Woodburner with rads.

[Lancashire Lass]

Hi all!

Now I know that we are allowed to claim 40% off the price of a woodburner if it is fitted and bought from the same chauffagiste! I also know from him that we must provide an old heater, so that he can take it too the tip and they will sign that he has brought it to dispose of before fitting the new one. Now these are my questions:

As woodburners are so much cheaper in the UK than in France (even with the 40% off), can we claim the reduction if the chauffagiste has ordered the woodburner on-line from the UK and then sold it on to us? It does not to my mind's eye seem any different than ordering from Godin in France.

Also does the old heater have to be a woodburning stove that goes to the tip or can it be any old heater e.g. an electric one?

I have seen what look like really good Hunter stoves that do radiators for sale on the Net. Has anyone got one and likes it? Or has someone got another make that they would recommend?

Thank you in advance for your help with these questions!

[Nick Trollope]

Coupla points;

I have never heard of the "new for old rule" and would be suprised if it was the case (No credit d'impots for a new installation?)

The stove has to be approved, too. I doubt if a UK-sourced one would have the necessary approvals.

 

[Eos]

I can't help with the first part of your email I'm afraid but I can tell you of our experience with one of the larger Hunter stoves.

We chose the larger multi fuel burner, capable of heating 14 radiators, for our sitting room having experienced the heat levels from a smaller Jotul multi fuel stove, with no radiatior heating ability in our slightly smaller living room.

Initially I was disappointed with the heat output from the stove as it seemed  much less than the Jotul. However, I forgot to take into consideration that a certain amount of heat goes to the back boiler and once that got up to temperature, the heat output raised considerably. It still would not have the same output though as the Jotul but retains heat longer, a feature the Jotul is no slouch at either!

We have 17 double rads of varying sizes. Although our system can work without an electric pump to circulate the water, we were advised to have two fitted, one to pump the hot water out and a second to pump the cooler water back. This is because our house is very long and the central heating system was fitted, not by us, well after the house was built 40 years ago but before the benefits of good insulation were appreciated.

The rads further away on the circuit were rarely even warm and the cooler returning water was so cold, it lowered the boiler temp too much (Can you tell I'm not a plumber yet?!) and the hot water was cold by the time it had travelled to the furthest rad. All the snow & ice last winter was no friend to the unlagged,  inaccessible or unlaggable pipe! The pumps made a huge difference to the cosiness of the house and it's good  too that we can use the system, though perhaps not as efficiently, if the electricity is down.

Anyway the point is, the stove performs well but our older heating system needed tweaking to get the best out of it.

[cooperlola]

In the UK we had a Colebrookdale Severn multi-fuel burner which ran the rads for the central heating.  They are owned by AgaRaeburn but I don't know what models they make these days.  As Eos says, be prepared to lose a certain amount of heat in the room where the stove is as three of the four sides of the thing are jacketed for the heat exchanger.

To overcome the problem which Eos mentions of feeding lots of rads, especially those on the same floor as the boiler (those above get heated naturally by the hot air rises principal!), we had an electric pump.

[Will]

I've never heard of the 'new for old' requirement either. In fact like Nick I'd be surprised if such a stipulation exists, because it would prevent people benefiting from new, environmentally-friendly, heating systems if none existed before, or if replacing a polluting system.

I think there is an element of French TVA in the equation too, which of course would not exist with a heating appliance purchased overseas.

[Alpinemist]

I also need to get a woodburner. Not one in at the moment but do have a chimney. Do most people buy them in the UK and just drive them over to France? Do the local installers get upset if you don't buy through them and they only get to install? I don't want to do the install myself in case of house insurance issues. What's most peoples common practise on this?

[cooperlola]

You could always go the whole hog of course:

http://www.rayburnfrance.fr/947.htm

Alpinemist, if you want the full rebates on your tax for your woodburner then you have little choice but to buy in France.   I have known installers to fit bought-in stuff but it's rare.  A friend of mine (French) who is a plumber and heating engineer did this for a fellow Brit with disasterous consequences which I won't go into on here as it's probably potentially libelous! They have to give guarantees which make them very reluctant to use a product they know little about.  Of course the flipside of this is that it can be seen as a licence to print money so watch out that you don't get ripped off.

[Alpinemist]

Never thought of the warranty side of things. That's understandable. I have sooooo much to learn.  

[cooperlola]

Returning to the original post (one LL to another) I would just issue one little caveat!  Having lived in the UK for over 20 years with a woodburner-backed central heating system, as it were, I must say I'm very glad not to have one now.  There was nothing more depressing than returning home after a day's work to have to get the coal in/split logs etc and light the boiler to get the house up to a pleasant temperature.  In the end we installed a couple of storage radiators in the living room and on the landing, just so that we could come home to a warm house.  Now that I'm unable to get about very easily (and none of us is getting any younger even if we don't all have run ins with lorry drivers!), it's a real treat to be able to just push a switch and warm the place up.  If you run your c/h from a woodburner, as opposed to just using it to make the sitting room a bit more cosy, then you become a slave to it.  It's worth thinking about whether you'll want all the hassle before you commit to a system based on a woodburner.

[Lancashire Lass]

Hey up Cooper lad! I was born in Oldham where were you?

Thanks for your comments and I will mull them over with 'him indoors'! We have propane gas heating in the parts of the house that are done and we have found it to be exquisitely expensive! We are now here all the time and are opening up areas of this old house to give us more space! We just thought that wood central heating would be a cheaper option and also give us a cosy fire to sit round in the winter! However I do see your point!

[Lancashire Lass]

Eos - yes, I think as some of the rads we want to install are on the first floor a pump will be necessary for us too! Thank you for mentioning it!

