*
Folks,
A friend is trying to convince me that these Finish/ Russian stoves are wonderful. They certainly have some very nice advantages (little emmisions,able to burn any wood without creosote build up, firing once a day etc). Some have stainless steel coils which heat water. I have seen some very elegant ones made of soapstone.
However looking at some of the down sides, the footer needed are extensive, they require a masonry chimmeny (supposedly the chimmeny needs to run in the wall of the house and not be exterior to it), they cost $3,500 without the stone facade, and I am not at all certain the local masons here in rural Virginia have ever seen one of these things.
I bet the total job costs $7,000 without the fireplace. At 8% interest that is $80 a month for thirty years. So how are these cost effective?
I am appreciative of the comments of anyone who has ever installed or owned one.
Thanks
Frank
Replies
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Frank,
10 yrs ago we added a Tulikivi soapstone heater to our house we were building. My n.e. N.C. mason buddy was going to start selling/installing them and he gave me his deal on the first one he did. He had been constructing finnish style masonry heaters for some time. The footing was big with some rebar but doing it with the rest of the foundation was no big deal. The interior chimney and the stove I helped with so the labor cost on all that was not much either. The stove was around 4-5 thou. maybe less, my memory isn't here this morning. So, we have the concrete, some labor for my buddy and the stove and brick.
Sure it was expensive but so would a normal fireplace if you are so inclined. Even a fab unit with a trip wall metal chimney and that ugly box on the side of your house would be costly. So we opted for the clean burning, fuel efficient (twigs and stems and spring gleaned branches from the woods, they ain't bs'ing), beautiful soapstone heater.
If we sell, which we won't, this unit will surely add to the charm of this house. Will the buyer pay for it? Who knows. We don't have a lot of $ but did it anyway. We may be the fool, you be the judge. Put a lot into the passive solar end and radiant heat in the floor and you know what? Never did a study to see the payoff schedule. Just live in comfort with total gas usage of $450 a yr. for the heat, dom. water, cooking and clothes drying in a 2700 sf house here in NW Ohio. So, maybe the payoff is there. BTW, use the heater for the fall and spring heat when we don't have the floor on. And for those cold spells and weekends. Total comfort, minimal maintenance, and beauty. You get what you pay for if your smart or lucky.
You can use a metal chimney on 'em. And the creosoteless claim is true. They burn so hot, my liner is clean as it was day one. Every year I go up and look down and still can't believe it. Wood use is minimal, maybe 15-18lbs a firing. One firing a day unless it's real cold, then two. Now if you want a mas heater and don't need the Tulikivi, you can find kits that give you the technology and you can finish the outside with something less exp. than soapstone. The heat retention I don't know would be as good. And I'm sure you can find a mason in Va. who knows about this stuff. Heck, the soapstone mine is in Schuyler I believe.
Hey, best of luck.
*Frank -- we just are finishing building our house -- at 8200 ft. Can get very cold (minus 0 temps) and very windy. We're also WAY off the grid -- so we make our own power (solar). We thought about a central heating system, but instead have an Envirotech masonry fireplace, made by Dietermeyer and Ward in Washington State. Yes, it is inside the house, not on exterior wall. It effectively heats roughly 3000 sf with just one or two burns a day, one big armload of firewood in each burn. Sure beats all the wood hauling and ash shoveling for a conventional wood stove or fireplace!As for $$. We paid less than $5000 for the unit, delivered. It comes with a videotape and extensive instructions and telephone support. I believe any mason could build it, without prior experience with the product. All the firebrick fits together, each piece is numbered, virtually impossible to put wrong pieces together. Ours sits above a basement, so it sits on concrete block base (hollow) built up from basement floor. Everything came with the kit (including dampers, glass-faced firebox door, clean-out doors) to build to a standard ceiling height (8 ft). All we had to add was brick veneer and chimney. They recommend a masonry chimney simply because you'll not have to replace it ever. Don't know exact cost of that.We're amazed by it. We have a few propane wall heaters to take the chill off, but haven't used them. They'll be used if we go away and fireplace has to be started cold.We faced ours with "new used" brick, but it can be faced with any stone...even tile. Each material will have its own heat-retention qualities. The brick is great....I imagine Calvin's soapstone is remarkable, but wasn't an option for us way out here.
*Interesting stuff! I found a bunch of add'l info on the web after reading this.
