New Stove Advice

[Caddy]

I curently have a Highlander 5 (5kW) wood burning stove as the only source of heat in my small cottage.

 

The stove is in the living room (5mx5m, low ceiling) but that has an open staircase to the upper floor. The house has thick stone walls, fairly new double glazing, good loft insulation but that's about it. The house also has solid floor downstairs and literally sits in a stream. The house is pretty cold (very cold to other people) and even with the fire roaring I never got the living room up past 16°C last winter. I'm not bothered about being cold but it does stop other people from wanting to visit (good and bad with that). My DHW is currently from a direct vented cylinder that is mainly powered from my PV and Eddie diverter. If the sun doesn't shine I just put up with cold water, I don't think I've turned the immersion on from the mains yet.

 

I was thinking about getting a bigger stove to help heat the living room in winter a bit better and indirectly the rest of the house. I started looking at stoves and saw some with boilers which got me thinking. I could install a small wet heating system, I would need 2-3 rads and towel rail and upgrade the HWC to a vented cylinder with a heat coil to use some of the energy from the fire to top up the water. I see a lot of the modern boiler stoves are say 2kW room to 8kW water for modern very insulated houses but some still do a more 5kW room 5Kw water.

 

So, my situation would be: Day, still no heating (unless I put on the fire), hot water from whatever spare from the Eddie provides from PV. Night: light fire to heat living room, boiler stove also heats some hot water for rads upstairs and tops up hot water. Better than last winter anyway.

 

I know it would not be a conventional system but should this work? I would need a pump for the CH hot water and can I treat the DHW tank like another rad in the system or would it need like an S-plan system  with a couple of 2 port valves? I don't want a complicated system, just if the fires on a get a bit of extra heating and HW from the boiler.

 

Thanks (wouldn't be fitting this myself by the way, I'd get somebody in).

[ProDave]

What sort of house is it that a 5kW stove will not heat a single room?  Are you tacking the problem from the wrong end?  Reduce heat loss rather than put more heat in?

[Caddy]

Dave, I think the original use for my house was an apple store and it was made to be a cold as possible (maybe a daft statement). The house /barn has been converted into 2 small cottages in the past sometime but is over 200 years old. I only have 4 windows and one door. All the windows are on the north side of the house and you see where they have been retro-fitted in the past. I had the stove serviced by a HETAS approved sweep, with new bricks, riddle grates, throat plate and door seal. I have a porch over the one door and cannot fit external insulation as it's in a conservation area and I don't want to being honest, it would spoil how attractive the house is. In the heat of this summer when 37°C outside, my living room was 17°C only with no type of mechanical cooling. Nice is summer, but cold in winter. Apart from digging up the floor and insulating and relaying and possible internal insulation on walls I don't think there is much more I can do. It's a small place and internal insulation would reduce already small rooms even more.

 

As I said I don't mind it being a bit cold, I'm just trying to improve it a little bit.

[Thedreamer]

I take it your stove does not have a direct air feed from the outside. 

 

 

 

[Caddy]

2 minutes ago, Thedreamer said:

I take it your stove does not have a direct air feed from the outside. 

 

 

 

No it doesn't.

[Thedreamer]

2 minutes ago, Caddy said:

No it doesn't.

 

Is that a option for you?

 

Edited September 22, 2022 by Thedreamer

[TonyT]

Any insulation in the loft?

 

Dontou have a suspended timber floor? Any insulation under that?

[Caddy]

4 minutes ago, Thedreamer said:

 

Is that a option for you?

 

Potentially yes. The stove is on an external wall and directly backs onto the lean to enclosed porch I have. But it would take about 1.5m of ducting to get to an area of wall not covered by the porch. Not sure if a Dunsley Highlander 5 can be retro-fitted for direct air? Do you think this would help?  

[Caddy]

1 minute ago, TonyT said:

Any insulation in the loft?

 

Dontou have a suspended timber floor? Any insulation under that?

Loft is well insulated with 100mm PIR and 270mm loft insulation over the top. No suspended floor. Giant stone flagstones with a skim of concrete over the top to try and level them and then carpet. I should probably dig up the flags and sell them for ridiculous reclaimed prices. 

[Caddy]

Thinking about it, would a thermal store be better in my case than an unvented cylinder. Allow heat input from PV and stove and less G3 hassle.

[Thedreamer]

18 minutes ago, Caddy said:

Potentially yes. The stove is on an external wall and directly backs onto the lean to enclosed porch I have. But it would take about 1.5m of ducting to get to an area of wall not covered by the porch. Not sure if a Dunsley Highlander 5 can be retro-fitted for direct air? Do you think this would help?  

 

Not having an external air feed means that the cold air will be pulled into your house to replace the air going into your stove when it is lit.

 

Our stove runs off a external air feed, from our suspended timber floor, but from the post below this would not be possible. 

 

It's not going to solve the problem but would make a bit of a difference.

[TonyT]

I have a Charnwood 4 in a lounge that’s probably the same size but 3m high ceilings - Victorian building and the stove can be overpowering, i just open the door and heat the hallway, bedrooms off the hall etc.

 

Strange that 5 kW can’t raise the temp?

 

wood seasoned ok?

Would a couple of electric heaters heat the room? As an experiment to see how much input you need?

 

probably worth doing heat loss calcs!

[Caddy]

11 minutes ago, TonyT said:

I have a Charnwood 4 in a lounge that’s probably the same size but 3m high ceilings - Victorian building and the stove can be overpowering, i just open the door and heat the hallway, bedrooms off the hall etc.

 

Strange that 5 kW can’t raise the temp?

 

wood seasoned ok?

Would a couple of electric heaters heat the room? As an experiment to see how much input you need?

 

probably worth doing heat loss calcs!

Some of my issue is that my living room is not a sealed room but has an open staircase to upstairs. The stove is trying to heat a cold room/house and the whole upstairs at the same time. That is why I've been thinking to get a bigger stove and potentially with a boiler to fit a wet system to help heat upstairs.