Different stoves have different clearances.
In my humble opinion the biggest mistake you will ever make is building your hearth for one particular stove, or a particular stove, or letting someone else build it for you for one particular stove. The reason for this is simple.
If you ever have to switch stoves, decide to, or have to switch a stove for another for any reason…if you build that hearth for one stove it will be highly likely that another stove may not have enough room to be installed back to code and will require a hearth to be torn out and rebuilt to give the new stove the proper clearance to accommodate code.
So what do you do?
1. Don’t tuck a stove too far into a corner.
2. Back of stove to wall, back of stove pipe to wall, corner of stove to wall, side of stove to wall, front of stove to front of hearth, and top of stove pipe to ceiling…what ever current codes are from these, the numbers are minimum numbers for any one stove install, so always allow more room by several inches, even a foot more, where possible, to avoid problems if you ever need to swap out a stove.
Typically sides, corners, of stove and pipe to wall can be accommodated with additional heat shields. Where you get into trouble is front of stove to front of hearth. If clearance here is too short can be a real headache for swapping out a stove should the new stove have different dimensions and/or different rear clearances and could need to be moved forward.
You can’t plan for every stove size, but you can plan to accommodate several with a little time and foresight.
Any pre-EPA stove that you may want to install later and install it yourself…throws a big wrench into hearth planning/building. Old stoves require huge clearances on all sides.
A hearth built to code today for a modern stove will NOT be able to accommodate a pre-EPA stove.
Takes longer to right this than to say it and explain it, but it’s no big deal to build it how you want. Like I said, the issues come into play when you go to swapping out stoves…and it’s not the hearth that’s the only concern, but also stove pipe outlet placement…so take your time and plan…and plan well.
If you wanted to build a bigger hearth there are people here to help guide you. I just thought I’d throw my thoughts out there because it’s a pain to need to change a stove out for a different stove and not have enough room to meet minimum clearances…if you would want/need it to meet current code. Codes change through the years too…anticipate that by giving yourself more room than currently necessary.
My grandpa didn’t leave enough room to change out the stove. As such my hearth doesn’t meet current code. I don’t want to tear it out because he and my dad built it, so I found a way around it…otherwise it would be an extensive and expensive rebuild to meet current code. When I decide to sell the place I will either tear it out and make it current, or simply install a smaller stove with smaller clearances.
