Hi all
We're thinking of fitting a multifuel stove to open fire. At present chimmney has aclay/pot liner. Local firm recommends/heetas steel liner, however are these the collapsable type I've seen fitted for gas. Not very sturdy for brushing etc.
Could you use the stove type pipe bolted together and fiitted from fireplace?

Just done mine was about £300 for the pipe just pulled it down the chimney and connected both ends, all done.

Flexible flue liners for solid fuel & condensing boilers should be Class 1 liners, whereas gas fires only need to be the inferior Class 2 liners. A purpose fitted liner will create a better natural draught than an oversize chimney due to the reduction in volume of air that is drawn through a stove as opposed to an open fireplace and there will be less nooks & crannys for the soot to collect in a liner to ease the liner cleaning process.

i did the same thing just got a metal firm to make me 3 plates plus bearers (angle iron), cemented angles in laid plates on sealed with caulk heatproof type, fixed fire pipe to centre plate sealed with fire proof caulk, to clean chimney just remove one of the end plates, the reason the chimneys are lined is to stop the sooty tar deposits leaching through bricks and plaster and appearing on chimney breast, if this happens you have wallpaper with foil strips

Did mine last weekend. liner cost me £17 a metre from http://www.cwberry.com and the terminal was about £50. I fit it (125mm) inside a 225mm chimney and filled the void with vermiculite granules that are about £12 a bag (used 2 bags). Took me about an hour to do -that was with two of us.

I have done other chimneys before in exactly the same way. Tell the liner supplier what you will be burning (ie coal, oil, logs, gas etc) as the class of liner varies, or the other way you just get the best one that will withstand any fuel.

C

Thanks for the advice, the installation process seems to be caught up in H&S now.
Fitted a multifuel to our first house 22yrs ago, no flue liner, just 1 meter length of enamelled pipe and finished of with vermiculite and cement!!
Local contractor wanted 2k for fire opening alteration and fitting of liner!
Looks like I might have ago

Local contractor wanted 2k for fire opening alteration and fitting of liner!

Christ! We paid that for fire opening and removal of debris, plastering, large slate hearth, chimney liner and installation and stove with backburner. Can recommend a couple of decent HETAS people in Sussex / Kent..

(My brother did his all on his tod – up onto the roof, dropped it down, fitted the plate and then backfilled the void)

I'm curious, why does a stove 'need' a flue when an open fire does not?

….by 'flue' I obviously meant 'liner' 😳

I believe the theory goes that in a stove, 80% of the heat goes into the room and 20% up the chimney. For an open fire it's the other way around, so if you run a stove stright into an open chimney it doesn't get the chimney hot enough to encourage thermal draw…. plus as the exit gases from a stove and chimney walls are at a lower temperature the creosotes in the gases tend to condense more readily leading to more cleaning and high chance of chimney fires etc if you run the stove straight into a chimney.

Ahhhh, OK. One bit though that doesn't make sense is the higher chance of chimney fires.
I thought that chimney fires are caused by an excessive buildup of soot being ignited by high chimney temperatures. But if the chimney doesn't get nearly as hot when using a stove then the soot deposits would have less tendancy to catch fire 😕
You would have also thought that the higher temperature within a stove (compared to an open fire) would have created a 'cleaner' burn with less deposits………… but maybe not 😐

You would have also thought that the higher temperature within a stove (compared to an open fire) would have created a 'cleaner' burn with less deposits………… but maybe not

They do.

As Drac says, they do.

It depends what you burn, but for wood it tends not to be the soot that is the problem in chimney fires but the creosotes that deposit and then ignite when they build up, throttling the flow of gases up the chimney (I too am not entirely clear if it is the flue gas temp that ignotes the creosotes or unburnt embers drifting upwards….).

I think this tends to happen, for wood, when it's too wet to burn efficiently, so all the volatiles aren't burn in the stove and so go up in chimney and condense if the chimney temp isn't high enough (you can see that this is a vicious cycle as if you don't get enough heat for complete combustion in the stove, it is unlikely that there will be much heat in the chimney).

With an insulated steel liner you have a double benefit that it heats up quickly (being metal and insulated) and the liner area is lower than for the chimney itself so the flue gas velocity is higher, all giving less chance of deposit condensation.

I cut/process/season all my own wood and run the stove pretty much non-stop all winter. Uget about an eggcup's worth of ash from the liner when it's cleaned.

Interesting stuff. How long do you store your wood before you it's burnt?

Cut down the woods and stored outside in cords for about a year, brought home and cut/split and stacked outside under a tarp for another year then as the winters stock is used up this gets moved into the wood sheds adjacent to the house and a further covered store some way off in case we run low (so stored properly covered for another year before burning).

Can accomidate about 20 m^3 in fully covered storage… though this is nothing compared to my boss who I'm in our wood 'syndicate' with who has a covered store roughly equivalent in volume to the downstairs of a typical 3-bed-semi…. he takes it more seriously than me though 😉

Bristolbiker is right good seasoned wood is the secret and good coal if your using a multistove. They hardly leave any ash at all mine is going at the moment and it's becoming a bit unbearable in here.

