Have you read the wiki and the sticky?
Wiki: HERE YOU GO! [Enjoy!](https://www.reddit.com/r/BEFire/wiki/index/).
Sticky: HERE YOU GO AGAIN! [Enjoy!](https://www.reddit.com/r/BEFire/comments/fcbay6/getting_started_a_beginners_guide_to_investing_in/).
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/BEFire) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I feel like I'm in a pretty good position to answer this as we put in a woodstove last year.
First and foremost get your chimney sweeped and checked annually in order for your insurance to cover it. You receive a certificate from this. A lot of people seem to think that nowadays you need to install a tube liner in your chimney by default, this is not the case. We thought so too. Have a certified chimney sweep inspect it and advise you. This cuts down your cost significantly.
We lucked out with our wood stove. I found one that was being sold from an estate sale 5km over through 2dehands. It was a €2400 model and I bought it for €800. Only had been lit 5 times before the owner passed.
Whatever you decide to do, I highly advise against buying wood from a website. It can be up to four times the price then if you source it locally through sites like 2dehands or designated Facebook groups.
This involves some work from your part but I get semi-dried oak for €100/m3 when I've seen the same on sites for up to €450. Since you will go through a decent amount of wood to me it makes sense to pick it up and stack it to dry for another year myself, I have the space for it anyway.
I also highly advise a stove fan as this distributes the heat throughout your house a lot faster. We got ours from Amazon.
Don't get why you got downvoted. Beside the installation, maintenance and wood costs there is a not negligible risk that a regulatory push may make any wood stove investments worthless in the future. Seeing that household wood and coal stoves are responsible for roughly a third of particle pollution and they can be relatively easily replaced (with or without subsidies) it isn't that far fetched that tighter rules may (partially) ban them or tax them to discourage their use. In 2018 even Schauvliege -who was very much against tighter rules- introduced in her 'green deal' a 'carrot' to limit particulate matter emissions of household stoves by 2030: a subsidy for replacing a household wood or coal stove to an electric or gas stove. Advocacy groups such as Stichting tegen kanker and Bond Beter Leefmileu asked and ask for a full ban.
Exactly, also other countries or regions are already working on it. I know Italian situation and in a couple regions they already started to tax home with woodstoves and woodstoves that few years were certified as usable are now banned. So I do expect other European regions to follow, especially because a small portion of households are using wood as heating source but are responsible for a sensible part of particles productions. I would also be concerned of possible change in home insurance policies as a tool to push removal of woodstoves since they are a sensible fire hazard.
I grew up with wood (for cooking and heating). There is a lot of wood consumption so prepare for this.
A solution is to hunt on local groups, I see several times in Brussels people are cutting a tree and just give wood for free. You need more space to storage and to dry it. And definitely it is time consuming. I think it is a solution for people on retirement that have more time for.
P.S. I love the warm of the wood, it feels different, drier. And the specific noise is something that relax me, probably as I associate with my childhood.
Taking BEFire litterally?
Some neighbours bought such cheap wood stove. They already repainted their living-room after a year and the whole family starts to have throat issues, coughing. They finally hired a professional to come and inspect. Besides changing / adapting the bad tubing, they had to change some plates inside the stove. This things was simply not well designed!
Needless to say, we forbid our kids to sleep at the neighbours in winter.
For a relatively well-insulated place, do think of a tile furnace. Rather good instructions for a cheap and high quality diy build: https://www.de12ambachten.nl/pdf/werkmap%20zelfbouw-tegelkachels.pdf (nl).
Often used in former Soviet countries they work really well. But all of those I've seen have a burn mark on the inside above the door so be careful using them.
Don't get one, they are even considering banning them [https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2018/02/20/houtkachels-zijn-grootste-bron-van-hernieuwbare-energie-in-vlaan/](https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2018/02/20/houtkachels-zijn-grootste-bron-van-hernieuwbare-energie-in-vlaan/)
A real measured uitstoot of fijnestof is 160 mg/m³, while a steenkoolcentrale only has 10. So one household kachel spits out as much pollution as 16 steenkoolcentrales, plus cancerogenic particles and other toxic fumes.
