Just wondering how many on here installed their own stove into an existing fireplace?

Did you get building control to sign it off? How many visits did they make, is it a big headache or just read the HETAS rules and follow them?

I’ll also need to relay the hearth as its been removed and carpeted over. Anyone done this? Photos would be good, can’t decide on brick, quarry tile or stone slabs. The house is 1960’s so don’t want it looking too rustic as it would be out of place, similarly I don’t want a glossy granite/marble thing.

A random idea was polished concrete, with the right mix I’ve seen it looking quite colourful for worktops etc. But is polishing concrete something that can be done DIY?

Planning on doing this myself. Seems straight forward enough.
Hardest bit would be getting the liner in I’d imagine.
The gas man is coming in Feb to service the boiler and said he’d inspect and sign it off for me. I’ll have to put a new hearth in as the one we have in is marble which apparently isn’t allowed. Don’t know about a concrete hearth.
Looking forward to doing it.

We filled our fireplace with a slab of Lancashire stone about 1m square and 4 cms thick, with bevelled edges, that we ordered from a quarry. Two actually because we did front and back rooms. We have solid concrete screed floors over Bison beams and blocks so I laid blobs of sandy mortar and dropped the slabs on top, using 4×2 timbers as rails to slide them into the fireplace. Flpiin’ heavy, they were. They form a good solid base for our two Dovre 250 stoves to stand on.

The bloke who fitted mine advised joins in the slab: rather than one piece I have four. He said the unequal heating under the fire might make a single piece crack.

Polished slate here, if I did it again I’d look for natural, as-split. The shine takes some maintaining, and it’s easily scratched and chipped.

Before and after shot. Black sandstone on top of the original concrete
hearth. I was going to fit slate but stove fitters said sandstone would be harder wearing than slate.

3 pieces of sandstone ok so far but as it’s not a polished finish harder to keep immaculate than a smoother finish but we’re not too fussed about that really.

Thanks guys 🙂

You do know that some stoves don’t need a structural hearth.
I think the Morso stoves are ok on just a non combustible base.

Edit: only a 12mm hearth required for this: http://www.woodburnerwarehouse.co.uk/multi_fuel_stoves/morso_stoves/morso_squirrel_1410_multifuel_stove.phtml

My hearth is comprised of 4off 600×400 slate tiles rustic multicolour I had left over from a kitchen tiling job.

I fitted our FireBelly FB myself including lining the chimney, not too hard a job really. My friend is a stove installer and was supposed to do it for me as a swap for some tiling work I did for him but he could never be bother to show up so I ended up doing it myself.

The bloke who fitted mine advised joins in the slab: rather than one piece I have four. He said the unequal heating under the fire might make a single piece crack.

Polished slate here, if I did it again I’d look for natural, as-split. The shine takes some maintaining, and it’s easily scratched and chipped.

Good call that. We’ve installed a one piece granite hearth, my wife wanted slate but the stone guy said it’d be a bugger to maintain. So I buffed the shine off, and then sealed it. But we can go one-piece as our stove sits on a bench, so little heat transfer.

And do not under-estimate the weight of a single piece…

Limestone is cheap and can be stained any colour.

Part J of building regs, a bit of help and building control signing it off for me – HETAS installers were quoting an absolute fortune for the job.

If I recall it right, the only thing building control were interested in was checking the draw on the flue liner with a smoke test before we stuck the thing in. They might have popped back in to look at it once it was in, but not in any meaningful way.

Obviously, if your clearances at side and back and hearth size/thickness is off, they’ll point that out!

I’ve found that hearths dont actually heat up up that much – the stove manufacturer should be able to supply data on how much heat it is sent down from the stove.
We have one piece hearth (granite I think) and it’s absolutely fine…. only gets warm. Depends on the type of stone I guess. With multiple pieces you’ll get some ash/dust in the joint.

we’re doing it now. old chimney breast, massive stone surround. just tiled it with Terracotta tiles, and cleaned the bricks. ordered the register plate, me and my step dad are putting it in (he did his and my mums)done a smoke test, no liner needed.