*Tina, Andrew, how about posting some references? I think I'm building a new place this summer that also will be well off the grid. Maybe this would be a good thing to include.Tina, how long does the stove take to come up to heat when starting from cold at what winter temp? How long before it starts to heat the house?
*
Get one, get one, get one. My masonry heater and the chimney etc probably comes to about 10% of my total house cost, and I'd do it again in a minute. Not only is it very fuel efficient and easy to use, its the most comfortable heat I've ever experienced. You sit in front of a roaring fire for breakfast and dinner, you don't have to feed the damn thing all day, your feet are never cold. Add to that the fact they look great. If you like to cook spend the extra thou for a bakeoven: we don't have another oven and cook everything in that all winter.
Does it "make sense" from a bank loan officers p.o.v? Probably not. But who lives in your house, you or your loan officer? I think it was Einstien who said "Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts."
I have a Heat-Kit made in Quebec which I can highly recommend. You can get more info on all from the Masonry Heater Association: http://www.mha-net.org
I cant praise these heaters too highly.
*
Masonry Heater Information -- http://www.mha-net.org/ -- this site also lists builders and mfgs, but don't think Envirotech is listed there. Also visit http://www.rumford.com.
*I'd like to see some plans. Preferably free. The more detailed, the better. Best of all.... detailed plans which I could use to make my own from scratch.I don't need everything broken down into dumb-speak. A few numbers and good illustrations are all that's needed. I can figure out the rest of the numbers, etc for myself.
*Y'all are making me jealous. I'd always looked on fireplaces as pointless energy-suckers, but then I grew up in California. My wife is now pondering where we could stick one of these things in our tiny Cape.My client, whom I met with today, wants a wood fireplace mostly for ambiance, though I'm lobbying for a soapstone stove (they put out a lot of heat too). She showed me a brochure for a volcanic ash fireplace -- weighing 1700 lbs! I hope it comes in pieces. I said we have enough support issues in her 100 y.o. house as it is! (She wants to knock out nearly every wall on the lower floor -- she's an architect...).Try Majestic Fireplaces for the low-mass options.Let me ask the wood-burning lovers: is there an acceptable gas fireplace? God, that would make my life easier.
*Thanks for the input. Looking at the literature I have on this Tempcast stove it looks as though you have to have a basement for the dust clean out and the clean air intake. Is that so or am I looking at this incorrectly?Frank
*Frank -- don't know about the Tempcast, but the Envirotech has its clean-outs in the back of the unit, about 4feet above floor. Don't need basement.And for warm-up times, we have 9 to 11 ft ceilings throughout, and starting with cold fireplace and outdoor temps of 10 degrees, indoor temp in 50s, it took half a day to get house comfortable. What's interesting about how it works is that you let it burn hot and furious (temps get to about 2000 degrees f) for a couple of hours, then damp down 90 percent until just coals, then close damper entirely. THAT's when you'll really feel the heat start coming through the brick.
*Andrew - I only mention gas fireplaces because you ask... I don't mean to promote them over these other stoves that sound like the cat's meow... anyway, we have had good experiences with Vermont Castings direct vent stoves. They look nice, are not very expensive or hard to install (actually they have very reasonable clearance requirements), and they put out a fair amount of heat. Best of all they are direct vent, so the flue is zero clearance and they bring in all their combustion air from outside.
*
Luka-
I believe there is a fellow in Maine named Basil Lepushencko (sp?) who sells plans for a masonry heater. There was an article either in FHB or in Harrowsmith about it, I couldnt track the reference down. The article was written by someone who had built from the plans, they said it was not that difficult and they were pleased witht he results. They were in Alaska if I recall so they certainly would have the opportunity to test the thing's output.
That said there are apparently wide fluctuations in performance of these heaters, and it does takes some knowledge to make the smoke channels perform correctly. I would hesitate to work from less than a thorough and tested plan. However if you have such a plan and decent masonry skills you should certainly be able to make yourself an excellent heater for a great savings; its many hours of labor that are the largest cost in them.
Good luck!
*I'd second that vote. They make some very compact and beautiful gas heaters (enamel and soapstone) that really do look like a real fire. I have several friends around here who have them.
*
thank you both -- i was afraid to even ask such a crass Q among these purists!