Very organised, I'm proper impressed! I want to replace one of our open fires with a small stove and have been trying to buy a second hand Clearview, but the prices they go for are close to the new price and out of my range.
I've just read about the Morso Squirrel which seems a bit more reasonably priced. Anybody got experience with one of these?

We have the Morso Squirrel, it burns the wood efficiently it gets very hot and warms our large living dinning room well . It is easy to light and regulate .It has a squirrel relief on each side which put me off but is not noticeable in our house as it is set in to the chimney breast.

Seasoned wood is the key and we go through about a square meter a month i guess.

I have also used the Morso Owl multi fuel with back boiler which was very good but unsuitable for our clean air act area.

Used Morso with back boiler on a boat the ash pan/riddle /grate thingy lasts only about a year with coal and needs replacing at about £25 ish perhaps more now. the boiler version smokes when opened due to angle of boiler but non boiler is not affected by this. Otherwise a good solid reliable perfomer would get another squirlel thing never bothered me

Crankboy makes a good point about smoke control zones – have a look here (http://www.uksmokecontrolareas.co.uk/). If you are in a smoke control area and/or want more contemporary styling have a look at the Euroheat Harmony range (the Harmony 13 in either wood or multifuel is of an equivalent power I think). You'll be paying about 20-25% more compared to the Squirrel, but you can fit a remote control to the air control valve for armchair control….. what's not to like!!! 😉

Morso Badger user here, awesome burner heats the our 3 Bedroom Semi a treat.

interesting thread – we've been looking at getting a stove as well. we just had our chimney swept and have had a few open fires. good fun but bugger all heat even when you get it roaring!

can someone explain the procedure for fitting the stove, liner, flue and all the other jazz?

i'm fairly handy, quite happy to give it a go if there's a significant saving over paying an official bloke to do it. as luck would have it our neighbours have scaffolding up at the moment, so it'd be quite easy to get up there (assuming no vertigo!)

does it all need signing off for building regs etc?

We had a Stovax fitted last year and I'm pretty sure (but may be wrong) that it has to be done by an approved installer, or get it signed off. Not sure what happens if you don't!

No Richmars there's no need to use an official installer.

No Richmars there's no need to use an official installer.

Hmmmmm – not strictly true. Legally, for all installations after 2002 you need a building control notice from your council should you wish to fit / replace a stove, flue pipe or make modifications to a fireplace. Alternatively, the work can be carried out by a HETAS registered engineers.

I know for the stove its think it's something along the lines of:

6 inch minimum air gap.
A minimum hearth size for free standing appliances
A minimum thickness of base
An air vent depending on room size and stove capacity.

You might want to check your home insurance if you fancy doing it yourself. Not sure what the other implications are.

We had both ours fitted by a HETA registered company for peace of mind. Means you get a warranty on the stove for one thing – our chimneys also go up through our daughters bedroom and we didn't want to take any chances with fumes / fires – it's an old house and we weren't sure what state the flues were in…

We have recently had a chimney liner fitted by flutech, and bought a Morso 04 Multifuel stove (smokeless).

All flutech did was rip out the old gas liner (pulled it down the chimney) and then got on the roof and dropped down the new liner, which already had a new cowel built in on top, just needed to be cemented in place on top of the chimney.

It came to £560 and took them about 1 1/2 hrs start to finish.

When I looked at liners online they came out about £150 per metre, and I didnt fancy get up on the roof to fit so I thought it was just as well to get some one to do it.

As to smokeless. Every supplier we spoke to said that all stoves produce large quantities of smoke when heating up, just smokeless ones eventualy burn hotter therefore cleaner. We live in a smoke less area but were told if we wanted just get an ordinary stove and keep a bag of smokeless coal around as this would be enough to stop any concerns from councils, and besides it would take a neighbour to grass you up.

Yeah Woffle there is some building regulations but a builder who knows his stuff will do all that, no need to use HETA it's not like gas regulations.

We got a quote from both and the money saved using the builder will pay for at least one more stove, if there was a problem with warranty.

true but for if you were to have a chimney fire you might find that your insurer got a bit sniffy (likewise the stove itself likely as not wouldn't be under warranty if it's not installed by a HETAS bod)…

We went the route of an official installer mainly because I didn't want the responsibility when gases etc got through the little uns chimmney breast in the room above 🙂

It does need to be signed off for building regs if you are likely to be selling your house. I just look on it as adding a bit of value as the next owner wont have to get it lined.

It's more expensive than clambering up on the roof yourself but theres always the possibility of doing a "Rod Hull".. 🙂 I will leave heights, fire and poisonous gases to the experts thanks!

Well worth it though… I love our stove so much, the almond colour is holding up well too despite what people on here said when I posted it 😀

true but for if you were to have a chimney fire you might find that your insurer got a bit sniffy (likewise the stove itself likely as not wouldn't be under warranty if it's not installed by a HETAS bod)…

Speculation really as building regulations just mention what needs to adhered to not that it should be fitted by a HETA chap. Morso warranty also doesn't mention anything about using a HETA chap to fit them either.

