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We have just spent the intire weekend installing a fire. To our horror it throws out no heat at all. Flames dance away merrily inside the thing, but no heat.It has a double turbo. We have used two different lots of logs, one lot better than other but a complete expensive waste of time so far, any suggestions please on how to get it to work efficiently. Thanks Molly
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Molly, a double turbo should mean it has to be connected to an electrical supply so the fans can blast out lots of lovely hot air. But, some come with the expectation you will fit trunking or ducting to carry the hot air, for example, to air grills fitted on the sides of your chimney breast.

If these refinements are non existant, then your fire should be blowing heat from above (or below) the door itself. Is there packaging or some other material blocking the air vents? Can you actually hear the fan? If not, is it thermostatically controlled, has the thermostat been damaged, is it plugged in, has it reached the required temperature? I feel fairly confident the remedy lies somewhere in your answer to these questions! If it isn't, what is the make and model?

Good luck.

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Thank you Piprob. I ought to say I have the most experienced DIY husband who has spent hours trying to work this out. The electric is connected, we are going to put tubes to other rooms and have all the gear. We have insullated the back of the chimney, at present we still only have the silver tube sticking out of the chimney we have a tube above already to install a grill, but no hot air at all. bernard says air is getting in somewhere because the flames just swirl around. It is so frustrating and expensive. I don't know name of fire, it was from Brico-depot. I have just lit it, it went well for 15 mins and has gone out!!!!!!!

Molly

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What make is it. My experience is that some inserts throw out negligable heat. And others have people stripping off as the rooms get so warm.

 

Whatever other special function your fire has, I believe it is a minimum that such a fire does warm a room all on it's own.

Also, we were told not to use our fire for some time after it was installed, so that all the joints etc could do whatever they had to do, maybe dry out. I have no idea what other people have been told, this is what we were told and did.

 

I frankly don't know what to say, thinking about it it is a Rene Brisach our friends have which doesn't heat well, and that is supposedly a good make.

 

 

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I have heard insets referred to as 'ash creating machines' for the lack of heat that they put out. We will buy another free standing log-burner as ours really does cause us to strip off. 23.6 in here at the moment and the burner is running as low as possible - we have no other heat source.

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Our free standing woodburning fire takes about 1 hour to start producing a respectable amount of heat but we start with a firelighter and a mixture of dry straw and off cuts of baton and lambris from the DIY work. We find the trick is to get it hot and buring well before introduicng any big logs. Unless the big logs are well seasoned then too much of the fires energy is used driving off the water. Also all we get when the fire is running well is the wood glowing red and almost clear flames.

Site below has a lot of good advice on woodburning including inserts.

http://www.canren.gc.ca/prod_serv/index.asp?CaId=127&PgId=722

http://www.canren.gc.ca/prod_serv/index.asp?CaId=103&PgId=576

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What you are describing is similar to what we have. The two outer hot air pipes go to side ducts on the chimney breast and there is one on the actual chimney itself. The turbofans only work really when the fire has been going about an hour, before that the heat comes out of the top of the insert itself.

When I first got this fire, about 3 years ago, I fiddled about with paper, twigs etc to light it and ended up with proper oak logs and this worked very well although time consuming.

Now, I use 3 small logs about 5/10cms wide and one firelighter and the thing is alight in minutes. I keep the vent to the chimney fully open and the slider on the bottom tray about half open.

I do find the the fire is affected by the weather and sometimes there is no draw so I usually pull out the tray a little and this cures that problem.

Unless there is something wrong with the installation, no chimney liner for instance, I think it's a matter of practice and patience to find out how your particular insert works.

Best of luck!

 

 

 

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I am really surprised that you use firelighters to light a log-burner. We have never done so and just use 'lighting wood' which we cut ourselves and paper or packaging that we save. John gets up and lights the fire each morning, it is a very rare day when it takes him a second attempt to light as it fails first time.

If we kept ours in overnight we would not be able to sleep as the place would be just to hot.  John was brought up in a house with open fires so he has years of practice.