*hotsawdust,Tank you berry much. I will allocate a couple hours to the search. Having a good idea where to start is a good thing. I also recieved an e-mail from a guy named Rod about this...>Luka, Couldn't post this for some reason. Try http://www.ctel.net/~mwhcoinc/pub.html for books with plans. Also try mha-net.org for some links to diagrams. Rod *cut-n-paste with his permission*I got a bit excited at that prospect then discovered the books are all based on using a kit to start with. But I wanted to post the link because someone else would probably want just that. What I really want is directions, no matter how sloppy, on how I can make the whole thing from scratch. It sounds like this Basil guy has written the book from that angle. Guess I'll find out soon enuf. Thanks again.
*
Hi again Luka-
I suddenly remembered where the article was- not in the magazines I mentioned but in Joiner's Quarterly from Spring 1997. (its a timber framing magazine.) In any case the address was in there:
Basilio Lepuschenko
RFD 1 Box 589
Richmond Maine 04357
They say the construction was about 60 hours. They ordered some soapstone from the TuliKivi people and had it shipped to Alaska, which apparently raised the price considerably. In any case that article and the plans should get you going!
*
Tina,
2000 degrees? Seriously? On one armful of wood?
MD
*Frank -There was an excellent article (I'd say one of the top 5 of my favorite FHB how-to articles) in FHB several years ago on building these things. Sorry I don't have the issue number but I'm sure it's in the indexes. The article had good pictures and got down to the nitty gritty of the construction, plus a well done cross section illustration of the inner workings that shows the secondary burn chamber. With good planning, it would be very easy to build in heat collecting pipes for supplemental domestic hot water heating or whatever else that can be thought of.I'm waiting for the opportunity to tackle building one of these monsters that basically becomes a central structure on its own in the middle of the house. (And I will make sure the combustion air source is piped in from the outside.)Alan
*Hi Guys,I build Masonry Heaters. I spent three years apprenticing with an Austrian master building the Austrian version called Kachelofen. We were a small buisness, two crews of two with the master doing all the paperwork and taking care of the clients. The company, Firma Greisberger in Koppl Austria, just outside Salzburg, produced on an average 7 stove a month. I estimate to have built between 80 and 100 units (got to take into account vaction time). About 20 of those I acted as lead mason.So now I am in Colorado and trying to make a living building Kachelofen for the uninitiated. It is not easy. I live in the poorest county in Colorado, and on top of that nobody knows what a "cock'lwhat?" is. But I will convert the heathens, that I swear.So I am biased but...A masonry heater is going to do more for your home than produce equity. If I may be so bold as to insert a little salesmanship, what you are purchasing in a masonry heater is an improved living ambiance. The Austrians, being closly related to the Germans, have studied every aspect of what they call "behagligkeit". They have a whole research and development section of the guild that studies every thing from optimum flue dimensioning to what is the most comfortable room climate for the human being. The masonry heater, in particular the Kachelofen is the most desirable heat source for the human body. If you want more info why, contact me. You are also buying an old tradition. A hand crafted Kachelofen, and to be fair to my kit producing competition, any masonry heater, is the result of literaly thousands of years of onsite heating research. What we normally heat with in this country is a result of about 150 years of trial and error. To be accurate the first Kachelofen found dates back only about 600 years, but the unpure forms go back much farther. By bringing a masonry heater into tyour home you are reinvigorating a thousand year old central European tradition. How much is that worth?Clean flues. No one but an owner will believe it. No creosote. Why? The Austrians Know Why. Creosote is condensation of smokey gasses. Hot gass meets cold metal and condenses in the form of a black gooey film. The Kachelofen first is hooked up to an internal chimney(by the way, to increase draft, stop, and I mean STOP puttin those silly looking chimney extensions 10 feet above the roof. put your chimney inside the envelope, and if it must be metal insulate the heck out of it.), preferably masonry. This gives the internal surface of the chimney a higher temerature. The Kachelofen effectivly draws the lions share of the heat out of the smoke and into the masonry before it reaches the chimney. So we have warm smoke meeting cool masonry, and no condensation. The other thing that helps is that the fire is burned hot to eliminate a lot of residual particulate mater in the smoke.I could go on and on and on, but I will spare you for now. If you want to know more just ask here, or email me at [email protected]. I am not yet a member of the MHA, and so have no listing or certification there. I am however a certified Austrian "Hafner" journeyman. I love my stoves, and I love sharing what I know about them with interested people. And I love to have more stove contracts. The tile buisness in killin my knees.And one more hit for the custom Kachelofen. I design the stoves individualy. I have never in Austria or in America set the same stove twice. I have a program designed by the Austrian Hafner Guild that allows me to customize the flues inside to oven to meet your needs and produce the best efficiency. I will travel.I hope that my plug for myself and my product has not been offensive to anyone on this site. I love these stoves just alittle behind my wife and daughter, and sometimes selling and discussing get mixed up. If I have offended please accept my appologies.Warmly, Scott Davis
