I am starting to look at buying my first house, hopefully in the new year. One of the features I want need, is a wood burning stove.

I am looking to get a house in Edinburgh and seen a few upper / lower villa’s with a chimney stack. Would it be possible / allowed / a good neighborly thing to have a stove in a city house these days?

Whilst I quite like the idea of a house just outside of the city in a semi rural area, the OH is not quite so keen…

thanks

Bear on the forum is familiar with some cleanburn ones I think. But that’s what you want to look for.

I have one in Cardiff. The neighbours only ever compliment the smell of the smoke. Especially when I burn wood from fruit trees.

I would think it will depend upon your status as a smokeless zone – we can out here but my folks can’t in the town where they live.

My neighbours had one put in last year (central Cambridge). Can’t be worse than a coal fire (which I use in winter).

My sister lives in the new town, they have three. The modern ones burn incredibly clean and are fine for smokeless zones. They kick out as much heat as an open coal fire and are staggeringly efficient.

fantastic, just what I wanted to hear.

Is there a rough guide as to how much wood they use per kWh output? How much wood would you expect to get through in a typical winter?

Check with the council if you are in a smokeless zone.

If so that limits your choice of stove but you can still get one.

Modern ones are very efficient so there isn’t much smoke etc. When ours is lit you can occasionally smell it outside but it’s not obvious.

They kick out as much heat as an open coal fire and are staggeringly efficient.

I’d hope they’d be miles better, an open coal fire kicks out something like 15% with the rest going up the Chimney!

We have a clean burn stove in a smokeless zone in Leeds not a problem at all. Ours is a morso squirrel. Your real issue will be sourcing and storing aprox 2 cubic meters of wood .

I’d hope they’d be miles better, an open coal fire kicks out something like 15% with the rest going up the Chimney!

Its possible my coal fire experience isn’t typical. We live in an old blacksmiths, and our fireplace means business – and I know how to get the best from it [melt the furniture].

I hope they are too! Our coal fire has been pretty useless (lights fine but it might as well be a candle) and it’s being replaced in a week by a woodburner. I really hope it chucks out some more heat.

our fireplace means business – and I know how to get the best from it

Put lots of coal on?? ANY open fire is going to be much less efficient than a stove

and just because the place you are looking at has a chimney doesn’t mean that it can take a fire been lit…

get it tested before you put the offer in

2 cubic meters

I presume that’s per month if it’s your sole source of heating?

2 cubic meters of wood

That’s exactly what we used last year as our sole source of heating.

Some countires (Switzerland for example) demand particle filters in some areas as a wood burner is worse than a diesel engine for producing the very fine cercinogenic particles. I’m sure Google will throw one up. With one fitted you can fit a wood burner anywhere.

Woodburners are lovely but be aware that you’ll never be able to cycle through a forest now without eyeing up potential fuel.
Kids trailers are good for this, the kids can walk/carry a couple of logs and the trailer itself manages a good few fires worth (N.B. this can cause confrontation with the other half).

As someone has said, check if you’re in a smokeless zone. We are but the stove we have is DEFRA approved so we can burn wood on it. Just about to get another for the back room too…

Woodburners are lovely but be aware that you’ll never be able to cycle through a forest now without eyeing up potential fuel.

This! My missus is beginning to make disapproving noises at the amount of drying wood that is accumulating in our back garden – mind you, it’s easy to deflect, as you can just show your OH pictures of McMoonter’s splendid edifices.

I live in a smoke control zone / clean air wotsit and have a fully building regs compliant woodburner. It needs to be a certified burner to be legal. Basically they can’t burn as low as normal ones, ie they restrict how little air you can let in to ensure you obtain a certain level of combustion to reduce smoke.
I’ve got one of these stovax website
Have a look here for a list of stoves list

The other factor to think about, is where and how much space your wood store will take up?

Whatevere you plan is, double it 😉

I have just had to arange for more extra storage on a farm I used to work on, as I must have over 50 cubic meters of Oak and Ash now!

😉

I think they are permitted in Edinburgh, IIRC, even within the ‘smoke-free’ zones, but – they need to be of a certain efficiency rating, so not all stoves will be suitable. It might be around 80% kind of figure but call the council to check.

FWIW our previous near neighbour ran a stove, but not sure it was up to spec. I don’t anyone cliped on him…

If your city is a declared smoke control area (it probably is), then you need to use an exempted appliance under the Clean Air Act. Luckily, there’s plenty of choice.

List here: http://smokecontrol.defra.gov.uk/appliances.php

Thanks for that information chaps. I appreciate the dangers of using an untested chimney and the potential for fires/CO poisoning. I had mentally planned to install a stainless flue within the existing chimney anyway.

As for the wood store, there is both a large-ish back garden and also a tree lined cycle path running past house by for fuel.

I don’t plan on having the stove as primary heat source, just for additional comfort during cold & damp winters.

You’re probably in a smoke-control zone which means you’ll need to put in a DEFRA-approved multi-fuel stove. This lets you burn wood, peat briquettes smokeless fuel etc but not coal.

I had this one installed in the summer – just starting to use it now.

DSC03288 by stuartie_c, on Flickr

Yeoman CL5 multifuel.

Scorchio! by stuartie_c, on Flickr

Scorchio!

Just going through this myself, although not Edinburgh. As an aside, we are looking at the “built in” types i.e. those that have the front of the stove flush to the wall. Will these be noticeably less “good” at heating the room – are they more an aesthetic thing?