Euroheat Harmony

Tick – got one, it's great – takes a little getting used to but once you get into it it burns well, and burns frugally – i.e. you burn less wood 😀 – it also burns very 'clean' as well – with well dried wood
We did consider the thermostatically controllable remote but decided that was just a bit silly….. 😀

Drying wood – the question was asked above – depends who you ask but, for fresh cut and split stuff they suggest 18 months – 2 years outside.
We've been buying kiln dried stuff – pricey but burns so, so well. However, now we've had the courtyard done I'll be getting a ton of fresh stuff delivered and stacked to dry….

Woffle/Drac – I had to tell my insurer that I had the stove installed and they wanted to see the HETAS stamped certificate. Beyond that no real issues, but I can't comment on if it was done DIY/builder.

If you go down the HETAS route, they are 'qualified' to make installation decisions beyond building regs – due to space in the chimney they fitted a 5" flue to my stove, even though, as Woffle says, the requirement is 6". Also the stove is also a little closer to the chimney in the hearth than 'allowed' by building regs, but again, bypassed and signed off without the need for a PCO to visit and inspect.

Speculation really as building regulations just mention what needs to adhered to not that it should be fitted by a HETA chap.

Granted. But the regs need to be adhered to / how the things are installed so either you DIY and then pay the council to come and issue a certificate, pay the HETAS guy or don't but risk having that conversation after the fact with your home insurer. It's admittedly unlikely but you take your chances…

(I'm also not sure what the law says with liability when you sell the house if you've installed it yourself. My brothers in the middle of seeing what ways he has of pursuing the previous owner of his house when the electrics the idiot had installed and rewired were discovered to be highly dangerous and not up to regs)

Loads of information and tips on here, having had astove before-Parkray Chiltern and my parents had a Hunter, we'd go for multifuel.thses two stoves also were our central heating and hot water supplier. Fortunately we're rural enough not to be in a smoke control area.
The air vent issue is dependant on stove output, over 5kw and you need avent in the room.

How about some pictures?

bristolbiker,

Can you tell us a bit more about your wood 'syndicate' – do you own some woodland?

I was afraid someone would ask that 😉

There is a large conservation wood land near me (well, it actually near my boss who is leader of our team of three) where as part of the conservation work a lagrish area is set aside each winter for local people to coppice. There must be 15-20 coppicing groups who get an area set aside each winter to work – in a good year each area yields about 15 tonnes of beech, poplar, ash and oak. I believe it is the only such scheme in the country – we had a guy doing a PhD in land management and particulalry coppicing and he said he's certainly never heard of such a large scale scheme where members of the public get to work, effectively, private land. The leader of each coppicing team has to do some H+S training, egt insurance and whoever is fellign needs a chainsaw ticket, but other than that the only bit of burocracy (sp) you see is the need for a rick assessment at the start of each days felling.

It started out as a bit of a hobby, but in order that the felling and transport of the wood doesn't take an age, between us we have a 4wd tractor and trailer, PTO driven saw bench and a large selection of chainsaws…. next year we may be looking at a hydraulic splitter to attach to the tractor (its really all about the toys 😉

Apaprt from getting a virtuely limitless supply of 'free' fuel ( the areas to be worked have already been set aside for the next 15 years!) it's incredibly good fun and hugely satisfying to go back to areas that have been previously managed and see what's happened.

That's one hell of a set up there Bristolbiker we use one chainsaw and X-trail with a dinky little trailer on for ours so takes some work but only really half a day or little more to clear about 1/2 tonne or so. That said we got permission to follow some tree felling who were clearing a wood on the land we have permission to seek wood from. They told us what we could use as they were just going to burn it were it stood.

There's tonnes of the stuff we've cleared all the hardwood out and or going back for the pine and the likes as soon as the ground is no longer a swamp. We've had to recruit my Uncle with a tractor and grain trailer though to shift it all there's so much.

Yeah, we were clearing the felled logs with a couple of LWB Landy's with offroad trailers but it was taking foorrreevvveeeerrrrr (it's about 3 miles from the wood to my boss house where we process it and it's about 15 miles then to my place).

Now with the 'proper' kit and three of us, we can fell and stack the wood in our (prob about 1/2 acre?) coop in a couple of days and transport 20 tonnes of wood in 4 trailer loads – so a late summers evenings work 😉 Plus, I don't have to do trips back and forth to collect the split logs in the car – one trailer load of logs tipped outside my door is now enough for a year…. stackign it anothe rmatter entirely!

One of the groups in the coop next us was using a grain trailer and front loader on their tractor and that made the loading and transport task a one man job in a couple of trips. An investment for the future……

Wow.

I might come back to you for more details on this. Just wondering if there is anyone round here we might persuade to run a similar scheme.

Hmmm. Sounds like a great setup you've got there guys.
I've got the chainsaw, the space to store plenty of logs under cover and one of these:

Just need some woodland 😥