Masonry heater forum ?

[Nicholas]

Does anyone know of a forum that is about masonry heaters/fireplaces ?
Over the years a few threads have been on here about masonry heaters, but I am looking for where the masons hang out ?
Maybe we need a sub forum for masonry ?

Nick

 

[mobetter]

I have checked these out and would like to do one in the future. They say it's best to build the house around the heater than to try putting one in existing floor plan. Some can weigh upwards of 30,000 pounds!

http://mha-net.org/


Also, check out this link for some ideas of differnt designs, real cool.

http://mha-net.org/html/gallery.htm

 

[Nicholas]

Thanks,
had that site book marked for a while,
I am at the point of needing to talk to unbiased heater masons about the differant core kits.

Nick

 

[Burn-1]

There is a Yahoo group for heater masons. I subscribe to it but there isn't much traffic.

Masonry heaters group

You may have seen the link from the MHA site.

 

[kksalm]

It would be great to have more resources to explore masonry stoves. I've been visiting this site to gain what little information is available to make my own 1950's vintage fireplace into something more efficient. I have enjoyed reading of some forum members attempts to modify stoves to EPA standards. My vision, compliments of ideas generated here, is to insert a masonry stove within my fireplace modeled after a contemporary secondary burn stove. Why not have the workings of a modern secondary burn EPA certified stove bricked into my fireplace behind an airtight opening enabling exacting draft control? Not only would I have the principles in place of an efficient wood stove, I'd also have the mass behind to store the heat produced. For those of you that favor catalytic stoves this method could be modified to your design as well.
Best regards from Kenai, Alaska

 

[downeast]

When we were designing our home for 100% wood heating, the Masonry/Russian Fireplace was a serious consideration compared to stand alone wood stoves. We looked at some places designed around the Masonry Fireplaces, got quotes from builders and "kit" makers, and calculated the cost benefits.

Final decision was to go with 2 wood stoves.
1. Cost: the Masonry Fireplace net cost was 3 to 5 times what 2 new wood stoves would cost including new flues.
2. The savings in firewood was not a consideration since we harvest our own.
3. Long experience with wood stove heating.
4. A Masonry Fireplace 'system' would have required an extra +10% space, extra foundation, and re-design of the house.
5. We had a smaller space 20'X20', that was to be attached to the 'real' house ( with plumbing, real flush baths, water heating, water pump, extra insulation for northern Maine ). The Masonry Fireplace in the new wing would not heat the older place .

The benfits of a Masonry Fireplace are obvious IF you are building completely from the ground up: efficiency, long-lasting easy heat, one loading/day, elegance, low maintenance, clean burn. And, the costs are much lower if you can build it yourself from available kits, or from scratch with good engineering.

 

[Burn-1]

Ken you might want to check out the Alaska Fireplace Retrofit Contest which was done by the MHA last year and sponsored by the Cold Climate Housing Research Center in Alaska. It sounds like they have found a good retrofit for existing fireplaces designed for the rigors of the Alaskan climate. I would think it might be even better in Kenai since you don't have quite as extreme a climate as the northern and interior parts of the state, right?

 

[karri0n]

It would be great to have more resources to explore masonry stoves. I've been visiting this site to gain what little information is available to make my own 1950's vintage fireplace into something more efficient. I have enjoyed reading of some forum members attempts to modify stoves to EPA standards. My vision, compliments of ideas generated here, is to insert a masonry stove within my fireplace modeled after a contemporary secondary burn stove. Why not have the workings of a modern secondary burn EPA certified stove bricked into my fireplace behind an airtight opening enabling exacting draft control? Not only would I have the principles in place of an efficient wood stove, I'd also have the mass behind to store the heat produced. For those of you that favor catalytic stoves this method could be modified to your design as well.
Best regards from Kenai, Alaska

Ken, actually, masonry heaters were incorporating secondary burn chambers before epa stoves started doing it. Because it's such a huge masonry mass, thermal conduction occurs much more slowly than in a steel stove, so secondary combustion is able to be achieved more easily and efficiently than in a wood stove. You won't need to copy the desing of an epa woodstove, as there are lots and lots of designs/cores otu there for masonry heat that work better at it. It's not an unbiased source, as they build the things, but you can check out http://mainewoodheat.com for lots of design ideas, and they even sell their core, and offer workshops, etc. if it was something you felt like tackling yourself.


edit: I was actually planning on logging in today and making a suggestion in the suggestions forum about a masonry heat section. Interesting that you posted this.

 

[kksalm]

This is already a great thread. Thank you for two more links that I can use as resources to plan my conversion. We recently had a 2 week stint where the temperature never got out of the minus double digits. It probably averaged -20. Lately it's been in the above 20's, today it's hovering just above zero. My natural gas furnace is getting a workout. When we first moved in to this old homestead house we didn't mind the $60. bill so much. The price of natural gas has since quadrupled and it hurts to pay the $200 plus a month this weather is bringing.
Thank you for the input. Hearth.com Rocks!