How much to install woodburner when we don't have a chimney?

suki1964

Andrew, one word of advice for when you are choosing your stove, don't go too big. Reading between the lines it sounds like you will still be using the ch to heat the house and just want the stove for effect and ambience on cold winter nights. My stove is 5kw and that heats the whole the living room and the two bedrooms either side. When burning at the correct range it will get the sitting room to the high 20s, sometimes it's too warm. But to get the best from a stove you have to work it,no point in having a large out put stove and only burning one log at a time cos otherwise you are too warm, will knacker the flu in no time

andrewf75

Thanks, yep from my minimal research so far, I think I'll be going for a small one. Its a smallish living room and I have no realistic ambition to heat the whole house - although hopefully I'll be able to turn down the thermostat and cover the cost of the wood

smellymel222

Thanks everyone for all the advice especially rustyboy21.

I suppose I want a real wood burner as my parents have one and its so nice to sit on a winters evening in front of it and toast some bread etc.

However, my parents have a big garden (so plenty of storage) and have a supply of free wood. I think because they get the wood for free, it kind of clouds my judgement and I think its going to be cheap to run! But I suppose you can buy a lot of gas for £7000!

I've just looked at some gas run stoves and Wow, there actually look quite realistic. Ive currently got a crappy looking fake gas fire which we hardly have on because it doesn't seem to warm up very well but I guess gas designs have come on.

Do these gas fires really throw out a lot of heat and are cheaper to run then wood burning stoves if you have to buy the wood to burn?

Also, it seems I have a pre-cast flue which seems to limit even what gas fires I can install. Curse the builder of my house, he seems to be against me getting a nice looking fire in my living room!!!

rustyboy21

smellymel222 wrote: »

Thanks everyone for all the advice especially rustyboy21.

I suppose I want a real wood burner as my parents have one and its so nice to sit on a winters evening in front of it and toast some bread etc.

However, my parents have a big garden (so plenty of storage) and have a supply of free wood. I think because they get the wood for free, it kind of clouds my judgement and I think its going to be cheap to run! But I suppose you can buy a lot of gas for £7000!

I've just looked at some gas run stoves and Wow, there actually look quite realistic. Ive currently got a crappy looking fake gas fire which we hardly have on because it doesn't seem to warm up very well but I guess gas designs have come on.

Do these gas fires really throw out a lot of heat and are cheaper to run then wood burning stoves if you have to buy the wood to burn?

Also, it seems I have a pre-cast flue which seems to limit even what gas fires I can install. Curse the builder of my house, he seems to be against me getting a nice looking fire in my living room!!!

Hi Mel ( Didnt want to call you smelly and give you a reputation ! lol)

If you like the look of the gas stoves, you are a bit restricted with only having a pre cast flue, as most, if not all of them need a proper chimney to be fitted.

However, if you can cope with the following ( hear me out ) and have a good artistic vision, then you could have what you want at a few grand less than you were working on for .

OK, try and vision this. Forget about the precast flue you have, get it blocked up and put the TV on that wall or move the couch in front of it.

Next, in a corner of the room, with an adjacent outside wall, you can have a freestanding gas stove like the link below. I am using a retailers webpage to show you the product, as the manufacturers ( Faber) website is crap at present, they have messed with it and then gone on holiday for a month ( Those Dutch ! lol)

http://stoneandfire.co.uk/product/faber-vaska-gas-stove/

There are other models available, I love the 3 sided Jelling myself best.

This would only have to sit on a glass hearth in the corner and the flue system would go up about a meter, then bend out to a wall terminal.

The cost of this would be around ( working on SRP's ) around £2.8k then I would say about £4oo fitting if that.

It would give you a really nice contemporary feel to your room, be ultra efficient and easy peasey to control.

There are other manufacturers out there doing similar, what you need in the above scenario is a balanced flue stove, I just love Faber product more as their flames are fantastic.

You can overcome any issues with fires, but you need to know how to go about it, as I have said on many posts on this site, a gas fire is not the type of thing to buy online, you need to know how you can use it in your own situation.

smellymel222

Thanks Rustyboy21. Is there any regulations about how close a balanced flue can be to windows and doors? Only the outside wall of our living room has your typical big 70's window, it makes the room nice and light but there is not much actually wall space. On one side of the window is the opening window and on the other side there is a bit of wall then our porch with the front door.
Can a balance flue only be a certain length? And does it have to run vertical or can it run horizontal?

rustyboy21

You can get some stoves which have flues whichcome out of the backbut if you siting it in a corner, you cannot go through the corner of the houses brickwork.

You ( in the scenario i placed above) would run the pipework vertical for min500mm then do a 90 deg bend and then fit a wall terminal. The pipework has to finish a min of 500mm away from the corner of the house and the same distance from a window.

Faber actually make a fire which is triangular in shape, made specifically to fit into a corner of the room. It is lovely. You then board up around it and you can decorate it as you see fit. It is called Solutions

There are ways and means to sort out your issues, you just need to find the right retailer with the right knowledge, in your area to do the legwork for you.

Hope above helps