Don’t understand this building regs stuff, we’re using an old antique stove and don’t see why we need to get it checked out. seems to me like another way to make money from people.

this is a useful resource as well as Part J.

http://www.stovesonline.co.uk/stove-hearth-size.html

as geoff says, you more often than not dont need a whopping great big hearth when a heatproof plate would do instead.

Don’t understand this building regs stuff, we’re using an old antique stove and don’t see why we need to get it checked out. seems to me like another way to make money from people.

The main reason for getting it signed off is that it proves in the case of a fire to the authorities and your insurance company that the stove has been fitted safely. (some guy got fined a fortune as he had a fire in a roofspace after the flue wasn’t fitted correctly – insurance void as well). The other reason is when you come to sell, you may find things are delayed as the solicitor may ask for the building regs sign off, and then if you don’t have it you or your buyer will have to pay for an indemnity policy. Not expensive but still a hassle.

Don’t understand this building regs stuff, we’re using an old antique stove and don’t see why we need to get it checked out. seems to me like another way to make money from people.

If you search for the thread regarding someone’s neighbour filling the OP’s house with smoke, it’ll be apparent…

yup

Building control made 3 visits, before starting, liner in, everything in. Found them generally helpful. No headaches – read the building regs part J and followed them. BC clarified a few points on distances and suchlike.

The hardest bit was the liner as you have to get the whole thing up on the roof and then feed it down the chimney. I tied a rope to the end of it, and tied to a hammer to the other end of the rope – easy (ish).

Or you can use a register plate on an existing chimney.

We didn’t know what state ours was in so we went the liner route – its the cheapest way of getting building control satisfied with the state of the flue – otherwise it was a professional smoke test.

Probably going to die a terrible death but we bought a little Esse 300 inset stove 4yrs ago and I just DIYed it. This little fella is only 3kw and literally (slight over simplification) bolts into an existing fire place with the fire back still in place. No liner, no nothing. Fire place and chimney had been in constant use for years before with no bother and asked the sweeps advice on its condition so didn’t see an issue – just don’t tell hetas as I’m sure I’ll go to hell.

i’ve posted this before, but what the heck, here it is again…

i’ve installed 3 or 4 stoves, 2 with the help of my father in law (who is a chimney sweep though not hetas certified) and 2 myself.

in our rental we installed a small woodburner and a flue. it was easily a job we could have done between us, but as this one had to be up to building regs as its a rental property and having spoken to the council and found out how much it would cost to get certified, it was only a little more to get a hetas registered company to do the job.

the local company are very large, you’ld think they could be trusted, lets just say it was the biggest bodge i have ever seen and it took the threat of immediate legal action to get it sorted. we are not talking about a slightly shonky finish, but serious potentially dangerous issues with the installation. both hetas and the flue manufacturers, who i both spoke to to ascertain the facts, were quite shocked.

so my point is, unless you desperately want building regs, if you can do it yourself do so. its not rocket science. building regs are way over the top, manufactures installation spec trumps building regs, its all easy enough to follow.

however if you are not 100% confident, if you are not sure about your chimney, you may be better paying someone BUT be warned!

DIY’d the one in my gaff ….

it was there when i bought it – i took it out to clean the chimney and found most of an old coal scuttle welded to a plate to create a register plate and some really awful wall tiles laid on the floor ….

now it has propper registerplate and real flue standing on a hearth made of as cut slate stones.

lets face it – i couldnt have made it any worse than it was!

I’m surprised that certification from BC would cost as much as a registered company to install, but I guess it varies by Council region. East Cambs is £100+VAT for a single notifiable works (we notified multiple jobs at the same time to max £150+VAT), the officer came out twice, once when the old fireplace had been knocked out and constructional hearth exposed, then again once installed to check draw, ventilation, CO alarm etc. I read the Regs to the letter, such as the sizing of the hearth, but could have got away with a larger stove. Lining the chimney meant the BC officer was satisfied the draw would be appropriate for the stove.

