HughF

I've grown up with Rayburns, and still have one in my off grid property. I'm looking at possibly replacing it because I'd like something with a larger firebox. Apart from a Rayburn supreme/355, which although having a large firebox is not an ideal unit because it's right hand oven only, what are my options? I need a grate as I burn a mixture of coal and wood. I don't need a back boiler anymore as I'm moving to a EAHP cylinder for my hot water, and I don't have any central heating radiators to run. I've spent some time in Austria and see the solid fuel cookers they have, something european might be worth consideration?

Burn that coal….. don’t want to leave any for the next generation…

If I had my way, I’d take the chimney down to open up the loft and block the chimneys up, but wife is insistent - ‘you had your way on the heat pump vs combi argument, you’re not winning this one’. Two solid fuel (we’ll never run them on wood, if I’m going to buy fuel, I’ll buy smokeless ovoids) stoves it is, unfortunately.

DIY is fine with BC eh, interesting. I haven’t found a hetas guy I trust yet. The local one who has done a few in our area didn’t fill me with confidence when he casually suggested he didn’t need to measure up for a register plate and would just cut something on site and fix it with silicon.

Roof, including chimney stack, is being scaffolded for flashing repairs and I want to make the most of the scaffolding, so I’m planning on getting my hetas guy to drop the liners at that point. 4 chimney pots on the top - each fireplace had a separate run up the chimney. I will have two liners installed, one per appliance. I cannot drill through the hearth and access the floor void so the external air supply will have to draw from the room. Unless, as I said earlier, I can draw from outside using a concentric flue liner, if such a thing exists.

As I think it is unrealistic to core down through the hearth retrospectively and get a duct into the floor void, I think we’ll have to settle for a grill/grating in front of the hearth. It’s a real shame a concentric flue liner system isn’t an option.

Or no foam in my case. 1” gaps all round, covered with trims.

Fensa install at my Somerset house…. Bunch of cowboys the lot of them.

Last time I fitted windows without BC or Fensa, I just lied when I sold the property - “they were fitted in 2004 when the extension went on”

Just get him on time + materials and tell him to crack on, you’re only paying him to sling pipe and press fittings.

To be honest, the hydronic design of these things is so piss easy, I could sketch it out on an envelope for you and you could just get a plumber to press it all up. It’s not rocket surgery this stuff.

We’re super happy with our trickle vents, has completely sorted out the indoor air quality and humidity.

We did private on our extension, I was panicking about trickle vents as I’d ordered the doors and windows without them (was planning dMVHR) then decided we didn’t want to go dMVHR. Drilled a few holes and screwed them on. BCO didn’t even look at them.

Private or council BC? private seem a bit more lax in my opinion.

Just say you can’t remember the name of the company who installed them, and you lost the certificate they sent you 🤣