Electric heating or multifuel stove

tugrin

PLEASE help me mae the decision - I bought a rather damp, single brick skin Victorian cottage a couple of years ago. It only had an open fire which was supposed to heat 3 radiators (2 upstairs 1 in kitchen) It never did that and the cold down the chimney was appalling. I stuffed pillows up it last year and used fan heaters. Result - warm-most of the time but lots of mould and condensation. I had ambitions to put in a multi-fuel stove and let the heat circulate - no doors open staircase would help this. But its turned into a nightmare. I have knocked most of the fireplace back to the original space but now I've got the old grate and back bioler to deal with...
Should I just cut my losses and have an electric boiler to run the radiators. I cant face another winter like the last one.
There is NO space at all to put LPGor oil tanks and my wood/solid fuel has to be stored in the shed which is 100 metres away.Thoughts/

Gloomendoom

My thoughts are that you should spend your money on insulation.

tugrin

I have - very good insulation in loft, all draught proofing done, fleece-lined and thick curtains. It seems tough to insulate single skin brick and the rooms are very small to star with so dry-lining would lose me precious space. Have considered warm stick on sheet liningbut everyone seems to think this is a con??

muckybutt

Insulated plasterboard and studding would only knock off about 6" of the room, I too am in a single skin cottage and that is what I am planning on doing in the near future.

Like you no gas no oil just open fire and a stove with boiler. What you have to think about now is if you go the electric boiler route or the stove route then a lot of the heat produced is going to go to waste with the walls etc not being insulated.

Whilst electric boilers are efficient it will cost you an absolute fortune to run while your house remains poorly insulated.

gc_bus

You will certainly need very effective insulation to run (cheaply) an electric boiler. However they are very quiet and can be flexibly sited as of course no outside wall for a flue is required.

tugrin

Thank you muckybutt and g-c bus - OK I'm beginning to see the sense of insulating the wall. The front wall of the cottage is mostly taken up by plastic UPCV front door and window (quite old but double glazed. Its a terrace so do you think side walls need it? Upstairs wiould be much easier. Is this a job I could do myself (cash strapped )

muckybutt

I would personally insulate all the walls if you can, as for it being a diy job - it depends on how competent you are, you will have to fix battens to the walls at the correct spacings, then screw the plaster board to the battens.
After that its either a tape and sand down the joints then paint job, or you go the whole hog and plaster the walls.

Fairly easy to do but like I said it really doe's depend on how competent you are.