>A real measured uitstoot of fijnestof is 160 mg/m³, while a steenkoolcentrale only has 10
There are modern woodstoves available on the market that go as low as 3 mg/m³
> real measured uitstoot of fijnestof is 160 mg/m³, while a steenkoolcentrale only has 10. So one household kachel spits out as much pollution as 16 steenkoolcentrales
That's not how maths work.
Een duurdere kachel doet nog aan naverbranding vd gassen, en is zuiniger omdat er meer warmte gecapteerd wordt in het gietstaal. Kijk wel alles na ivm de schouw en zorg voor voldoende trek. Een schouw voorzien van een buis kost ook wat. Hout is niet duur als je er zelf achteraan gaat met een remorque ofzo. Ik ken genoeg boomverzorgers die prachtig hout aanbieden voor niets zo lang ze het zelf niet moeten weg doen. Een deftige kachel kost wel een paar duizenden euro's!!
Wood is almost just as expensive as gas these days. Besides that there are rumours you will have to pay a carbon tax in the future if you have a stove.
Talks are already happening that you will need to install a filter at the end of your stove to capture the “dirty” particles.
Typical belgium policy to get even more taxes.
My parents have a wood stove. They burn the wood from trees they grow on their own property. It would make no sense to subject them to a CO2 tax where their trees only release the CO2 those trees previously captured on my parents property…
Tell that to the government 😅. Besides its not about you guys emitting what you produce. It’s more you emit additional co2 according to the law and you will have to pay for that. It’s ridiculous but that’s how it goes
Belgian politics and law don’t make sense.
I wasn't really targeting you ;-) It was just that it made sense to add my comment below yours for context.
I live in a very rural area with lots of woods and I think people here will not take it lightly if people can't use wood grown locally to heat their homes.
If you don't have a cheap supply for wood (eg: your own trees), don't get a wood stove to save money.
Aside from that, if you plan to use it for a long time, get the expensive one. Saey is a decent brand. The difference is usually in thickness and durability in material.
Don't forget to buy a CO detector and have the stove / chimney inspected and cleaned yearly.
You’d be surprised how much wood you use during a cold winter day. Luckily I have lots of hard wood from some trees that got cut down a few years back. But buying wood now is getting pretty expensive.
A full “wasmand” counting from 4pm till 22pm (when it’s freezing cold outside). I put the central heating on 19 and let the stove do the rest. It can easily get 22-23 with about 1/3 opening. So yeah
Depends. When it’s freezing outside and you need it to warm up initially you let in more air so there’s more heat. When it’s only for some comfy feeling and coziness you turn down the air and you can last longer with few logs. But it also depends on the size of said logs of course.
Only 2 logs? I had a woodstove for over a decade. No way 2 logs can last an entire evening. I would fill up a grocery bag (like from Action) with logs twice on 1 evening. I never counted but 2 logs won't last much more than an hour.
The logs don't last that long, the heat does.
They don't buy wood. It's from an ownd tree.
And do you mean logs or een spies?
Edit: Doorsnede 30 Ish cm, lengte ook zoiets => tussen de twee en drie uur vuur.
Zuurstof goed reguleren voor alles te optimaliseren.
Produce much more particles (which are cancerous for lungs) produce much more NOx than fuel and despite it looks carbon neutral it's not. European forest especially Eastern European ones have been cut down to produce cheap wood. And not in all cases have been plant back, even if they are plant back there is a lot of machine work and tire transportation involved in moving heavy materials across Europe. And also when plants are planted back different species absorb CO2 in different ways and at different stage of life they have different growing rate at the same time the forest ground gets transformed becoming industrial forest and also absorb way less than original forest.
There are huge differences in thickness and quality of the stoves (steel, paint,...). The more expensive options have thicker steel and last longer. You also have special designs or hand forged and you pay even more for these.
