County4x4

I bought a B&Q "Champion" brand rotary mower about seven years ago, and despite my expectations it's been an absolute belter. It never gets the fuel drained in winter and still starts first pull after being stood for months. During that time it's cost me exactly £1 for a new diaphragm for the carb! It mostly gets used in the garden - but also does some rough patches behind the workshop, and used to do the rough round a local model aircraft flying field too. Reckon I paid less than £100 for it, and it doesn't owe me a penny! Andy

Mate of mine does a lot of warranty work for Esse and says the build quality is often questionable at best. Also, plenty of high end stoves using steel rather than cast these days. Andy

Also slightly dubious about the statement that What's the other 30% then - I'm guessing that if this is one of those "just light the bag" products it's likely to be some form of paraffin wax - so perhaps not as "green" as it's being made out to be? Andy

I like the idea, but like many of these products, price is definitely going to be an issue as most of them are a lot more expensive than "traditional" firewood briquettes, if I can call them that! Other companies are producing briquettes in the UK from waste cardboard and rape meal - "proper" briquettes I mean - not the sort of thing you'd be able to produce in your shed - but both of them are a lot pricier than the equivalent made from wood waste. Until the price comes down, I can only see these things having a niche market to be honest. Andy

I'm not sure that the manufacturers come up with their own efficiency figures to be honest. A friend of mine is in the process of prototyping a new stove to compete with the likes of Clearview at the "top of the pile" end of the market, and he was talking about having to take the stove off somewhere to be tested (as part of the CE marking process I believe) The test facility operate the stove in various scenarios - like "accidentally" leaving the bottom door open to overfire it, and also conduct tests to come up with efficiency figures. I guess these tests are in the equivalent of laboratory conditions, so results can be replicated, and standard tests applied to different stoves to give a meaningful comparison. Andy

I'd emailed him too, and my gut feeling is that he's probably genuine going by his other feedback. I reckon once you have 100% positive feedback of several hundred on ebay, then the bigger your score, the more you want to keep a clean sheet, and the less likely you are to jeopardise it by knowingly selling dodgy gear. Andy

John - not sure if you missed my post before. Can you post details and pics of your briquettes please. Depending on price and specs I may be interested in some for resale. Cheers, Andy

John - I hadn't realised that you were actually in production now. Could you post some details and pics of your briquettes as I may be interetsed in some for re-sale. Cheers, Andy

Interestingly - if you click on the "wood stove" bit on the link you gave - the form you get to fill in is entitled "Automated wood pellet stove enquiry form" - so whether the grants are available for "normal" stoves isn't clear. Also, my recent experience of these grant schemes is that basically that they're a bit of a backhand operation. We had a new gas boiler fitted under a grant scheme, and it had to be an approved boiler fitted by an approved installer etc - who may come from miles and miles away. The installers and appliance people pay to be approved, then the gummint pay them to do the installs. And funnily enough - when they come round to price the job up, it always seems to work out at just about the full cost of the grant! I know what a new boiler costs at trade price - and the estimate for our installation was way way above that for a case of basically removing one boiler from the wall and fitting a new one in it's place. So while we did get the grant from the gummint - the costs suggested to me that they could have got an awful lot more for their money - or done three times as more energy saving boiler changes with the same money in other words. People on other forums have mentioned that the price for a particular job in the renewables area has always been a lot higher with the grant than without - which basically ensures that the approved installers can make as much as possible out of it, while the government can coo about what a good job they're doing of saving the planet. The customer has ended up paying a very similar amount either way. It just all seems a bit of a scam to me. Regarding the moisture levels - many modern stoves and particularly those that are heating water as well extract so much heat from the fire that flue condensation can be a problem and this is obviously worse if wet wood is being used. Friends of ours with an Esse wood fired range cooker had major problems with tar build up recently and they were burning very dry wood - around 11-14%. In their case it was the boiler return stat being set too low, which meant that the boiler was always full of coolish water. This was cooling the flue gases to the extent where the flue was almost blocking completely with tar and crud within a week or two. Had they been using wood at 25% or so - it would have been even worse. Andy

What are you going to tow this 6m3 of logs with? Andy

I was about to suggest Broadbent Drives - we used to use them for racing mowers and had good service from them. Treediver has given the link already. Andy

Congratulations mate - to both of you - things will never be quite the same again! Maybe an arbtalk nursery is called for - we've got a Holly - you have a Hazel - who's going to be brave and go for Ginkgo?! All the best, Andy

:biggrin: Quality reply!! Andy PS - Smiles - the rods you mentioned are called "lockfast" rods if you're looking for them

Getting back to this top down lighting thing - I actually remembered to give it a try tonight before I lit the stove. We're using coal at the moment - but only because we got about a tonne for nothing - before you start:001_tt2: I usually light the kindling on top of a few bits of paper and then once it's started to catch, I put a few bits of coal on top and build up a bit of a pile. This usually produces a fair bit of coal smoke until the stuff gets going properly - this stage can last a good few minutes even with the bottom door open to get a real good draught through the grate. Anyway - tonight I built it upside down - layer of coal on the grate, then the usual amount of kindling, and then one bit of a firelighter on top of that. Lit the firelighter and let it be. The stove (Morso squirrel) was putting heat out a lot quicker than usual as there were flames dancing about from the start - and there was hardly any smoke at all, even when the fire had got down to the coal. Conclusions - not a myth after all and gives much better results in terms of quick heat and less smoke (for me in my stove at any rate) than the usual bottom up method. Cheers, Andy

