Opening up a fireplace costs

dominoman

The house we moved into has had all the open fires removed and bricked up.

We would like to open it up and am wondering about the approximate costs. I will find the fireplace and surround myself so it is the cost of fitting it that I need.

We want to install an open fire for burning wood, but not a wood burner.

Does anyone have an approximate cost?

suisidevw

Do you have any DIY skills? If you do this is more than doable by yourself.......

Obviously to comply wtih building regs you *should* get it signed off by your local Building Control if not fitted by a HETAS engineer.

dominoman

Yes - I am reasonably competent DIYer. Good to hear I could do it myself.

I think I could do much of the prep myself, and would then get the chimney swept by a pro before installing the fireback.

The only real problem is that the old constructional hearth was removed and I don't think rebuilding that is something I have enough knowledge to do - unless I can find a good online guide.

Kiran

Opening up a standard fire place is very straight forward and doesn't require building regs approval if you are only going back to the original builders opening and not making it any larger.

Can I ask, more out of curiosity, why you don't want a wood burner/smulti fuel stove? The advantage would be that you don't need a constructionl hearth with modern stoves and you also don't need to worry about chimney integrity with a lined flue.

Although aimed at stove installation www.stovefittersmanual.co.uk has some good information so you can decide which bits you want to do yourself.

Good luck

suisidevw

Obviously the cost to a 'proper' stove installation far outweighs an open fire! I have one of each so know this to be true!

Kiran

That makes sense, I was just wondering if it was a purely cost driven decision. I had 2 stoves installed at the same time, I did all the builders work etc. and supplied the stove and sundries so kept control over the material costs. Labour on a supply and certify basis was much more reasonable doing the 2 at the same time.