Newbie Intro

[valuman]

Hi All,
I'll try to keep this short, but there's a lot to tell...

We've been in our old, New England home for twenty years and are now doing some long awaited remodeling and upgrades to the drafty place. Because the single flue center chimney has been used to vent our oil boiler and we have no practical place to install a metal chimney, we've been unable to install a wood stove for all these years. This summer, we'll upgrade the boiler to an efficient, direct vent model and gain the use of the chimney for venting a wood stove. Hurray!

We essentially have a blank slate to work from regarding a hearth, back wall and stove, although from early research, including reading quite a bit here, I'm developing some preferences regarding stove options. I'm thinking around 45k btu/hr will be about right as we tighten up the 1600 square foot house since we're currently keeping the upstairs closed off. I very nearly purchased a used Keystone model stove, but the price haggling just didn't work out to my satisfaction and I'm not in a huge rush... yet.

What I do need to get defined is the hearth area. The floor is maple and the tile lined chimney is not attractive enough to expose, so I want to face it with faux stone or brick over Durock. I think real brick would be great but will likely be a budget buster since I didn't factor that in with the multiple projects. I'd enjoy reading your thoughts, suggestions and experiences in this regard.

Thanks in advance!
v-man

 

[chimneylinerjames]

As far as the chimney goes, you will need a stainless steel liner with insulation.

Have you thought about cultured brick? I have installed it multiple times and it looks great. Super easy to install also. There are metal sheets that you hang on the wall, they have small lips, sorta like a shelf that you rest the bricks on to keep the courses of brick perfectly straight. You use constriction adhesive to bond the brick to the metal. Then afterwards you just use a pointing bag and mortar.

 

[valuman]

Yes, I am planning to install an insulated stainless liner in the chimney; I should have mentioned that in my first post.

Thanks for the cultured brick suggestion, I'll definitely look into that option.

 

[begreen]

Hi All,
I'll try to keep this short, but there's a lot to tell...

We've been in our old, New England home for twenty years and are now doing some long awaited remodeling and upgrades to the drafty place. Because the single flue center chimney has been used to vent our oil boiler and we have no practical place to install a metal chimney, we've been unable to install a wood stove for all these years. This summer, we'll upgrade the boiler to an efficient, direct vent model and gain the use of the chimney for venting a wood stove. Hurray!

We essentially have a blank slate to work from regarding a hearth, back wall and stove, although from early research, including reading quite a bit here, I'm developing some preferences regarding stove options. I'm thinking around 45k btu/hr will be about right as we tighten up the 1600 square foot house since we're currently keeping the upstairs closed off. I very nearly purchased a used Keystone model stove, but the price haggling just didn't work out to my satisfaction and I'm not in a huge rush... yet.

What I do need to get defined is the hearth area. The floor is maple and the tile lined chimney is not attractive enough to expose, so I want to face it with faux stone or brick over Durock. I think real brick would be great but will likely be a budget buster since I didn't factor that in with the multiple projects. I'd enjoy reading your thoughts, suggestions and experiences in this regard.

Thanks in advance!
v-man

The stove is going to define the hearth. Decide on that first and then honor it's specs for size, insulation and clearances.

 

[valuman]

At long last, we fired our new Fireview stove for the first time this morning. Finally!

I've put down a Durock/tile constructed floor protector for now since the stonework we decided to go with for facing the chimney and the permanent hearth didn't make it into this year's budget. My foremost question this morning is around breaking in the new stove. The manual says to burn a series of small to moderate fires before really heating the stove up. Does that mean a couple of low fires for most of the day, two small fires per day for a couple of days, or something else? Other than seasoning the paint and drying the stove cement, what am I trying to accomplish with the process?

Thanks for your input and guidance.

 

[rideau]

One of the primary purposes of the slow break in fires is to slowly drive the moisture out of the soapstone...you don't want to crack it. You also cure the stove cement (drive out any moisture) and burn the fumes off the paint on your stove and flue. Just build a very small fire, which doesn't have lots of really little pieces, as you don't want things getting too hot too fast. Let the fire burn to about 250 degrees then slowly die down and burn out. You can then load another bunch of wood, using two or three fairly small splits, and let the stove get a bit hotter during this burn.....maybe up to 325 or so. The key here is for gradual heat build up. You do not want a hot fast fire, but a slow warm one. Let that fire burn out, then repeat getting the stove a bit hotter. After that you are free to use your stove. The fires can all be done one right after another. Every year, if you are dealing with a cold stove, you should have one or two moderate fires to warm the stone and drive any moisture out. No quick hot fires on a soapstone stove hat has not been used for a while.

You probably want to keep a window cracked, to get rid of the paint fumes.

 

[valuman]

That's really helpful. Thanks!