Recently, more and more often the owners of country houses, summer cottages, and just large spacious apartments install wood-burning fireplaces in their homes. This type of heating becomes quite affordable, but is still considered a luxury and an indicator of the owner's security. Fireplaces not only heat the room well, but also create a special coziness and comfort in the home.
In urban apartments and houses, heat is provided mainly by public services. Wood-burning fireplaces for the home often help out in cases where, for some reason, heating communications do not work or they are completely absent, for example, in the country. Such heat sources have been serving people for many centuries and today remain relevant and in demand.
Choosing a wood-burning fireplace for a summer residence
To keep a country house warm in the cold, you need to choose the right fireplace. First you need to decide on the place where it will stand, and depending on this, choose the design. There are several fireplacesspecies:
- wall-mounted;
- embedded;
- corner.
Wall-mounted is more suitable for spacious, large rooms, as it occupies a significant area. If such a fireplace is placed in a small room, then the comfort of being there may suffer.
Recessed designs are well suited for small rooms. Miniature dimensions allow you to place such a fireplace under the stairs or mount it in a column. Often built-in models play a decorative role.
Corner wood-burning fireplaces fit perfectly into the room. They are placed opposite the front door and windows.
What should I look for when buying a wood burning fireplace? The following parameters play an important role when choosing.
Temperature
- Combustion temperature. In order for the heat transfer to reach the maximum level, and the energy to suffer minimal losses, it is necessary to maintain a very high combustion temperature in the fireplace. Ideally, it should reach 850 degrees.
- Gas and smoke temperature. This figure should be low. When leaving the furnace, the temperature of the gases should not exceed 350 degrees. Models with this indicator have high fire safety.
Details
- Furnace chamber. It must be made of sheet steel. This material allows you to keep the fire in the fireplace for days, while the risk of cracking is completely absent, which cannot be said about cast-iron fireboxes.
- Firebox door. It is best to use a cast iron door. It will not warp at high temperatures, while maintaining high efficiency. Tight closure eliminates excessive draft when the fireplace is not in use.
- Glasses. From the inside, they must be blown with high temperature air. The blower system makes it possible to avoid excessive soot pollution. Better conditions are created for combustion.
- The Cleaner Burning System is specially designed to reduce emissions for a more efficient fire. The frequency of maintenance of the chimney and fireplace is reduced to a minimum. In this system, additional oxygen is supplied through a special channel located on top of the combustion chamber. This allows the remaining particles to burn out before the gas and smoke exit into the chimney.
Air
- Air supply. In order for combustion to be the best, the air entering the furnace must be well heated. For these purposes, channels are often used at the back of the firebox. They are heated by the fireplace and the combustion air passing through them becomes warm.
- Street air. To increase the efficiency of combustion, it is better to connect the fireplace to an air duct that goes outside. The necessary amount of oxygen for combustion will flow through it.
- Quality. Wood-burning fireplaces can last for decades, so when buying, special attention should be paid not so much to appearance and finish as to quality, reliability and ease of use.
Fireplace design
Of course, choosing wood burning fireplaces for your home, everyonepays special attention to design features. But they are installed in the house not only for heating.
The atmosphere that is created in a room with a fireplace is very important. The room seems to come to life, it becomes much more comfortable in it. To make the fireplace not only practical, but also beautiful, there are many natural and artificial materials for its decoration. The main attention is paid to the portal, external framing and cladding. Marble, dolomite, ceramics, granite - wood-burning fireplaces are finished with these materials. Photos show all the variety of materials.
Marble allows you to make the most beautiful carved reliefs, it lends itself well to processing, has different colors. Granite is used less often - it is quite expensive, but noble material. Granite granular chips look amazing.
How to operate wood burning fireplaces
In order for the fireplace to serve for a long time, it is necessary to follow some operating rules.
Special attention should be paid to the quality of firewood. Their humidity should not exceed 20%. Choose medium-sized logs that are not resinous. You should not lay down a large batch at once, because, flaring up, firewood can give too much fire, and therefore smoke. Thus, sooty areas may appear. It is better to install wood-burning fireplaces that have a clean burning system. They provide full use of fuel, not even small particles remain.
After heating, you need to make sure that the firewood is all burned out, only then closechimney. Do not use water to extinguish.
When the fireplace is on, keep the room free of drafts. However, access to oxygen is necessary in order to keep the fire going. The area of the room where the fireplace is located must be at least 20 square meters.
Wood-burning complete fireplaces can weigh from 400 to 1300 kg. The floor under the structure must necessarily have a concrete screed, be strong enough. When installing, you need to calculate the actions so that the fireplace is at the level of the finished floor.
The wall with which the stove comes into contact must be made of fireproof materials, not contain any communications. Pay special attention to this issue.
In general, each fireplace should have its own special design of partitions and walls with which it comes into contact. If a wooden house has a leaning wall, then you should not make a separate foundation for it. With a separate movement of the foundation of the house and the fireplace, the structure may collapse. In such cases, the floors are reinforced with an iron profile before installation.