*FrankI posted at the end of this discusion but need to reply directly to your question about air and ash. Some heaters are designed with basement air and cleanouts. Good but not always needed. A Kachelofen, unlike an openfireplace, only burns for an hour or two a day. You have enough air to combust in your house. And unlike the open fireplace, your heat is not going up the chimney, it is being stored in the mantel of the stove. So you are reusing the warmthof the house, not losing it.Cleanout. A properly built stove will produce enough ash to be cleaned out of the firebox every few days depending upon usage. this can be done from the firebox door. The flues should only need cleaning, now get this, once every 8 to 12 years. That's 8 to 12 years. I have cleaned about 40 or so stoves and it is pretty quick, 3 hours, and when done by a professional leaves no mess in your home.W
*Tina,The reason that it starts kicking when you close it down is because the heat can no longer escape via the chimney. Just like a garden hose, the smoke in the flue stops moving when you shut off EITHER end. Alot of heater builders in America put a damper on the roof but this is not needed. Once you cut off the air source, rember playing with your straw at McDonalds, put your thumb on the end, lift the straw out, let the coke fall back in to cup when you release your thumb?, same'osame'o with smoke in a chimney. So the Heat can not go up, it goes out.Forgive me, but I dream about stoves and finally someone started a discussion where I can vent all these thoughts.Warm
*Mad Dog,Your must find a masonry heater near you and go see it. Talk to the owners, Sit by it, Heat it your self, Caress it, Smell it, Know it. Only one thing in this world is better than a properly built masonry heater...Scott
*Well yeah Scott, a little heavy on the sales but what you say of the operation etc. of the masonry heater is pretty close to right on.Maddog, You will get a fire at 1500/up on that log bag of wood. Little stuff, scraps, nothing over your wrist size. And you bet it keeps the creosote away. 10 winters and flue is unbelievably clean. I am thoroughly satisfied with the operation, maintenance and beauty of this Tulikivi. If only the price was down there. I couldn't have done it if it wasn't for my mason buddy. Thanks Tom, we really appreciate it.Radiantly yours,BC
*Well I am impressed. Why? Because I've helped friends who are potters fire their kilns, and it takes about 15-20 hours and a lot of goldarn fuel to get those things up into the 2000 degree range.I've known about the masonry heaters and admire their economy to use and warmth produced. With my exposure to timber framing, it is a natural for this type of system to be incorporated, though I have not dealt with one yet.Some questions I have are: can you burn softwoods without risk of creosote buildup as well? Does the system cook you right out of the closest rooms? Is there a way to regulate heat in individual spaces? How feasible is it to add a system to an existing house? I always figured you built the house around the masonry he
*Mad DogYou can burn softwoods. Try to stay away from woods that are full of sap or pitch. The trick with the creosote lies in the hot burn. Like Calvin said, wood the diameter of your wrist. And the system needs to be built right to effectively reduce the heat in the smoke before it hits the chimney. So get either a good stove mason, or a good kit. The system should not burn you out of your home. I do not know where the temperature of 1500 degrees is being found on calvin's stove. I assume he is refering to the temp in the fire box. The beauty of the system is that the same temperature in metal will burn your hand, while with masonry it will not. I oftem have built benches in my units. One client says that he is uncomfortable sitting on the bare bench, but his wife finds the heat just right. She is alittle better insulated.Regulating heat in different spaces is hard. You can have different parts of the stove in differnet rooms, install dampers that allow you to shut these parts on or off. But if you start doing this, you will be messing with your efficiency. Mostly though a masonry heater is an even temperature and after using it you get used to how much wood to burn to stay comfortable. This system is not good if you want to use thermostats to regulate specific temperatures.You can retro fit a heater. Price goes up, but it is possible. Easiest if the unit is to sit on an existing slab.
*Dog,The temp is in the firebox....and no, I haven't put in a thermometer. Rely on the lit and explanations of my mason buddy. However, the soapstone tempers and holds the heat. You can touch any part of the stove but the iron door and glass. Softwoods not a problem.A centrally located stove with good air circulation and an open floor plan is the ticket for comfort. The walleye are running. Stop by, stand in the cold river and try your luck. After, I'll get the ribs from New Riegal and you warm your toes by the stove.Adios.