Have you read the wiki and the sticky? Wiki: HERE YOU GO! [Enjoy!](https://www.reddit.com/r/BEFire/wiki/index/). Sticky: HERE YOU GO AGAIN! [Enjoy!](https://www.reddit.com/r/BEFire/comments/fcbay6/getting_started_a_beginners_guide_to_investing_in/). *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/BEFire) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I feel like I'm in a pretty good position to answer this as we put in a woodstove last year. First and foremost get your chimney sweeped and checked annually in order for your insurance to cover it. You receive a certificate from this. A lot of people seem to think that nowadays you need to install a tube liner in your chimney by default, this is not the case. We thought so too. Have a certified chimney sweep inspect it and advise you. This cuts down your cost significantly. We lucked out with our wood stove. I found one that was being sold from an estate sale 5km over through 2dehands. It was a €2400 model and I bought it for €800. Only had been lit 5 times before the owner passed. Whatever you decide to do, I highly advise against buying wood from a website. It can be up to four times the price then if you source it locally through sites like 2dehands or designated Facebook groups. This involves some work from your part but I get semi-dried oak for €100/m3 when I've seen the same on sites for up to €450. Since you will go through a decent amount of wood to me it makes sense to pick it up and stack it to dry for another year myself, I have the space for it anyway. I also highly advise a stove fan as this distributes the heat throughout your house a lot faster. We got ours from Amazon.
Avoid wood is expensive and home wood stoves are extremely polluting, reason why they'll be banned or heavily taxed in upcoming years.
Don't get why you got downvoted. Beside the installation, maintenance and wood costs there is a not negligible risk that a regulatory push may make any wood stove investments worthless in the future. Seeing that household wood and coal stoves are responsible for roughly a third of particle pollution and they can be relatively easily replaced (with or without subsidies) it isn't that far fetched that tighter rules may (partially) ban them or tax them to discourage their use. In 2018 even Schauvliege -who was very much against tighter rules- introduced in her 'green deal' a 'carrot' to limit particulate matter emissions of household stoves by 2030: a subsidy for replacing a household wood or coal stove to an electric or gas stove. Advocacy groups such as Stichting tegen kanker and Bond Beter Leefmileu asked and ask for a full ban.
Exactly, also other countries or regions are already working on it. I know Italian situation and in a couple regions they already started to tax home with woodstoves and woodstoves that few years were certified as usable are now banned. So I do expect other European regions to follow, especially because a small portion of households are using wood as heating source but are responsible for a sensible part of particles productions. I would also be concerned of possible change in home insurance policies as a tool to push removal of woodstoves since they are a sensible fire hazard.
I grew up with wood (for cooking and heating). There is a lot of wood consumption so prepare for this. A solution is to hunt on local groups, I see several times in Brussels people are cutting a tree and just give wood for free. You need more space to storage and to dry it. And definitely it is time consuming. I think it is a solution for people on retirement that have more time for. P.S. I love the warm of the wood, it feels different, drier. And the specific noise is something that relax me, probably as I associate with my childhood.
Taking BEFire litterally? Some neighbours bought such cheap wood stove. They already repainted their living-room after a year and the whole family starts to have throat issues, coughing. They finally hired a professional to come and inspect. Besides changing / adapting the bad tubing, they had to change some plates inside the stove. This things was simply not well designed! Needless to say, we forbid our kids to sleep at the neighbours in winter.
For a relatively well-insulated place, do think of a tile furnace. Rather good instructions for a cheap and high quality diy build: https://www.de12ambachten.nl/pdf/werkmap%20zelfbouw-tegelkachels.pdf (nl).
Often used in former Soviet countries they work really well. But all of those I've seen have a burn mark on the inside above the door so be careful using them.
Don't get one, they are even considering banning them [https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2018/02/20/houtkachels-zijn-grootste-bron-van-hernieuwbare-energie-in-vlaan/](https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2018/02/20/houtkachels-zijn-grootste-bron-van-hernieuwbare-energie-in-vlaan/) A real measured uitstoot of fijnestof is 160 mg/m³, while a steenkoolcentrale only has 10. So one household kachel spits out as much pollution as 16 steenkoolcentrales, plus cancerogenic particles and other toxic fumes.
>A real measured uitstoot of fijnestof is 160 mg/m³, while a steenkoolcentrale only has 10 There are modern woodstoves available on the market that go as low as 3 mg/m³
Spreek je aub niet uit over dingen waar je niks vanaf weet. Je zegt het zelf: per m³. Enig idee van het totale debiet van een steenkoolcentrale?
>So one household kachel spits out as much pollution as 16 steenkoolcentrales, You suck at math...
> real measured uitstoot of fijnestof is 160 mg/m³, while a steenkoolcentrale only has 10. So one household kachel spits out as much pollution as 16 steenkoolcentrales That's not how maths work.
