woodburners before i commit myself to anything. The toasty toes will just have to wait a bit ... On the positive side, it means I can rip out the truly horrible hearth that the previous owners had put in

greyteam1959

If it really is only 2 years old surely the cheapest option would be to fit a new part ???

alleycat`

Curious.
Hunter is quite a well established brand.
CleanBurn seems to be a spin off "brand" of hunter i wasn't aware of.

I assumed by the term "cleanburn" it was some sort of hunter "defra" marketing speak and not a distinct "brand".

Either way i wouldn't consider hunter a "premium" brand.
Certainly not a bad one but not what i'd call top notch.

I can't comment on the one you have that is broken as i don't know the brand, just a rough "new" cost to buy.

The biggest problems with the chinese stoves is they are inconsistent in quality and getting spare parts is usually a mare.

Some are better than others but it is a bit potluck.

All i can really say is i'd put hunter in the higher entry level part of decent stoves and certainly not a massive leap forward (at least in money terms) over what you have, albeit broken.

I would think you are really buying a better support network and consistancy of product rather than saying you are getting a rolls royce stove.

I believe A badger on this forum has a hunter and he speaks highly enough of it. The ones i've come across have always seemed decent enough. Not exactly pretty but they do a job.

I have a stovax stockton, which i'd put alonside the hunter in terms of quality, so i'm not exactly a stove "snob" on these things.

I suspect if you want to go for the top end you'd be looking at Euroheat or someone like Clearview but you'll do well to have much change form £1,500 (i think a harmony 13 is about £1,300), i suspect a new clearview 500 will be in the same ballpark.

If you want to go for cheap, but supposedly decent, i think the firefox 5 might be worth a look (probably £400).

The best advice i got was to look at a few, have a play with them and see what you find that you can get on with.

alleycat`

mervyn11 wrote: »

If it really is only 2 years old surely the cheapest option would be to fit a new part ???

I'd normally concur but google turns up exaclty nothing when searching for stove spares for this stove.

Not even how to source replacement glass.

Trying to find a replacement cast iron top is going to be interesting.

It is possible the top has cracked, not due to abuse, but due to poor casting quality.
However, if the sweep says the stove looks like it was "abused" i'd be wary of throwing parts at a potentially damaged appliance.

Then again if eh is trying to sell you something it is hard to know what is truth and what is fiction.

A._Badger

I'd agree with Alleycat (and yes I have a Hunter - it isn't perfect but a 14kw stove isn't easy to find, let alone afford!).

It's much like cars. If you have the money and it matters enough to you, buy a Jaguar or a Mercedes. If it doesn't or you can't, then a Ford will do the same job and cost a lot less to buy and run.

One thing this story does illustrate is the danger of buying cheap cast iron stoves, which rarely have proper support from distributors or manufacturers. Or. come to that, even expensive cast iron stoves and letting them suffer thermal shock. Steel is, in many respects, a superior material for his application.

Shop around by all means, but your sweep sounds like he is giving you a cost-effective option - which is a lot more than many stove shops will do. They will want to extract he maximum amount from your pocket that they can. And some of them, from my experience, will say almost anything in order to do it.