This wood heater needs periodic inspection and repair for proper operation. 30 Jan - 5 min - Uploaded by R Brown A look at my old Hutch Mfg. Double wall fireplace insert in action. I use this fireplace insert. 6 Mar I have never seen a stove like his Hutch Rebel. Nov 23, 2017  Wood stove good or bad idea, wood stove, wood heating, wood burning stove, catalytic wood stove Disclaimer: Land Designs Unlimited LLC assumes no liability for property damage or injury incurred.

If there’s a wood stove in your life (or in your future) and you already have a masonry fireplace in your home, it’s likely that you have used (or wish to use) your fireplace’s chimney as the chimney for your wood stove or wood burning fireplace insert. Such a choice would seem both sensible and economical.

However, any heating system works best when all its parts are designed – at the outset – to work together. Just as a furnace operates best when the flue size of the chimney is carefully matched to furnace capacity, so a wood stove is safest and most efficient when attached to a chimney whose flue size most closely matches the flue collar outlet of the stove. 6n6p v drajvere unch 2.

While wood stoves can be successfully connected to fireplace flues (a flue is the inner section of a chimney and is designed to carry away smoke and other toxic products of combustion), certain standards must be met. Here’s a look at what they are and why they are important. There are two types of wood stoves that can be connected to fireplace flues: freestanding stoves and fireplace inserts. Freestanding stoves can be connected to chimneys built especially for them. The chimneys may be of masonry construction or be a factory-built metal system that’s been designed, tested and listed for use with wood burning appliances.

Freestanding stoves also can connect to an existing fireplace chimney, if the height and position of the stove’s flue collar permits it. When this type of installation is done, the stoves may be called hearth stoves. Fireplaces aren't designed to vent (or carry away combustion by-products from) wood stoves or wood burning inserts. They are a uniquely designed solid fuel burning system in their own right.

The fireplace system consists of the firebox, a damper (the mechanism that regulates air flowing up the chimney), a smoke chamber (the area between the damper and the flue) and a flue (a passageway inside the chimney through which the smoke rises). Together, they draw off the smoke and gases produced by burning wood. How well the firebox, smoke chamber and flue are in correct proportion to each other determine the system’s performance. The applicable rule of thumb (which is included in many local codes) is that the area of the firebox opening should only be about 10 times larger than the area of the flue’s interior dimension – a 10:1 ratio. Fireplaces built according to this formula seldom smoke. Since fireplaces are largely decorative, rather than a serious heat source, that’s an important feature.

Whenever a wood stove or insert is vented through a masonry fireplace system – even if the code requirements laid down in 1984 are followed – the ratios on which efficient operation of that masonry system initially was based may be changed. For example, the size of an insert’s firebox is smaller than that of the masonry firebox, so the existing masonry flue may now be proportionately too large.

An over-sized flue causes a reduction in the speed at which air moves out of the chimney. This lets the smoke that exits the wood stove linger inside the chimney, cool down and deposit condensed creosote on the chimney interior. Creosote is a brown or black combustible deposit – given off when smoke condenses – which must be monitored and swept out to keep your system safe. Major creosote deposits are created when wood stoves or inserts do not meet the 1984 “first flue tile” standard, and vent smoke directly into the fireplace or smoke chamber.

Smoke condenses inside both the firebox and smoke chamber and may produce a ceramic-hard glaze of condensed creosote – which is hazardous, difficult and potentially expensive to cleanand which damages masonry materials through the corrosive action of acids it contains. Never permit continued use of this type of installation, even if your stove is old enough that manufacturer’s instructions do not require the connector pipe to extend into the first flue tile. Insist on a safer installation for yourself and your family.