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Quote:

++ The electric is connected, we are going to put tubes to other rooms and have all the gear. We have insullated the back of the chimney, at present we still only have the silver tube sticking out of the chimney we have a tube above already to install a grill, but no hot air at all. bernard says air is getting in somewhere because the flames just swirl around. It is so frustrating and expensive. I don't know name of fire, it was from Brico-depot. I have just lit it, it went well for 15 mins and has gone out!!!!!!! ++

So you have a couple of "holes" at the top of the woodburner which you will eventually use to pipe air to other rooms. Do these holes still have their blanking plates? If not, put the blanking plates back in so that the firebox is 'sealed' again, light the fire and see whether it heats up.

We've had an insert in both the UK and France for 5+ years. They're just cheapies from Bricomarche. When we installed the French one, we couldn't get the turbo to blow hot air. We checked the top and found one of the blanking plates had slipped so we were losing heat to the chimney area and when we switched the turbo on, it actually mixed hot air with the cooler air from the chimney dropping the resulting blown air temperature substantially. Once the blanking plate had been replaced - and I think we fire-cemented them in as we knew we would not be piping hot air elsewhere - the firebox got hot quickly and the fan blows hot air within 20 - 30 minutes of lighting the fire.

I'm not sure how successful running the turbo *and* venting hot air to other rooms simultaneously would be. Perhaps more of an either / or situation.

Carole
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The insert in our old house was almost entirely useless, it really was just a big hole in the wall with a door on it, no controls or anything.

This one's better, in that it has the drawer on the front that you can use to create extra air-flow to get it going.   But, as Anton said, it can be very sensitive to weather conditions, and some days, no matter what you do, all you achieve is the destruction of a lot of logs, with no appreciable heating results.

There are good inserts around.  There are also a lot of lies around.  "You'll be able to light the fire again in the morning from the glowing cinders."   Yeah, right - I would give ours 2 hours max without nursing, and it's dead as a dodo.

"One log will last you a whole evening."   Dream on! 

After a couple of months experience with this one, I've come to the conclusion that it's directly connected to the Tempo electricity system.   On red days, when electricity is prohibitively expensive, you're wearing jumpers and scarves and cursing this fire that just won't burn.   On white days, when electricity is cheaper, the fire is blazing.

Happy winter, everyone.   Still grey and damp down here, even yesterday's cold wind seems to have gone.

These electric fan thingies, are they expensive?  Do you have to knock walls down to fit them?

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++ These electric fan thingies, are they expensive? Do you have to knock walls down to fit them? ++

They're assembled as part of the insert and imo couldn't be retrofitted to the stove. A fan pulls in cold air at the bottom of the stove, passes it around the firebox to heat it (there's a gap between firebox and a second metal skin for the air to flow through) and hot air is fanned out of vents at the top. Usually come with 2 or 3 speeds depending on the model / cost. An alternative is to have a grill in the chimney breast to let heated air from a non-turbo insert into the room.

Ours will happily stay in for 8 hours providing it is closed right down and it approves of the wood! Didn't like chestnut recently - definitely prefers oak and beech.

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I must agree with everything that has been said about the efficiency of Inserts.

We had a free standing burner that looked lost in our fireplace but it heated our 45 sq.m room fantastically. Last year we finished a new lounge behind the chimney (35sq.m) and replaced it with a double sided Insert of at least 3 times the size, it fills the fireplace, but all this does is consume logs at a blistering rate and neither room is now really comfortable on a winters evening. Central Heating was on the ultimate agenda but I see not option but to install it sooner rather than latter now!

 

Stuart

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Some inserts do heat exceptionally, maybe too well........

Maybe we should list the various makes on here and how people have found them. I am assuming that they will have all been installed as they should.

 

So I must say that our Turbo Fonte heated really well. Only thing was that for all it heated well, it did use a lot of wood....... although I admit I like having a warm house.

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I'm not sure there is any definitive answer to the woodburner issue. We've been struggling with a freestanding burner for a few months, have received various tips; now we can get a decent fire from mostly new wood. Get a chainsaw, hatchet and log splitter. Cut different sizes of wood-- it's fun!

Someone mentioned that leaving a fire overnight and starting a new one from the embers the next morning is impossible-- it's not, just stick a big (damp) log on and almost close all the vents: if there are enough embers there will be some left over in the morning.

I sell antique woodburners/Cuissinieres and have not received any complaints regarding their function.

As for the modern 'turbo' units, maybe the answer is in the fitting: I have a friend (currently in Japan) who is an ex-engineer, he fitted his own and when he returns I'll ask him for fitting tips and let you know.