I'm kinda between two camps on this one - as I've swept my own chimneys in the past, and I'm also looking at chimney sweep training at the moment with a view to offering it as a service. For what it's worth, I'm guessing if the question was asked on a chimney sweep forum (if there was one) then the response there would be pretty much the same as if Joe Public posted on here that he had a massive pop in his back garden hanging over his conservatory and he was thinking of hiring a ladder.... A proper chimney sweep has a lot more knowledge than just how to stick rods together - he'll be trained in all sorts of stuff relating to flues and how they work, how to spot any potential problems that could affect the fabric of the building, and in extreme cases, problems that could gas the occupants! He'll also have the correct equipment for sweeping your particular chimney, with different rods and brush types for cast, brick and lined flues, a proper sweeps vacuum (usually over £700) to remove all the soot and dust without blowing it round your house, soot cloths and so on. He may well have camera gear that he can put up your chimney to inspect it. If he uses the wrong gear, and puts a hole through your lovely new stainless steel liner, he'll also have insurance to cover it! He'll probably issue you with a certificate that will stand up in court too if necessary, to say that your flue has been cleaned to the required standards. As always - it's down to the individual at the end of the day, but having started looking into it, there's a lot more to the job than just sticking a brush up a chimney - and for the sake of £30 - £40 - it might be a better, and possibly safer option to get someone in. The superflex rods that slasherscot mentioned are the ones to use with flexible liners btw - Wakefield Brush sell them via ebay cheaper than on their own website, with a free brush and free postage too IIRC. Cheers, Andy

I always used to send overseas stuff via the Post Office- never had any problems. Otherwise, you can get an instant quote and book a collection using interparcel.com as long as you have your package dimensions and weight, and a phone number for the recipient - you can't submit the form without one - I've used them a lot over the last few months for domestic deliveries and they always turn up when they're supposed to. Even the economy 3-5 day service seems to arrive next working day most of the time. They do international deliveries too - mostly using UPS or fedex. Cheers, Andy

Found it: Lighting fires is another problem area. Traditionally, we use paper, with twigs on top, and then we add larger pieces as we go on. 1) First things first; we need to stop using paper. Being mineralised, paper makes thick fluffy ash flakes, and these can obstruct the flow of air through the fire. 2) Build the fire upside down. Put the coal or larger wood at the bottom so that it forms a reasonably solid mass, and will catch everything that falls onto it. (This enables it to catch all the small embers that form from the burning of the kindling, and which would otherwise fall through the bars of the grate and be lost. By using this method, the embers will fall onto the wood/coal and create a hot heart to help the ignition process along.) 3) Then put the large kindling on base, the smaller kindling on top of that, and on the very top place a small fragment of firelighter (I use only a quarter of the firelighter) plus some very small kindling. 4) Light the piece of firelighter and the fire will burn down faster and cleaner than the conventional technique. This method has one stunning advantage: We have all, at one time or another, lit a fire that has failed to catch light. We then have to demolish the fire and rebuild it form scratch. This is possibly the dirtiest job known to man, and usually results in creating a terrible mess, leaving one black to the elbows. Been there, done that and didn't like it. Using the upside down method, if the fire shouldn't catch, then all is simplicity and cleanliness. Simply add a few more small kindling scraps, another quarter of a firelighter, and off we go again. No mess, no fuss, and no dirty hands. THIS REALLY WORKS. Trust me, I'm a chimney sweep.

Half the trouble is that people have no hesitation at all about buying and having a stove installed for well over a grand - but then they go and buy the cheapest wood they can get because "wood should be cheap shouldn't it 'cos it's all over the place" I've also heard stories of people trying to light logs with a match! Not sure what Felix meant though - if it was lighting the fire from the top down, quite a few people swear by that method - there are supposed to be some advantages over bottom up - but I can't remember what they are:001_rolleyes: I'm sure google will find it if you're interested. Andy

A lot of the cheap stoves sld in the UK are cast iron - but imported from China and sold under all sorts of brand names once they arrive. The castings are often poor quality soyou end up with air gaps between them once they're all bolted together. This will make the stove practically impossible to control as it will still end up pulling hard even with all the air controls shut off. There are quality stoves in both iron and steel - but obviously the quality sets you back more. Worth it though in my opinion! Cheers, Andy

"Are Ecofans any good" falls into the same bracket as "Husqvarna or Stihl?" unfortunately. Many people think they're the best thing since sliced bread, and others think they're an expensive gimmick. They work best if you have a bit of a gap around your stove so they can draw cooler air over the fins at the back of the fan blade - they are not supposed to be plonked in the middle of the stove where the surrounding air is baking hot. You should also be able to save a few quid on that ebay price. I think the manufacturers have a list of suppliers on their website - they're made by an outfit called Caframo. Sorry I can't just say yes or no! Andy

My Head Forester once upon a time wouldn't have elm in his house. He reckoned there was an old saying that "Elm hateth and waiteth" - though I don't know if that was more to do with dead ones chucking branches off - maybe someone had one land on them once upon a time? I used to burn tonnes of the stuff though - no ill effects so far! Never heard the elder story - though it's mentioned in the firewood poem - "make a fire of elder tree, death within your house will be" Andy

Yep - nice one mate! Just one thing that crossed my mind - there seemed to be a fair bit of down time and guard lifting. Do you have a lot of bother with jams, logs falling sideways etc? Andy

Not bad at all mate - even at 22% you're probably a good way below what a huge amount of stuff is being sold at. Stuff from some local forecourts etc won't even burn - and others are reporting having to use coal to keep the wood going - stuff like that isn't firewood in my book! I reckon the stuff you have there will be good for your customers and good for your reputation too! Cheers mate, Andy

Is there a difference on the reading if you test a freshly split inside face? Andy

One of the big national companies are selling at £149 for a m3 bag. That includes delivery I think - but even so...... Andy