For awhile now, I have being toying with replacing my open fire with a log burner stove.
The coal / log fire is great but not very efficient at throwing out a lot of heat as I guess 80% of the heat goes up the chimney.
The room to heat is about 40ft long and 20ft wide which opens up to a small passage and then into the dining room and open stairs to the first floor.
Looking at the various sites on-line, it sounds that a log burner would fit the bill but are they as efficient as they claim? They state that even with a smaller KW burner, their houses are as warm as toast!
As my gas bill for next year will most likely be in excess of £2K this got me thinking that if I had a back boiler incorporated I could link this up to the hot water tank and use this to help off-set the gas bill for the central heating and hot water. Whilst I appreciate that there are other ways of reducing my gas consumption, lowering the temperature isn’t an option as due to my wife having MS, a constant reasonable room temperature makes a big difference to her well being.
Next year I will also be looking to install solar to help reduce the electric bill which is nearly as high as the gas.
Supply of seasoned wood is not a question as I get plenty of this during the year and in the past end up giving logs away or dumping them.
Whilst cost of purchasing the system is of importance, this wouldn’t be the major driving factor. Looking more to reduce my dependency on gas and a reasonable pay back period on the investment.
If a linked up system is too expensive then probably looking at just getting a basic high output burner to help heat the main lounge.
Would appreciate any feed back from anyone who has a log burner and any particular features to look out for etc.
Thanks
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I have a log burner linked to a hot water cylinder and a heat dump radiator - my Combi boiler has been off since I installed the stove last march.... Got into the habbit of lighting a fire every day for hot water - Im loath to spend money on the electric coil in the tank. THat said I am looking at a hot water solar addon for the future, when budget allows.
If you have a free supply of wood - it will pay for itself in 1-2 years, less if you do alot of the labour yourself... but you will still need a hetas installer to do the install itself.
Excellent, many thanks David.
So I guess the back boiler I would need one pipe to connect to a heat loss radiator and also onwards the hot water tank. Another loop / pipe is run from the boiler stove to the other radiators in the house?
Can I ask what size / type burner you have?
I have a morso burner it heats the house ,i have never had the heating on since we put it in,it was not hard too do just open up the fire place and get a liner fitted,I dont have a mine linked too the hot water but it would make a huge dent in your bills if you did that,http://www.whatstove.co.uk/ is a good site ,all I would say is you get what you pay for ,so a morso clearview charnwood ext are a bit more too buy, but a much better stove that will go for ever.
We have an oldish 'Villager' log burner, bought second hand (but virtually unused) for £75.00 12 years ago - to say it's paid for itself would be an understatement! We ran it without a flue liner until a couple of years ago and have noticed that it is even more efficient now. Apparently, apart from the possibility of fumes leaking into the loft space, your house insurers would be rather awkward in the event of a chimney fire - or worse.
Will upgrade in a year or so and have ours linked as mentioned above
Ours is lit about 4pm and within an hour will take over from the central heating for the rest of the evening. The key is free wood tho! Wouldnt do without it - there is something rather satisfying with the wind howling outside, the cat stretched out and roasting on the mat and us in T shirts being warmed all for free!
It is recommended that a carbon monoxide alarm be in the room to be on the safe side.
If you do end up trying to link it into central heating get some good professional advice at least if your planning on installing yourself.
Boiler stoves can be very dangerous if installed incorrectly. Also the link up systems etc are not cheap, easier on an older vented system than sealed combi's.
David out of interest what set-up do you have and what sort of money was spent if you don;t mind me asking? Sorry to hi-jack but its probably relevant for graeme too.
Thanks
Goes without saying Simon! Whilst I am happy to undertake any pipe work I would need them to be professionally connected etc.
Currently getting a company to perform an assessment for me but my question is if I purchase a back boiler system I assume I could use this without actually connecting the pipes for the water until a later date?
Graeme - I can give you some advice on some of the points of this, having been there and done it - twice now.
Firstly, there is a difference between a pure 'wood burning' stove and a multifuel stove (which can burn smokeless fuel nuggets as well). Wood only models will not tolerate burning coal of any description and can be difficult to keep in overnight, whilst multi fuel versions will happy burn overnight on a shovel or two of the smokeless fuel.
I have installed a Aarrow Ecoburn 11 multi fuel stove, it ran previously on a stainless twinwall chimney system and has now been moved to my new property, the chimney lined by a local firm and the stove installed there.
I actually asked the same questions as you, nearly dead on a year ago -
http://www.landscapejuicenetwork.com/forum/topics/multi-fuel-wood-b...
Mine is solely a 'room heater' due to the technical level of plumbing that would be required to get it to heat water too, as the lounge where the fire is installed is a long way horizontally from the bathroom (which is on the ground floor), where the hot water tank is installed - our water is heated by a special tank system that gives mains pressure hot water too, as the property was fully replumbed, the capability has been left within the system for the additional back boiler to be fitted at a later date, but it is unlikely that it ever will be as it would be an additional £1000 worth of work.
When saying about back boilers, there is a big difference between pure 'boiler stoves' that do mainly hot water and provide little room heat and 'burner stoves' that mainly provide room heat but can be fitted with a back boiler to provide and I quote 'a supplement to hot water'.
My stove is 11KW output and is more than enough to heat our half of a 1930's ex council semi detached property - and we haven't even got the loft insulated or a lot of the draughts stopped yet.
I have attached a picture of our setup - the building work is still ongoing to finish the 'fake' chimney breast around the fire etc - you may wonder why it is on a plinth - quite simply it makes it easier to clean out, load with wood and its easier to see the flames too.
As regards fuel, as this is a large stove, it does have quite an appetite for wood, although it has run for the last year almost solely on softwood scrap wood, pallets, fence posts, joists etc. 25KG of smokeless fuel will last about 10 days or so at around £8 for the bag, so allowing for chainsaw chains, chain oil, two stroke etc, I reckon it costs about £2-£2.50 per day to heat the house now.
The stove was just under a thousand pounds a year ago and the chimney lining and associated repairs just under £1500, so compared to running the oil boiler at the previous property that used around £800 of oil a year, it will definitely pay back in time.
The stove will maintain the lounge temperature at a constant 25 degrees C without running particularly hard and that is with every door in the house open. Generally speaking it takes it around 35 minutes to raise the temperate 10 degrees C from a 'cold start'.
Any other questions feel free to ask!
Adam makes a good point. Boiler stoves often have a large percentage of heat to DHW or CH up to 85% with then only a 15% output to the room.
They can also be physically very large as a result and eat wood. A simple burner to heat the room could be less than 1/3 the KW, much smaller dimension wise and burn better. Burning at full heat is much better for your flue.
Many thanks for everyone's replies.
Yes I think it would be best to go for a multifuel stove so that I can cherry pick the fuel type and of course overnight burn would be a must.
I am still keen to see if I can link the stove up to feed the rads but the more I investigate this, I am leaning against this option but would probably go for a larger unit with a back boiler to keep my options open.
I recently looked at getting a woodburner hooked up to the rads but it looked to be overly complicated if I wanted to keep my existing boiler plumbed in as well....
To plumb in a wood burner with back boiler what you really need is a thermal store. Until I have saved up enough pennies (or waited until possible government grants are released in the New Year) I will stick with my open fire. I will then install a woodburner in the spring and keep the option of a backboiler open.
Keep us posted with what you do and if it works well for you Graeme!
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