Log Burner Surround

lhchap18

Hi All,

Means I have some time on my hands in these difficult times I fancy a bit of house renovating.

When I purchased my house a couple of years back it came with this log burner fitted which we use in the cold nights.

I’ve seen a few images of people with log burner surrounds and was wondering if:
1) Are building regs required to be informed of the change?
2) I’m planning on having a new Heath fitted and was going to attempt the fire surround myself. Are there specific guidelines and materials to utilise for the project? From what I’ve seen, it’s a bit unclear if I have to utilise brick work and cement whilst building the surround or if I can just stud with plasterboard?

Here’s an image of something which I like:

Wooden floor will also be coming up and we’re putting down carpet.

Any advice will be appreciated. May still approach a builder depending.

Thanks

Tucker

Your stove manufacturer will normally provide details of distances permitted for various angles to combustible and non combustible materials. I'd start by checking their specifications. 
I am no expert but it already looks far too close to those tables and tv. 

FreeBear

Tucker said: I am no expert but it already looks far too close to those tables and tv. 

The hearth looks way too small... There should be 150mm to the sides & rear, and at least 300mm to the front. https://www.stovesonline.co.uk/stove-hearth-size.html

The flue where it goes through the wall also looks a little suspect - Has the installation ever been signed off by Building Control ?

A word of caution - I have some 420mm of hearth in front of my stove and carpets. Have burns in the carpet from hot embers falling out. Now have a sacrificial mat in front of the fire to limit any damage.

Davesnave

There are many ways to do what you like in the picture, but standard plasterboard and stud work isn't one of them! It wouldn't be compliant with regs. Even the chimney breast above the fire may get hot and if you used the fire you have for a long time you'd be likely to get cracks where the flue enters the wall.

Our set up above utilised a galvanised steel box for speedily lining the opening and the entire chimney breast was dotted and dabbed using cement board and skimmed.. Any good metalwork place should be able to fabricate a box to tie in with the register plate. Our was arranged in 2 days via the stove installer. The box is painted with ordinary good quality emulsion. We've just had our 4th winter with this fire and so far no cracks or problems, but the back of the lining is less than a full brick to the plastered room next door, so that wall gets pretty warm! No cracking there either, so far.

We opted for a non combustible limestone surround and finished the floor with LVT. The distance from the fire to the edge of the hearth is 0.43m, and as there's always the chance of an accident, we put a cheap £20 Dunelm rug in front. It's still undamaged, but a bit threadbare now!

-taff

The picture you showed of what you would like and the one that dave posted are all inset fireplaces. Yours is inside the room, so work out if you do make a fire surround, then it will be jutting into the room, and you're going to have to move fruniture and probably lose quite a bit of space around it were you to place at regulaton distance etc. Basically, you're making a chmney breast in the room again

Davesnave

-taff said:

The picture you showed of what you would like and the one that dave posted are all inset fireplaces. Yours is inside the room, so work out if you do make a fire surround, then it will be jutting into the room...

Theoretically it could go into whatever's behind the wall too, but I agree space will be lost. The large wood burner we replaced was in the room, but we were lucky to have a shallow chimney breast and an unexplored fire opening. Because of the shallowness, our fire is a wide and not very deep model and we still ended-up perilously close to the room behind.

Jack_Cork

I've done what you want to do. I used lightweight thermo-blocks, covered in plasterboard and skimmed and  hardiebacker board for inside the fire