Wood burning stove inside historic fireplace?
Shopping around is often the mistake a homeowner makes. If you call three contractors who have been doing something for 25 years and they say one thing and offer a high price, that is where the job should be. If someone shops enough and learns a little and can push the wrong bottom feeding contractor (as i tried asking if the stove flue can be stuck 3′ up the existing flue), they will manipulate the contractor into doing something that should not be done and that contractor will not convey the risks, if he even knows them. Contractors who fall into this should not be doing the specialty they are doing. They are handymen or opportunists.
I have noticed that people on here assume that the shoddy work was always out there and this is the way it is and has been and we have to accept it. There was a time that you called a contractor who told you what had to be done and he was correct. We are not that removed from that. If people learn how to avoid the bottom feeders, they will have less trouble.
I know, the temptation of a low price or saving money is attractive . But with this and many other things, things we might consider luxuries, if the homeowner cannot do them correctly and safely, they should not be doing them at all.
I keep saying this here, i worked in lower management for a professional property management firm and for commercial buildings in nyc. We did not make the mistakes that i read about here and when i read what you said, i realize why we did not make those mistakes. If you shop around for something, that is the mistake.
Raise the bar urbandad. It will be good for everyone, the homeowners, the contractors, the kid walking down the street, the city.
stevecym
in General Discussion 4 years and 2 months ago
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60 replies
restorationcontractor | 4 years and 2 months ago
@Colonialrevival, I think you were at the very least quite harsh with Steve, he was only trying to help you.
While his replies may be long winded, take the time to read them as he knows what he is talking about and has years of experience under his belt.
I do have first hand experience with this, however after reading the thread I don’t feel good about posting.
Thank you @Bobmarvin for not deleting the posts it was an interesting discussion.
Not that I necessarily follow my own advice but we are all here to talk about the old houses we love/hate (otherwise we wouldn’t be here) and the work they require in somewhat of an informal social online setting IMHO.
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
i will try to keep this brief, but i wish to explain how i felt about some of the communication and perhaps say something that might help op really take advantage of a site like this:
i felt you were dismissive.
i don’t want to enter gender (and would rather not know the gender of people posting on this board) into this but you used that phrase “mansplaining”. no women has ever used that word around me. i don’t know what it means. perhaps where i questioned your lack of info and how it would go for me if came to a meeting like that, was that mansplaining? a man would not have accused me of this. he would have found a way to tell me to …. off.
now that i suspect you are much younger than me and i am envisioning who you are, i would not have said a lot of things i did say. i thought i was dealing with some sort of manager or high end professional, someone with a bit more age and perhaps a little weathered. i am not meaning to offend here, but perhaps that is not you.
this leads me to something else. i now realize your use of the term “ent husiasm” might have been in earnest. i took it as patronizing and dismissive. i might have read that wrong and i am sorry if i did.
asking me to stay off your post? that is an invitation for trouble. my opinion may be in the minority on this, but my thought is once it is on the internet it is in the public domain. to ask something of this sounded a bit self entitled and i ignored it.
you came on here at a time when we have a couple of people stating things they are pulling from books as if they know it all. i will admit it gets under my skin. guys like me go out and work and get dirty and injured and it takes years to learn all this stuff and someone else comes on and reads things out of books and repeats it. its disrespectful to people who came up in it and learned this the old fashioned way (when people do not have answers or someone is wrong, pull the book out). when we were younger, if you thought you might be talking back to someone who had more experience and age, you would give them more difference, at least until you can prove them wrong and if it was not in the workplace and did not matter, we were told to keep quiet.
Your approach to this made it sound like you are someone who did not like what you are hearing so you wanted nothing to do with what i was saying. when i get calls from potential customers i do not run out and visit with them without first making a 1/2 long phone call to discuss the job. i am not selling myself to them as much as i am weeding out people who do not want to hear the truth. with buildings, the truth can be expensive.
But avoiding it can be more expensive (and deadly).