Good Luck- it's cold out there!

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Turbo Fonte is a make, but we had no 'turbo' things to go with ours, if anyone was wondering. The nearest we had to extra heat outlets were two vents out of the side of the chimney breast to catch any heat trapped in there. We had to add another vent as it simply got too hot and started cracking the chimney breast.

 

And there was no way our fire liked young or damp wood. The young wood gave out no heat and the damp stuff, not only didn't give out any heat, but the fire died with it, wouldn't have last an hour after it was put on, even onto a hot fire, never mind all night. They are capricious things aren't they.

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Update on our insert problem:

At this moment the fire is roaring away. The outside of the fire is cold. I can put my hand on the glass. It seems everything is going up the chimney.Husband is at his wits end, but is determined to win this battle.

Someone has mentioned fitting an equaliser to see if that works. Any ideas.

Molly

 

 

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What make is it. Do you have a steel flue. You are right there is something radically wrong.

If you have alternative heating it sounds like you should be using it or buying some, until you get this sorted out. Petrole heaters throw out a lot of heat, (unlike your insert).

And good luck.

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We had the same problem when we first installed our woodburner, and I wish I could tell you exactly what has changed. We think that basically it is the wood that we bought earlier this year has now dried out. It is the Bahamas in our living room as I write and if we put a good sized log on before we go to bed, we will still have embers tomorrow afternoon.

Hubby uses fire lighters, lots of kindling and then the first log is usually a split one. Within half an hour of lighting, it is kicking out more than enough heat for us.

I have to say though, that we have bought an insert and then had second thoughts about building it in, so it is sitting in our fire place, looking slightly less pretty than a free standing wood burner, but it was cheap. We can't understand how an insert can deliver much heat into the room when it is enclosed all but the front.

Krin

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Bit of a long shot, but is there a horizontal metal plate (baffle?) at the top of the combustion chamber ? E.g. if you laid on your back and stuck your head in the fire (preferably when it's out) can you see the sky ?

Our inserts have a horizontal plate to stop flames (and heat) rising up the flue, but a small gap around to allow the smoke to escape.

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Still can't get it to stay alight overnight!

But I have another question.  I don't mind the work involved in cleaning it out or getting logs in or whatever, but I don't like cleaning the glass door!   I have to clean it every day, because it's almost completely black inside, and it's a bit miserable if you can't see the fire.  Onto second bottle of insert-glass cleaner already.

Is this normal, doctor?

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<< Is this normal, doctor? >>

I think it is, Nurse.

More expensive stoves seem to direct air in front of the glass to stop it tarring but if you want a controllable burn, then not that much air will be rushing round the logs and you'll get mucky glass. In my experience anyway. We have a different solution to you though - we don't clean the glass. The other thing that'll make a difference is the quality of the logs. Very dry oak and beech will generate less smoke and tar than wetter wood.

If you are cleaning the glass daily, you may find that a handful of crushed, damp newspaper and a little of the ash will rub the worst of the grime off before you finish off with the glass cleaner.

Carole
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Coo-we don't clean our glass door daily either!If I want a glow I open the door. Some flames show through anyway.Our insert doesn't stay in overnight usually( has been known to ) but the freestanding Godins often do and just a handful of twigs is enough to get them roaring again. On a calm,not too cold day they are very difficult to light though whereas the insert is OK most times
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We have cleaned the glass door on our Supra free standing fire about once a month since we installed it in November. Always has about 10% of glass dirty.

You will only acheive full quoted heat output of fire using well but not overseasoned wood (suggest oak) . We get an estimated 4 to 5 Kw from a 10 Kw rated fire burning the fairly mankey ( ? spelling and source language)  and expensive job lot we sourced in October. If we go mad and use the last of the offcuts of unsalvaged Oak floor board we get a lot more heat.

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I think we may be getting somewhere at last. After lots of head up chimney and waggling about we have fitted a pressure equaliser.

We have also bought for very old logs, the difference is that the air is not shooting up the chimney so fast. Room is warmer, not boiling. The three bedrooms have the coldness just taken out of the air. Hopefully this will work, so we are bricking up now. Thanks for everyones advice.

This wonderful machine is called a automatic draught stabilizer by Georgin

Moderator.

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