[Lancashire Lass]

Will and Nick thank you for your replies! I have decided to go and speak to the tax office! I will screw up my courage as they are the only people here I have found to be xxx unfriendly! Our plumber has been working here in the South West all his life, I would put him mid 50s. I cannot imagine why he would say what he did if it was not true! I also speak good French, so I was not mistaken! I have other friends who are telling me that they did not have this performance providing old fires for the tip! The plumber said that he really should be saying in his documentation that he removed the old fire. Now as this is a new area we are opening up, there has never been any sort of heating there before! Yes, I must brave the dragon tax lady with the disapproving leer and the facial warts and go ask her!

[Lancashire Lass]

Our plumber has left us the Godin book and even with the 40% off, the prices are way above what we would pay for a good English Hunter stove! I never considered that he would not install the stove if we bought it elsewhere! I am grateful for your post as I will now go back to him and see if he throws his hands up in horror at the notion of 'la poele anglaise'!!!!

[Lancashire Lass]

Alpinemist - I will send you by e-mail who we intend to buy our stoves from. They deliver to most of Europe. Also I will let you know what the plumber says when we ask him about the installation! You must not even think about installing your woodbrner yourself as it would invalidate your household insurance if there was a fire!

[Lancashire Lass]

The other thing I want to source is 7" twin wall flue with connectors as unlike Alpinemist we have no chimney and have to have the double skinned, insulated piping! The price for this in the UK is £135 a metre, could it be that it is cheaper in la France? Does anyone know of any on-line stove accessory providers where I could look up this price?

[Eos]

[quote user="cooperlola"]Having lived in the UK for over 20 years with a woodburner-backed central heating system, as it were, I must say I'm very glad not to have one now.  There was nothing more depressing than returning home after a day's work to have to get the coal in/split logs etc and light the boiler to get the house up to a pleasant temperature....If you run your c/h from a woodburner, as opposed to just using it to make the sitting room a bit more cosy, then you become a slave to it.  It's worth thinking about whether you'll want all the hassle before you commit to a system based on a woodburner.[/quote]

Our Hunter stove was lit last October & remained so until May this year!*

We found it more economical on fuel to load the stove to it's capacity about twice a day, after the first "getting going" fire of the morning. Then it constantly ticked over, once "closed down" as I refer to it, doing it's thing in the background. Sometimes we'd top it up a couple of times depending on our requirements.

Because it never went out though, just very low,  the house was never stone cold or had to be heated from scratch.

*Weekends away etc not included.

[cooperlola]

[quote user="Eos"][quote user="cooperlola"]Having lived in the UK for over 20 years with a woodburner-backed central heating system, as it were, I must say I'm very glad not to have one now.  There was nothing more depressing than returning home after a day's work to have to get the coal in/split logs etc and light the boiler to get the house up to a pleasant temperature....If you run your c/h from a woodburner, as opposed to just using it to make the sitting room a bit more cosy, then you become a slave to it.  It's worth thinking about whether you'll want all the hassle before you commit to a system based on a woodburner.[/quote]


Our Hunter stove was lit last October & remained so until May this year!*

We found it more economical on fuel to load the stove to it's capacity about twice a day, after the first "getting going" fire of the morning. Then it constantly ticked over, once "closed down" as I refer to it, doing it's thing in the background. Sometimes we'd top it up a couple of times depending on our requirements.
Because it never went out though, just very low,  the house was never stone cold or had to be heated from scratch.


*Weekends away etc not included.

[/quote]Well obviously, then from what Eos says, LL, a Hunter is a better proposition than ours was.!  It rarely stayed in for more than eight hours without a top-up.  I guess if you're in all day it's not so bad but with often over 12 hours out of the house ours invariably went out.

I come from Colne, btw.[:)]

[Jo]

Am I right in thinking you have to be paying income tax in France for qualify for the rebate? [8-)]

[mint]

Not only paying income tax, the house has to be your "residence principale".

[MLongford]

I am interested in this thread as I am currently researching the best way to go with my own heating system.  I agree with Cooperlola that life is too short to be stoking a woodstove 24/7.  We have an old stone barn which we've converted, but even though I've insulated it where possible in the renovating process, it's cold in the winter and the upstairs is ridiculously hot in summer. I have a woodburner and rads at the moment, and I want to change the woodstove for an air source heat pump, and the rads for fan coil radiators so that I can have heating in the summer and cooling in the winter.  I can defnitely see the advantages of being able to flick a switch, especially when you come home in the winter and have to start turning round to light the fire and wait for it to get going.   Someone has recommended a company in the Dordogne that I'm going to contact.  It might be worth considering.

[Lancashire Lass]

Before you go for that, you might want to research the noise these make! We know a family who installed this and have had to change it after a year as it kept them awake all night!

[Lancashire Lass]

Yes Sweet, we are here full-time and it is our only house!

[mint]

Only thing is, LL, I believe that the credit is now down to 25%!  Not sure whether it's worth anything as the retailers will definitely have thought of it and put the prices up 25% to start with?[6]

[Lancashire Lass]

Well Sweet, we will see what we will see!

[Annie]

Hope someone on this thread can help! We returned to our house this summer to find the old oil boiler had finally given up the ghost (water everywhere) So here is my question: We were thinking of replacing our open fire with a more efficient woodburning stove. Should we go for one with a back burner and try to link it into the central heating system and if so what would this entail? Would we be better having a replacement oil boiler as well? What about cost which we (as always) need to keep to a minimum as this is an unexpected expense. ANY advice would be appreciated. We are back in the UK at the moment but would like to sort something out so that we do not freeze in the winter. Thanks in advance.