Hi
Is wet central heating an absolute necessity? I was wondering if I could heat my house with a couple of wood burning stoves. I think I might be able to design things so there is circulation of hot air upstairs, and cooler air back down.
I could also fit electric underfloor heating as backup for the occasional chilly morning.
T|!Hi |! |!Is wet central heating an absolute necessity?
No, there are *several* alternatives
|!I was wondering if I |!could heat my house with a couple of wood burning stoves. I think I |!might be able to design things so there is circulation of hot air |!upstairs, and cooler air back down.
Look at *old* American films, that is how it was done there for decades. Boiler in the basement, flues for hot air through the house. Not sure about fire resistance regulations in the UK.
My upstairs heating zone is only on during *very* cold weather air circulation up the stairs works well in my house.
No. Otherwise life on earth would only have begun relatively recently.
You might. But adding decent air ducting is expensive and takes up a deal of room. Which is why hot air systems ain't popular in the UK - without all the other reasons.
Fitting underfloor heating is a very expensive option too.
The beauty of a 'wet' system is it's cheap and easy to install after the house is built. And is an easily designed and controlled system - regardless of how the water is heated. The only real downside is visible rads.
No.
I was wondering if I
That should work.
Cheaper to fit gas or oil...
On Thu, 07 Jun 2007 08:27:08 -0000 someone who may be snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote this:-
I have lived in a number of houses that didn't have it fitted.
You can do. Arrange to get wood locally, when word gets round you may have more than enough. Local companies can be a good source as they have to pay to get rid of wood and giving it to you will be cheaper.
Wood burning stoves can power a wet central heating system BTW.
This can also be done in a more controlled fashion via a heat recovery system, which has the advantage that the ducts will be smaller then for a natural draught system.
Underfloor heating reacts relatively slowly and thus is the least desirable thing for occasional use.
.
I had been planning to heat a thermal store directly with a Sumo from Dowling Stoves -
As for warm air circulation, I think I have a layout which could encourage it through the house, without the use of ducts. All I need to construct is a floor opening in the upstairs corridor ~1m2, which will let cooled air (and light as an added bonus) in downstairs.
I could just not fit the CH part of the system and see how it goes. The trouble with that is I really need to size the stove's boiler correctly from the start.
T
I've not used a solid fuel stove with a heat store - but from experience of using a 12kw Hunter stove with pumped radiator central heating - you need to be careful with your 'heat leak' installation.
You need to design for the situation where the stover is burning well
- and you lose mains power to the circulation pump. Your 'heat dump' radiator needs to be on a gravity circuit, and capable of 'losing' the stove's heat on its own - to avoid boiling the system.
In our installation the radiator was installed in the hallway - which was the other side of the wall from the fireplace. On the odd occasion when we lost mains it was always in the depths of winter, and sometimes when we were 'out' - can get scary !
Regards Adrian
Part of the rational for using a thermal store is to provide somewhere for a full charge in the stove to go in case of a power cut. The store would be almost directly above the stove, and gravity fed. The heat leak radiator should rarely be needed.
But, if stove heats my house without the need of a CH system, I can specify a smaller boiler, and allow more heat directly into the room.
T
My house in France is heated by a wood fire. There is a heat exchanger in the flue and, when the flue gasses hit 30C, a fan switches on that circulates warm air through ceiling ducts. A cord of wood is cheap there and the building is single storey, so there is plenty of loft space for the ducting. However, the ceiling around the air ducts gets dirty surprisingly quickly.
Colin Bignell
And putting ducts where you want them upstairs would mean cutting away joists half the time.
And the leaks ... and the siezed up corroded valves ... and ....
DG
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