*Thanks Scott,Cal,Good information. One of the stumbling blocks for my property up north is that it is full of poplars, white pine and spruce but no decent sized hardwoods for firewood. Maybe this system would be compatible at least with the poplar, and there are literally thousands of them. Are larger diameter logs undesirable? Around here I can get all the wrist sized oak, cherry, walnut, elm, hickory, maple, and locust I would feel like loading my truck up with, all for free.Cal, I wouldn't be standing in the river. Not me. Too many cold dunkings in my past. Committed to boats. You'll have to tell me more... the ribs and stove may be worth the tr
*Mad Dog -- Yup, 2000 degrees (don't stick your hand in to adust the logs!). That's the beauty of these stoves -- they burn everything, leave almost no ash, let off almost no gasses.Scott -- yeah, I figured the damper forced the heat out through the brick. It's 10 degrees out this morning. The last time I fired the stove was last night about 7 pm. House is still warm and comfortable. Fireplace bricks are still quite warm. The one thing I've learned is that you have to learn to think ahead with these stoves -- because there's about a 1-1/2 to 2 hour delay between when you light the fire and when it starts pumping the heat out through the brick, you've got to anticipate your heating needs. Right now, I'm anticipating that our carpenters will arrive and want a fire. Masonry stoves are also not the type of fireplace that you stand in front of to get warm when the fire is burning. Yes, the 2000 degrees put out some heat while it's burning, but the real heat bursts out after damper is closed. Walking up our basement stairs, it's amazing the blast of heat we get just halfway up.
*Sehr gut, Mein Herr. Wilkommen aus Breaktime.Now, how the heck does one pronounce "Kachelöfen." Or "Tulikivi"? What's a "grundöfen"? Are these the names of peoples, brands, places...? I feel like I've wandered into a German (or Finnish?) pastry shop.
*This all sounds so more sophiscticated than the New England tradition of cramming as much coal into the boiler as possible before going to bed, then waking up freezing anyway.Any thoughts on the environmental friendliness of wood heat, for those of us in urban areas? I refer to the CO, particulates, etc. sent up the chimney. Obviously these stoves beat the heck out of the standard heat-sucking ambiance wood fireplace.Still playing with combustion ... ad
*Andrew, it was explained to me that this Tulikivi and I would suppose most of the well built masonry heaters, expel little. Possibly to Calif. emmisions tests but to that I'm not sure. Only smoke you get is on initial combustion, paper & kindling, and then only for 5/10mins. Heard at the time (10yrs) that a catalytic converter was not necessary. Volume of wood used is minimal compared to even the efficient wood stoves of late. You can probably figure about 18 lbs a firing. Two firings/day for sole source of heat. One firing for extra heat in addition to your normal source. We use it for spring and fall heat so we don't have to run the floor. We are very satisfied and highly recommend.
*MD,Softwoods are ok, the temp of the fire burns the daylights out of the wood. Quick hot fire is what you want. Burn about an hr, hr/half depending on the mass of the stove, coals go out and then shut her down. As a primary heat source you would lite the fire when you get up, do the chores and then shut it down. Come home 5/6 and lite another one. You do not close down the dampers like with a conventional stove. Start it, burn it and when you see no glow, it's ok to shut it down. A complete burn, gases ash etc. Your talking one of those log bags at each firing. Not much and easy to handle. The only thing you need to get used to is the time delay Tina mentioned.The walleye are starting to run the Maumee River. Soon it'll be a$$hole to elbow lining the banks and shallows. 10 fish/day limit. Everyone welcome. The ribs are from New Riegel Cafe. Worth the trip or at least a side detour. SW of Fostoria near 23. You may have been by it when you were on the road. Let me know, I'll phone in the order. Depending on when you're going to Pete's, I'll meet you there.