I will convey this for your benefit:
i knew i had the information correct (the man i did this with was particular to a fault). you wanted me to go away as you felt i would push others away who might have better info. that is not the dynamic here and it is better it is not. if someone, especially someone like me who works on buildings, comes on here and says something wrong, they pounce. if i repeat it twice, they will pounce harder. the reason they did not pounce was i was the only person on this board who had done something like this (and i knew that, i had never read about this situation on here). Even with DIBS, he has done a combination of rolling up his sleeves and it seems like spending a good bit of money hiring intelligent people to do things for him. but he does his research. when he came on here and did not speak back to me and told you to google it, i knew he did not know. and guess what, he probably had a pretty good idea that i knew what i was talking about otherwise he would have challenged me. when dealing with contractors, especially when you call them to your house, let them ramble on a bit and talk and listen and fact check behind them; the ones that know the job will give you good details and the ones that don’t will trip themselves up.
People who write on like to give best practices. there may be 3 ways to do something. i have a house full of short cuts here but i am not going to tell someone who does not understand the risks involved in those shortcuts to use them and i will not do them in a customer’s house. in the past it sounds people may have solved your issue by other means. in talking to people i am getting a sense that the proper way to do this is driven less by code and more by insurance companies. i tired to get the companies i called to tell me the WHY and i would have shared that (my guess is they do not want to be responsible for an old lining, even if it is good; they don’t want a fire and a homeowner’s company comes after them?). They were not going to dedicate the time to expalin something to someone who was not purchasing something. had you asked me nicely to see what more i can find about this, i would have poked around a bit. i am very curious about a lot of this; in truth, i am constantly surprised that something i did with someone in suffolk county years ago was actually the “best practice”.
had you not used the phrase “unfortunate ramblings” i would have come back on and perhaps shared some of what i learned without writing what i had. I included the other things because i am often seeing a dismissive younger generation that seems to not value the efforts of people who toil and does not understand that the details – the “stories” – matter a lot.
cammymcfadden | 4 years and 2 months ago
@colonialrevival (a very fitting name actually), the whole point of a forum is to foster discussion. It’s a community — not a search engine where you can expect a response based on the parameters you set – and then get dismissive (and ageist) when you don’t get your preferred answer in your preferred format. Speaking of search engines, you might want to use one – as this very question has been addressed many times (my fellow Brownstoners are too polite to mention this).
I do hope you stay and learn a few things (not just about flues and firebrick). And if not, don’t let the Eastlake double-entry doors hit you in the vestibule on your way out.
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
so back to the flue issue. the third person i spoke to the other day said something like this to me as to why someone does not want to push a stove flue just 3′ up a chimney (with a good lining) and push some insulating material around it: he said they are afraid the force of a fire can push that insulation out of the joint between the flue and say a terra cotta liner and land in the living space” since this person was not a paid installer i did not spend to much time questioning him. i kind of got my answer and ran.
I called this person was he was a “techinal editor” or “research director” for Mother Earth News magazine from circa 1978 to 1992, the period when people really began looking into alternative fuels and ways of heating. he heats with wood and he did also tell me that he had to have a metal insert put in his chimney for other reasons.
btw op, i made these calls the other day because i was pissed. all of us guys know someone who knows something. if the answers are not appearing here and i know someone, i will make a call.
JohnHancock | 4 years and 2 months ago
@handy….lol!
daveinbedstuy | 4 years and 2 months ago
” the force of a fire can push that insulation out of the joint between the flue and say a terra cotta liner” Nonsense. A fire is contained inside a cast iron wood stove. You don’t see or experience any “force” in the metal exhaust flue coming out of a wood stove.
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
DIBS: sorry, i was not clear. they were talking about a chimney fire. i know the thought is that the heat and flame from a chimney fire would rise but that is what they said.
i think a lot of the worry around this concerns a chimney fire.
to my point, if anyone says anything wrong, dibs is right there.
daveinbedstuy | 4 years and 2 months ago
And chimeny fires are caused by issues within the chimney (typically buildups) , not the firebox. And the OP has stated that their chimney has been determined to be in good shape.
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
DIBS, I think the entire doubt about this for the OP is the “why” companies that retrofit stoves into preexisting fire places with good liners do it this way. it is an added cost. it might be the responsibility; they don’t want it. three companies have said if they do it, they run a flue from the stove up the chimney out out the top. I pushed them. when questioned, they were firm on that (all three told me “if we do it, that is the only way”; one said, “unless you have a stainless liner to attach to”). the man i did it with had a 15 year old chimney and did it – years before this lining thing was talked about. what you are reading here is probably the “best practice”. i cannot debate that as it comes from paid pros. you know, you always do your research and go with the smart money; i called the smart money. maybe they are using this as an excuse to sell a little more work and make a little more money? perhaps. i did mention somewhere else t hat i get a sense insurance companies are behind this; maybe the insurance companies for the stove installers are telling them to to it this way?