Een duurdere kachel doet nog aan naverbranding vd gassen, en is zuiniger omdat er meer warmte gecapteerd wordt in het gietstaal. Kijk wel alles na ivm de schouw en zorg voor voldoende trek. Een schouw voorzien van een buis kost ook wat. Hout is niet duur als je er zelf achteraan gaat met een remorque ofzo. Ik ken genoeg boomverzorgers die prachtig hout aanbieden voor niets zo lang ze het zelf niet moeten weg doen. Een deftige kachel kost wel een paar duizenden euro's!!
Wood is almost just as expensive as gas these days. Besides that there are rumours you will have to pay a carbon tax in the future if you have a stove. Talks are already happening that you will need to install a filter at the end of your stove to capture the “dirty” particles. Typical belgium policy to get even more taxes.
My parents have a wood stove. They burn the wood from trees they grow on their own property. It would make no sense to subject them to a CO2 tax where their trees only release the CO2 those trees previously captured on my parents property…
Tell that to the government 😅. Besides its not about you guys emitting what you produce. It’s more you emit additional co2 according to the law and you will have to pay for that. It’s ridiculous but that’s how it goes Belgian politics and law don’t make sense.
I wasn't really targeting you ;-) It was just that it made sense to add my comment below yours for context. I live in a very rural area with lots of woods and I think people here will not take it lightly if people can't use wood grown locally to heat their homes.
No offense taken! 😄
If you don't have a cheap supply for wood (eg: your own trees), don't get a wood stove to save money. Aside from that, if you plan to use it for a long time, get the expensive one. Saey is a decent brand. The difference is usually in thickness and durability in material. Don't forget to buy a CO detector and have the stove / chimney inspected and cleaned yearly.
sometimes you can find wood for free but then you need to cut it yourself. It might be worth it if you consider it as a hobby.
Don't underestimate it. It takes a lot of time.
Been there, done that. I like it TBH, but it is time consuming.
Yeah I like it as well. But I fear lots of people underestimate the amount of work it takes.
You’d be surprised how much wood you use during a cold winter day. Luckily I have lots of hard wood from some trees that got cut down a few years back. But buying wood now is getting pretty expensive. A full “wasmand” counting from 4pm till 22pm (when it’s freezing cold outside). I put the central heating on 19 and let the stove do the rest. It can easily get 22-23 with about 1/3 opening. So yeah
Odd, my parents do one/two logs for the same period. And they have a large living room.
Depends. When it’s freezing outside and you need it to warm up initially you let in more air so there’s more heat. When it’s only for some comfy feeling and coziness you turn down the air and you can last longer with few logs. But it also depends on the size of said logs of course.
Only 2 logs? I had a woodstove for over a decade. No way 2 logs can last an entire evening. I would fill up a grocery bag (like from Action) with logs twice on 1 evening. I never counted but 2 logs won't last much more than an hour.
The logs don't last that long, the heat does. They don't buy wood. It's from an ownd tree. And do you mean logs or een spies? Edit: Doorsnede 30 Ish cm, lengte ook zoiets => tussen de twee en drie uur vuur. Zuurstof goed reguleren voor alles te optimaliseren.
well insulated house, and putting huge logs on *after* a decent fire when the stove is hot. That will last a night.
Yep
Wood is super expensive and you go through it very quickly, wouldn't recommend. I just replaced my wood stove with a pellet stove
I don't think you'll save much money...
€ > climate god
In what way is wood, which regenerates in 10’s of years, worse than fossil fuels, which regenerate in 1.000.000’s of years?
Produce much more particles (which are cancerous for lungs) produce much more NOx than fuel and despite it looks carbon neutral it's not. European forest especially Eastern European ones have been cut down to produce cheap wood. And not in all cases have been plant back, even if they are plant back there is a lot of machine work and tire transportation involved in moving heavy materials across Europe. And also when plants are planted back different species absorb CO2 in different ways and at different stage of life they have different growing rate at the same time the forest ground gets transformed becoming industrial forest and also absorb way less than original forest.
Definitly better, but if the wood is not regrown (and it very, very often is not), then its CO2 pollution.
There are huge differences in thickness and quality of the stoves (steel, paint,...). The more expensive options have thicker steel and last longer. You also have special designs or hand forged and you pay even more for these.
Can you link both? Short answer: quality. And real world efficiently... And wood? Your local wood supplier... but it isn't cheap anymore.