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Wood burning stoves


Jo
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How good/bad/indifferent are the Godin stoves? Thinking of buying a small one, 6.5 kw, to use as back up in the sitting room when the full central heating is not required. Have seen a nice Godin one but haven't used them before.

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We bought 2 wood stoves and a piano cooker from Godin. Service very poor you could say inept, this of course maybe just our local dealer. My feeling is that there are better stoves and cookers on the market for similar money............ we would not buy Godin again.

W
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Two stoves and a piano cooker is a lot of Godin.  So, wouldn't want to take anything away from Wilko's criticism. But, it might just have been the dealer rather than the product which gave the disappointment.  Have to say that we bought a beautiful Godin wood burner about 5 years ago and we have been so pleased with it that if we move the half ton stove will have to be dismantled again and taken with us, to avoid my having withdrawal symptoms.  [:)] 

 It is 14 Kw, heats over 100 square metres so that the central heating radiators downstairs are automatically turned off for almost all of the time. It's mean with the wood, against some smaller wood burners that we have. It can be kept going overnight, we can leave it quite safely if we decide to go out - for example - once the fire is burning. We use perhaps one log basketful of  hard wood per evening (mid afternoon to late evening in cold weather), we can use it all year round if the weather is cold and thus avoid using our central heating.  It has saved us a great deal on gaz and the year after we bought it, the tax office refunded 40% of the purchase price (through a government scheme in place at the time of purchase, set up to encourage people to buy some more environmentally friendly form of heating.  We love open fires but in our last house with the huge draughts and the vast amount of air needed to fuel our huge chimney fire, the enormous amount of wood burned and the constant knowledge that a vast amount of the heat was going straight up the chimney, together with the fire risk, we decided that a big woodburner would be more suitable for us. We did not use the open fire in our present house - after 6 months we decided to buy a Godin, we waited a further almost  6 months for the stove to be manufactured, it was installed in one summer afternoon and we have been thrilled with it.  Our dealer was in Caen (Calvados).

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  • 3 weeks later...
My friend had 2 jotuls which she always said were great. I was always cold in her house and would hug the stove to get some warmth. Needless to say I didn't go for them, and in fact have Handols now, as they have soapstone on them. Otherwise I would have had a nestor martin.
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I agree about Godin.  I have a huge Godin woodburner plus a massive Godin oven, hood, etc and I have been hugely disappointed in everything.

NOT value for money, IMHO, plus the manufacturers aren't very good with providing spares, etc and then they close the factory for all of August so you might have to wait a long time for the exact model you want.

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T. Tell me:

"Godin haven't really moved forward like other manufacturers have."

Interested to see your source for this info.

"Even the cheap Chinese copy better stoves these days.

Do you have a website ?

Thanks for your help

Wilko
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Sweet

"Godin woodburner plus a massive Godin oven, hood, etc and I have been hugely disappointed in everything "

Can you elaborate ?

"they close the factory for all of August "

That's France. It's great

It's a good idea

So if you did the w/burner/stove again what would you buy ?

Happy cooking

W
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[quote user="Wilko"]T. Tell me: "Godin haven't really moved forward like other manufacturers have." Interested to see your source for this info. "Even the cheap Chinese copy better stoves these days. Do you have a website ? Thanks for your help Wilko[/quote]

To get a more efficient clean burn it is universally noted that air drawn in from the base of the burner must circulate around to superheat as it joins the combustion chamber. Godin's castings haven't changed over many years. You just have to look at the Scandinavians for quality woodburners or the UK's Clearview. Of course there is the overwhelming freedom of choice that many people buy Godin for the look.

Can't help with the website but my Chinese woodburner from a UK supplier, is a copy of someone else's and not a Godin, so the dealer told me. Would have bought something better if I lived permanently in France but as it only gets a few weeks use each year it wasn't worth it.

 

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Ok, i am very biased because i have a Clearview and am constantly amazed and delighted by its performance. It is only the small 8kw single door model but it heats a large space evenly and efficiently. T is right about the way the air intake works to push the flames so that the glass door stays clean. He's also right about the design, they are functional rather than pretty, but for me, that's a price worth paying. And i cook on mine, all the time, when i am there in the winter, and it is fantastic.

We collected ours from a great place in Canterbury and fitted it ourselves very easily. We will be in France again late April hopefully, and the first thing i will do is fire it up - even if only for 24 hours to air the place.
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We replaced a french godin insert that ate wood like it was going out of fashion and much too large in kw for the size of the room and which hadn't been inserted just dumped on a rubble base, with a villager wood burner with the option of burning coal and a back boiler bought locally in our dept. We love it and especially the air wash system which means no glass to clean.

We also replaced our Godin woodburning cooker which we bought ourselves and kept for 4 years before changing it for an electric Everhot cooker and very pleased we made that decision.

The reasons for changing the Godin and some of you may think this sounds mad but it made the room TOO hot even with the door into the hall wide open and I found cooking in the oven a nightmare as controlling the temperature was disatrous unless burning coal which we didn't want to do too often and it wasn't a great deal more successful either.

Chris
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[quote user="Wilko"]Sweet "Godin woodburner plus a massive Godin oven, hood, etc and I have been hugely disappointed in everything " Can you elaborate ? "they close the factory for all of August " That's France. It's great It's a good idea So if you did the w/burner/stove again what would you buy ? Happy cooking W[/quote]

Wilko, we bought the Godin products when we first came to France, knew next to nothing about these sorts of products and we were staying in a French B & B where the owner recommended them.

We bought a Carvin, the largest output burner they did in those days and it has an output of 13 kw.  We do have a large room where it is.  To save messing up the house, which was prettily renovated, we had it installed with an outside flue.

It does get very hot but burns well-seasoned (and therefore pricey) oak logs like there is no tomorrow and OH has to clean the glass every single morning or you wouldn't be able to see the flames.

Then, in the kitchen, we have a Godin stove that has everything imaginable:  2 electric ovens, a wood or charcoal burning oven, 5 burners including a wok burner, grills, rotiserie, plate warmer, "plancher" for top of the stove grilling.  Also, there was a massive hood which has 4 speeds and is very efficient.

There was a glass door that was badly fitting and it has a silly little knob which makes it very difficult to open.  And now after only about 3 years' use, the glass door has fallen off completely as the mild steel hinges have completely broken off.

The brass trimmings and decorative bits discolour and are difficult to get shiny and I am not sure that they are even brass, probably only brass-plated.

The whole lot cost a lot of money, about the cost of a small car, and the installation costs alone topped 6 thousand (yes, thousand) euros.

I had a legacy that I wanted to spend on something for the house so the money wasn't a problem but, if I had that money again, I'd have spent it a lot more wisely![:'(]

So, I hope you spend YOUR money a lot more wisely than I did, Wilko.

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Sweet, thanks for the response.

"So, I hope you spend YOUR money a lot more wisely than I did, Wilko."

We did more or less the same as yourselves ie 2 Godin w/burners and a piano cooker. As I have said I will never buy Godin again; build quality of the piano cooker not to mention problems with the Godin dealer we bought from, despicable little man.

In short we didn't spend our hard earned any more wisely than you.

C'est la vie

W
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