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
so dibs. i called back Maggie at NY Chimney Repair at 1-516-279-1513. i told her the scenario and asked her about installing a “wood stove in an existing fire place with a perfectly good terra cotta lining”. i asked if i could post her company’s name on line (again) and quote her and this is what she said:
“if it is a perfect liner and an engineer signed off on it”
So i asked “so you would do it?” She said “we would consider it, but i doubt an engineer will sign off on it.”
i asked, “why would an engineer not want to sign off on it” and she replied “because it is not the right way to do it.”
somewhere in there i asked about insurance and she said “it has to do with the ventilation of the stove”.
daveinbedstuy | 4 years and 2 months ago
As I read the installation instructions on Vermont Castings website, it may have an effect on the draw so that does have “to do with the ventilation of the stove.”
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
something about it then settling more tar on the lining if it is not run through a flue pipe. i read something about that and the guy i called said that. the flue opening into the larger chimeny and possibly the draw you are referencing might cause that issue. beyond my comprehension.
count on you.
hkapstein | 4 years and 2 months ago
I’ve seen inserts installed into a tile lined flue. I don’t think I’d do it though. But if you call enough people, I’m sure you’ll find someone who would do it.
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
urbandad, after i did all that research here and relayed how the pros do it, can i ask what do you mean by “inserts installed in a tile lined flue”? can you clarify? how is it different that what the people i spoke to said?
lkrshacmzcy | 4 years and 2 months ago
54 Responses and counting…love to see all the activity!!
lkrshacmzcy | 4 years and 2 months ago
54 Responses and counting…love to see all the activity!!
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
@chris: how much more can someone say something to this?
i want to know what he is implying. after i did all that leg work to get the best and safest practice i want to know if he is going to post some short cut.
hkapstein | 4 years and 2 months ago
@steve, when I said insert, I meant a fireplace insert rather than a liner. I think that would be more typical than a freestanding stove for a fireplace flue, but it’s possible a freestanding stove could be used, and it’s not an important distinction here.
All I was saying is I’ve seen folks vent a wood burning appliance into a tile lined flue, and I bet there’s contractors who would install it that way, but I would not do it in a brownstone. In a 1 story house where the chimney could be more easily inspected and didn’t pass through many occupied spaces I’d be more likely to consider this, but in that case the liner installation would be pretty easy anyway.
andriywww1990 | 4 years and 2 months ago
urbandad: it would have been ok to say what you did about venting that in an unlined flue before i made all of those calls because no one on here, including myself, really knew for certain what they proper, professional way to do this was. so i drove it to the end zone and called all of those people and got the answers. i even asked can this be vented in a flue without its own lining from the stove or in your case insert. now you come on and say you bet there contractors who would do this. i bet there are as well. i am sitting in my house with has all sorts of things that are not correct in it – but i do not do that kind of thing in my customers houses (my wife says it is the cobbler’s children with no shoes).
this is what is wrong with making a suggestion like you just did, especially with something that a minimally experienced person might conclude can be dangerous and to an audience that may not realize the danger. it makes people think that it is ok to shop around for shoddy contractors who do not give a toss about the homeowners safety and who won’ t be there in two years if something goes wrong. it also drives legitimate contractors from the business because as more of these – i don’t know what to call them (dirt bags? i worked for a man once who took advantage of people and there was no limit to who he would do shoddy work for; we need to make it hard for them to exist) – enter the field and take money from people, it makes it harder for people who want to do it the right way to compete. and when you come on here and say something for the sake of saying it, without really thinking about whether it is ok or complies with an accepted industry standard, it means that legitimate contractors who want to do this the right way have to fight back against your “let’s lower the bar” mentality. it makes it harder for an honest person with integrity to sell the job.
if you want to comment to what i said, why don’t you pick up where i left off: “if an engineer would approve it they would consider it” and call an engineer and push it around that way. and then, if the engineer says it is ok, say so.