Took a look at the wood stove installation in the house our daughter and son in law just bought. The house is a fixer-upper and we expected the stove wouldn't be usable, but this one is downright scary.
It's an old VC Defiant. The installation looks nice...
![[Hearth.com] Another scary installation](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/1792367549307-webp.349690/ "[Hearth.com] Another scary installation")
...until you realize that the wall protection (about 6" from the back corners of the stove) is just slate fastened directly to the sheetrock wall. I don't know what's under the floor slates, but I suspect they too are laying directly on the floor. Then there's the baseboard heaters and the wood window frame...
Then the chimney. Single wall pipe right through the sheetrock ceiling, with a heat shield in front (!) of the pipe. It's even worse when I crawled into the attic...
![[Hearth.com] Another scary installation](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/1792367963809-webp.349691/ "[Hearth.com] Another scary installation")
The black stovepipe reducer is touching the sheetrock, with bits of slate and sheet metal in a halfhearted attempt to provide a heat shield and foil tape to seal it...
...and the stainless chimney pipe is touching the rafter, which was cut away to clear it.
![[Hearth.com] Another scary installation](https://www.hearth.com/talk/attachments/1792368213466-webp.349692/ "[Hearth.com] Another scary installation")
Outside, the chimney cap is maybe 18" above the pitched roof, and well below the roof peak.
I told my daughter don't even THINK of lighting a fire, and that it needs to be completely redone, to the point they should think about if they even want a stove in that particular corner, or somewhere else in the house instead since it has to be redone from scratch.
The stove itself is severe overkill for the size of the room, the side door handle is frozen and the front is broken off, but appears OK otherwise. Is it worth anything more than scrap metal? Their new neighbor offered them a smaller stove for free but I'll make that the subject of a separate thread.
Although, if there's a newer stove with reduced clearance to combustibles, we could avoid redoing the floor and wall (just treat it as combustible). A new chimney I can deal with.
It's an old VC Defiant. The installation looks nice...
...until you realize that the wall protection (about 6" from the back corners of the stove) is just slate fastened directly to the sheetrock wall. I don't know what's under the floor slates, but I suspect they too are laying directly on the floor. Then there's the baseboard heaters and the wood window frame...
Then the chimney. Single wall pipe right through the sheetrock ceiling, with a heat shield in front (!) of the pipe. It's even worse when I crawled into the attic...
The black stovepipe reducer is touching the sheetrock, with bits of slate and sheet metal in a halfhearted attempt to provide a heat shield and foil tape to seal it...
...and the stainless chimney pipe is touching the rafter, which was cut away to clear it.
Outside, the chimney cap is maybe 18" above the pitched roof, and well below the roof peak.
I told my daughter don't even THINK of lighting a fire, and that it needs to be completely redone, to the point they should think about if they even want a stove in that particular corner, or somewhere else in the house instead since it has to be redone from scratch.
The stove itself is severe overkill for the size of the room, the side door handle is frozen and the front is broken off, but appears OK otherwise. Is it worth anything more than scrap metal? Their new neighbor offered them a smaller stove for free but I'll make that the subject of a separate thread.
Although, if there's a newer stove with reduced clearance to combustibles, we could avoid redoing the floor and wall (just treat it as combustible). A new chimney I can deal with.