We did ask a neighbour to get the liner down the chimney for us as we didn’t fancy going on the roof! But other than that, it’s not a difficult job and we fould BC helpful.

We have slate as a decorative hearth over the constructional – it raises the level of the hearth to meet Regs and will look better once we’ve laid a new flooring. We just got outdoors slate paving slabs and grouted between them. They’ve been fine. A single slab shaped for the recess could have cost £300, we paid about £40!

It is yes/no thing with putting a liner down the chimney. I did for piece of mind but as others have said if the smoke test is ok you might not need to.

This might be worth a read tho…. EYE OPENER

Good luck which ever way you go with it.

My experience of Building Control is they couldn’t be more helpful, I mentioned a wood stove to my BC chap the other week and he emailed me all the regs stuff the next day, without me even asking, saying ‘Any Questions, give me a ring’.

I just installed my new Dovre Astroline stove into the shared chimney with the solid fuel AGA. I found a sheet of black marble or possibly granite to set it upon. The stove is on legs so very little heat reaches the base.

Sorry no pics yet until I get my web connection back.

Well, I’m now in my new place and have a local guy coming to quote tomorrow. Based on another similar quote he showed us, (and rounding up the prices for simplicity) we are looking at £500 to enlarge the existing fireplace, £500 for a Carron 4.7kw stove (as an example, not decided), £500 for the HETAS sign off (I’m guessing this also covers the installation/commissioning of the stove) and £250 for a granite hearth.

Interestingly, he said if the chimney passes a smoke test we probably won’t need a liner at all (60’s detached bungalow). I was imagining a quote of around £2000 but inclusive of a liner.

I’ve read they make the stove much more controllable, and I suspect the consensus on here is to fit one. One thing I am bearing in mind, is the HETAS guy may be happy to sign off without a liner, but as a DIY job building control may want one, which would then wipe out much of the saving over a professional installation…

The issue a lot of people have is that they see the fact it comes under building regs and think that it cannot be done DIY. nothing could be further from the truth. Building regs are there for safety and make sense in the most part. Bulding control can be very helpful. There are many misconceptions about installing a stove the biggest being that it is hard to do!

The hardest bit I can envisage is enlarging the existing fireplace. I want to go from 430mm wide to around 750mm, and from 750mm high to 900mm high. Specifically, I can see how to fit a lintel, but how to support the existing throat of the chimney, and what is inside the chimney breast either side of the fireplace…airspace? I can’t imagine its solid brick.

In the loft the chimney reduces down to a single pillar so I suppose I should get up there tomorrow morning, perhaps I’ll be able to see down into the chimney breast from above.

Any thoughts on whether I should go with just a smoke test as advised, or go for a flue (assuming it’ll make the stove more efficient/controllable?)

£276 for building control to sign off the fireplace opening and stove installation.

Any thoughts on whether I should go with just a smoke test as advised, or go for a flue

I would definitely line the chimney. your fire will be more efficient for it and you have piece of mind knowing all the gases are in a sealed pipe.

The hardest bit I can envisage is enlarging the existing fireplace. I want to go from 430mm wide to around 750mm, and from 750mm high to 900mm high. Specifically, I can see how to fit a lintel, but how to support the existing throat of the chimney, and what is inside the chimney breast either side of the fireplace…airspace? I can’t imagine its solid brick.

Might be worth having an explore with your hammer and chisel in the area above the existing fireplace – We had a small opening with a small lintel above it, and a much bigger (hidden) opening with another, much bigger lintel above it. Which made it much easier to open out the chimney for the stove.

Generally fitting a liner and cowl will make the fire burn more efficiently, which means fewer deposits on the inside of the chimney.