Throw a log on the fire: two fireplaces renovated
We restored two fireplaces last month, but I finally am getting around to posting the pics. To give you some orientation: There are two chimneys with three flues each in our three story house. We tackled the front chimney which vents the boiler through one of the flues (which was relined). The parlor FP above…
We restored two fireplaces last month, but I finally am getting around to posting the pics.
To give you some orientation: There are two chimneys with three flues each in our three story house. We tackled the front chimney which vents the boiler through one of the flues (which was relined). The parlor FP above it was restored and it’s flue was relined to burn wood. The bedroom FP above that was restored to a gel-burning FP. The mantels, surrounds and hearthstones were also reset or replaced where missing.
I had been warned by other brownstoners that it would be messy. And it was! Think of it as surgery on the house. Centuries of soot and a bunch of guys with jackhammers. But, it took only five days, although my partner decamped with the dog to his mother’s house, while I huddled in the two rooms that were dust free.
The finished products are more than worth it. The wood burning fireplace drafts just perfectly: not a wisp of smoke even on Sunday when we had those strong winds.
Here is the link to the pics:
http://www.flickr.com/gp/15516153@N02/a63B5C
If you watch it as a slideshow, make sure you click on the ‘i’ for descriptions and titles (all pics have them).
Thanks to the brownstoners who helped with my questions about FP restorations.
Enjoy!
8:29: Thanks for your compliments about the fireplace.
As far as the issue of green-ness, I would still want to maintain that wood is greener than burning coal, electricity (produced from coal) and natural gas whether it is burnt in a campfire or a EPA certified wood stove, if you look at the amount of carbon released when it is burnt. In terms of wood, the carbon released by burning is the same carbon that was sequestered by the tree as it grew, and would have been released by it’s rotting, whereas with coal and gas you are removing sequestered carbon from under the earth that was fossilized and adding it to the atmosphere. You end up with a net gain of carbon when burning these fuels. Same with oil.
Then there is the issue of air quality. It is not yet proven that when stoves burn wood in real life (not the smoldering, but efficient, burn that the EPA uses when it tests them) burn cleaner than well-designed (and I agree there are many poorly designed FPs out there) fireplaces. CA certifies some FP designs as clean burning heaters.
Bottom line: I think the issue is more complicated than ‘fireplaces dirty! stoves, gas, electricity and oil (God forbid!) clean!’ There is no fuel without any environmental impact at all (wind, hydroelectric, nuclear included) and one could go crazy if one took an absolute stand about this. (Note the whole biofuels evidence that came up recently). Which is why I said ‘wood is green (to an extent)’. But, I seem to think burning wood in a well-designed fireplace, especially harvested off land sustainably, is greener in some ways than other heating options, unless we look at solar powered electric heat, etc.
You may find some interesting points in the below link. Especially check out the article on emissions:
http://www.rumford.com/green/index.htm
John Ife, I’d love to have a wood-fired cook stove, in our house, but it might be a little bit inconvenient. Let’s see… 🙂
Ohlise,
That is assuming that you are using an advanced combustion wood burning stove or fireplace, which these brownstone fireplaces, definitely are not. These fireplaces produce a lot of soot. Not that there is necessarily anything wrong with having a beautiful fireplace in your living room. Just don’t kid yourself about being green.
guest at 6:13,
What a coincidence, I grew up in the UK as well and have fond memories of the warm glow of the smoldering embers emanating from the hearth in our “front room”, which probably prompts my interest in the coal option. Hell, the heat source for the living room in the home I lived in ’til my teens was an old Rayburn coal-fired unit! It incorporated an oven (maybe 2, actually), hot plates and heated the domestic water too. I have vivid memories of my mother putting the yeast mixture to rise in the airing cupboard (which contained the hot water tank) next to the range and then cooking delicious bread in the range oven. Yum!
Having grown up in the UK with coal-burning fireplaces, I can testify that they are a dirty, sooty pain in the arse. In our renovation we created two wbfs from what had previously been decorative hot air vents but I kinda regret that we didn’t go for the gas option. There are some very handsome English gas grates available today (in both sleek modernists designs as well as traditional period designs) but they are damn pricey. I also looked at the amazing antique stoves (all of them rebuilt and can be converted to gas) from Good Times Stoves in western Mass. Anybody out there use gas?
Here you go:
http://www.thegreenguide.com/doc/ask/stove
Can you tell me what is green about burning wood?
3:48- That is Sterno, but it is very similar. Sterno has a small blue flame, the fireplace gel has large crackling flames. But, there are many recipes for homemade gel on the internet as well. The easiest involves mixing isopropyl alcohol that you buy in the drugstore with a half-finished can to extend the life of the can.
Forgot to mention the most important advantage of a gel FP: you do not need to line the flue or have a flue at all. You can have a fire on your dining room table or patio table if you wanted. It does not give off too much heat or fumes (although I have found that when you burn it for a while you do get some odor and you need to crack the window a bit).
Are those the same gel cans you use for fondue and catering trays? How funny to think they just add salt to make them a fireplace fire source.
12:55 : Yes that is the heart pine/ pumpkin pine/ old-growth pine floor/ sub-floor. Ours probably had carpet/ rugs over it at one point. In the parlor FP pics, you will see we have the same floor in the parlor (actually the entire house). This one is untreated and I plan to keep it that way. It has a lovely patina and shine on it’s own, dings, stains, spots and all.
The parlor floor was finished by the previous owners with polyurethane, the shiny kind. When it needs to be refinished I plan to strip it back to an unfinished state and at the most oil it. We have area rugs on both floors.
John Ife, you are right about these being coal FPs, which is why they are so shallow and suited to being converted to a Rumford type FP. I had initially thought of getting a gas coal basket insert, but the charm of wood seduced me. Coal fires get very hot, hotter than wood. Coal is also not a green fuel (wood is to an extent). I could burn coal in my wbfp if I wanted, only coal fires are hard to start and are meant to stay on most of the season to provide heat. They’re not like the short fires that we burn with wood just for fun. Having said that, this FP heats the room by about 5 degrees above room temp with 3-4 logs in the FP. The most heat comes not from the roaring flames though, but from the embers when the flames slightly subside.