*Sehr Geehrte Herr Andrew,"Kahk-ul-ohfehn","Two-lee-kee-vee". I still haven't figured out how to get the umlauts on my computer, but a "gruendofen" is nothing more than a basic Kachelofen without cooktop, waterheaters, speacial air intakes, dampers. "Gruend" means ground. So a "Groundstove" is really the starting place for the Kachelofen technology.I just looked back at you post. you spelled Kachelofen with an Umlaut above the "O". That makes the word plural and changes the pronuciation to "Kahk-ul-oofehn". Kind of.Kachelofen is just how the Austrians pronounce masonry heater. The word comes from Kachel, which is tile, and Ofewn which is Stove.Becarefull, The Kachelofen corporation website publishes a description of the word Hafner, stove mason, that is incorrect. Hafner comes from the word Haeferl, which is Austrian slang for bowl or large mug. The first stove tiles were bowls thrown on the potters wheel, with the edges squared off. Thesse were set on edge to produce the mantel of the stove. I have set these tiles and whoever thought of doing that was a masochist. Some believe that potters were the first Hafner, but the masons claim they were doing it first.My master once joked in a magazine article that the sound of the fire in the strove was the Hafner symphony. Perhaps that is where the K.C. got the idea that Hafner was the insperation for Mozarts Haffner symphony. Not. Haffner was an Austrian family for whom Mozart wrote the piece.Tulikivi is a finnish Brand name. We set a stove with those guys once. They sent down two "master" stove masons to "show us" how it goes. By ten a.m. we had taken the tools from the "master" who was drinking coffee and talking about all of his adventure over the world introducing this wonderfull product. The other mason must have wiped down the face of the stove 40 times, and it still had a film on it
*Herr Andrew,CO emissions while burning wood are neutral. If you let the wood decompose in the forest it will give off the same amount of CO as if you burn it. Other particulates get burned up in the fire. Burn hot, remember? And another factor that the EPA is still grappeling with in it's collective mind is that you only burn 2-3 hours a day! So even if the smoke is a little more dirty than a newfangeled wood burner with Catalytic converter, One must add the totals produced in a day, not a cross-section taken while burning. Side by side, some of these Cat. stove perform better thatn a Kachelofen, But they have to perform longer to produce the same heat, therefore producing more pollution.Mit fruendlichen Gruessen,
*Ach so! Danke schön. (I take no responsibility for my spelling in German.)
*I too have been long interested in these types of heaters, and I remembered that there had been at least one article in FHb about them. .. a quick check of the FHb magazine search function revealed a long list of articles from about a dozen issues.. .including the one I remembered from issue #36 - Dec 1986, which shows the detailed construction of an underfloor chinese masonry heater called a K'ANG, written by Jeffrey SmithAlso #71 - Jan 1992 has a good article showing construction of a beautiful looking Finnish type, called i Building A Tiled Masonry Heater by Vladimir Popovac, with a side bar about emmissions and EPA standards and the Masonry Heater Assoc of N. America.Also #76 - Sept 1992 an article entitled i Small House Big Heater, written by Albie Barden, details a brick covered Finnish hybrid with oven, seating nook, and fireplace bypass, for off season viewing.And for the less purist, who wants a high mass hybrid stove/fireplace. .. issue #42 - Oct. 1987, has i Masonry Heater Hybrid by G.Carl Marcus.-pm
*I am still looking for a neet fireplace that was mede by a company named "Thermal Energy Storage Systems" out of New Jersey, This was back in the 80's but judging from their construction, someone may still have one around or is making them under another name.Any Ideas ? Thanks
*
Folks,
A friend is trying to convince me that these Finish/ Russian stoves are wonderful. They certainly have some very nice advantages (little emmisions,able to burn any wood without creosote build up, firing once a day etc). Some have stainless steel coils which heat water. I have seen some very elegant ones made of soapstone.
However looking at some of the down sides, the footer needed are extensive, they require a masonry chimmeny (supposedly the chimmeny needs to run in the wall of the house and not be exterior to it), they cost $3,500 without the stone facade, and I am not at all certain the local masons here in rural Virginia have ever seen one of these things.
I bet the total job costs $7,000 without the fireplace. At 8% interest that is $80 a month for thirty years. So how are these cost effective?
I am appreciative of the comments of anyone who has ever installed or owned one.
Thanks
Frank
I'm reading old messages and wondering... did you ever put in the Tempcast? Did you look at other masonry heaters? I'm this close (fingers set at 1/2 ") to ordering one.
Greetings Carol.
The post you are responding to is almost 5 years old and the address data to that poster was lost when Taunton changed forum hosts several years ago.
I wouldn't expect a response from that particular poster unless he is still around and happens to catch this thread.
However, I believe there are several folk who frequent here that have experience with masonry heaters.
Hopefully they will see your question and offer some advice.
I'll be building a masonry heater in the not too distant future so your post grabbed my attention.
Cheers and Welcome to Breaktime.
Edited 12/27/2004 3:35 pm ET by rez