angiescarr

Hi. Is anyone on the forum upgrading from a normal woodburner to a boiler stove? If so can I buy your old one? Even if it means shipping from the UK.

For financial reasons I can't put my whole wet system in this year, maybe not for a couple more, and apparently you can't run a boiler stove just as a stove in the short term.
A lovely local freecycler has offered me a really tiny shepherds stove, but I'm afraid it won't be big enough to heat our living room.
Buying new would seem wasteful so I'm looking for a second-hand one. Buying and selling second hand just doesn't seem to be common over here. It's starting to get chilly up here in the hills.

fionamw

Hi... just so you know you're not alone, I'm wanting to upgrade to a backburner woodburner and would love to let you have our enormous woodburner but (a) we haven't figured out the costs, practicalities etc ourselves yet and (b) I wouldn't give my inset woodburner to my worst enemy - it barely heats 6ft of room!!!!

Jur

In Portugal you can find round ones, which are free standing with a lit on. They produce excellent warmth and you can put your kettle on them.

bil

Looking at that installation, I would suggest a couple of points. Firstly I don't like 90 degree bends and horizontal sections. They can be very dangerous. Take it out thru the wall at 45 degrees fron the VERTICAL (30 is better) and do it as high up the wall as you can to maximise heat loss to the room from the single skin pipe. Remember that the pipe as it passes thru the wall will expand and contract MASSIVELY and if you don't allow for this, it will crack the plaster and even the wall itself. Finally, don't use single skin tube outside, no matter what anyone else may say. If you do the thinwall singleskin will cool too rapidly, chilling the flue gasses and causing condensation, which can go on to cause massive problems. Make sure the top of the flue outside is higher than anything close to it like walls and roof.

Inset stoves are very poor at heating rooms unless they have really good airvents all round, and even then they aren't any where near as good as a freestander.

If your free stander is too close to a wall, it can damage the plaster. To stop that I use a line of vertical racilliones between the wall and the stove with an air gap between stove and racilliones and another between the racilliones and the wall.

friar tuck

If your free stander is too close to a wall, it can damage the plaster. To stop that I use a line of vertical racilliones between the wall and the stove with an air gap between stove and racilliones and another between the racilliones and the wall.[/QUOTE]

I had the fireplace rendered because of cracking plaster but even that has gone. What are racilliones?

We have a Morso 'squirrel' and a Herald 'hunter' in our two main living areas in the UK and they get too hot even for a large room. We will be bringing a 'Squirrel' over with us when we move full time.

Jur

Just to clarify, this is not my house. I justed wanted to show Angiescarr which stove I meant.

At home we have a square one, about 50 cm away from the wall, with a chimney going straight up. The chimney is inside the room to have more heat. It works a charm and we can put the kettle on top of it too!

bil

I had the fireplace rendered because of cracking plaster but even that has gone. What are racilliones?

We have a Morso 'squirrel' and a Herald 'hunter' in our two main living areas in the UK and they get too hot even for a large room. We will be bringing a 'Squirrel' over with us when we move full time.[/QUOTE]

Racilliones are the long terracotta 'bricks' that are 1 - 3 inches thick, a foot or more wide, and up to a metre long. They are used in roof making to infill the gaps between the vegas (rafters) Because of their internal air spaces they make quite good (if fragile) heat insulation.

Do you mean the inside of the fireplace was rendered? If it was originally done by you as a non expert, I would sigh and say 'Next time don't do that.'

If it was done by a 'professional', and god knows, I've seen hundreds like that which were done by people who were supposed to know what they were doing, but clearly didn't, then I get a tad irritated, because it is ripping the customer off big time. In thirty years in the trade I have never ever seen a domestic render that would withstand that level of heat shock.

If Hunters are as they were, then I deffo wouldn't advise bringing it over. The best names these days are clearview and woodwarm.

I can't remember what the morso squirrel looks like. If you want to bring one over, go mad and get one of those German grey cylinders. They outclass anything that the UK produces (to the best of my knowledge). They might deliver one to you out here.

friar tuck

"Do you mean the inside of the fireplace was rendered? If it was originally done by you as a non expert, I would sigh and say 'Next time don't do that.'

If it was done by a 'professional', and god knows, I've seen hundreds like that which were done by people who were supposed to know what they were doing, but clearly didn't, then I get a tad irritated, because it is ripping the customer off big time. In thirty years in the trade I have never ever seen a domestic render that would withstand that level of heat shock"



The rendering was done by a pro but I think the burner was too close to the wall at about 5". The other one I have now tiled with some old trimmed slate roof tiles and it looks grand and does the job nicely.

bil

[QUOTE=friar tuck;8911586

The rendering was done by a pro but I think the burner was too close to the wall at about 5". The other one I have now tiled with some old trimmed slate roof tiles and it looks grand and does the job nicely.[/QUOTE]

Sorry, but the rendering wasn't done by someone with any knowledge whatsoever. They might call themselves a pro, but it's not what I would call them. Dickhead, more like.

You just don't render the inside of a fireplace. You also shouldn't line it with housebricks, as they can't take heat either for any length of time.

Fireplaces should only ever be lined with firebricks set in fire clay. Never ever with cement, or god help us fire cement. Fire cement is to me about the most useless thing on the planet.

Did you use a heat resistant adhesive? If any of the slates come loose, you might be able to get something like that you could glue them back in with.

Cats-R-Us

Have you checked with the Chiminea shops in your area. We live in the Andalucian region (Granada Province) and were given a 60% discount on the price of a log burner. It appears to be only specific shops in each town but the grant of up to 60% discount comes from the Junta de Andalucia. You need to be a resident and show a copy of your padron. We have heard since that they sometimes check back with you later to ensure they are not being taken out of the region as it is not a country wide grant. They also gave grants on installing central heating and solar.

Solarwhizz

Get one with a clip in boiler option, then you can convert later at your leisure.
Villager do a good range, and for cheap and cheerful there is the Lilyking imports (no info on quality of these thought). I had the Villager Elite with Backboiler running 5 Rads (3 beds Hall and Bathroom)in my last house (reform traditional build IE stone Mud walls etc), found it to be very economical in comparison to the Gasoil I have in my current house, about a 40% of costs per year to run. Also if you look here http://www.boilerstoves.co.uk/boiler...llation-A.html it gives you a various system layout schematisc for installation.Including chimney flues.

angiescarr

Interestingly this is very good news. This is the type of woodburner I've been offered. (@bil) I have a straight chimney with two flues with the liners already in place but I read your advice about expansion and angles etc with interest. I'm collecting the little woodburner today.

angiescarr

Ahh. This is also interesting... For when the other half gets some work and finances stop freefalling!
Thanks guys (And girls) for your help.

bil

Do take what I say seriously. Horizontal sections are effectively unsweepable, and you really want to be able to sweep up thru the stove if you have a pitched roof, down thru the top (less risk of mess) if you have a flat roof.

As for expansion, in 30 years sweeping chimneys in the UK where such an expansion joint is mandatory, I have never seen one. What I have seen is cracked plaster and brickwalls in abundance.

Another way to see how much water is in wood is to take a log, brush off all the loose bits and weigh it. Put it near the stove to dry, and weigh it ech week until it stops losing weight.

It costs a huge amount of energy to boil that water away and you can all to easily be wasting a third of the fuel that way.

Seasoned isn't important, dryness is.

Rotor

He`s right, I worked in the heating industry for 5 years and seen all what Bil mentions ...install correctly and you will only have to do it once