I HATE the wood burning stove. Any alternatives please.

[Cameo]

Sell Overseas Property

OK, spent our first winter in BG, and the old petchka in the lounge kept the whole house toasty warm, no probs, except that it has made the whole house really grubby and dirty. Walls are all about 10 shades darker which look horrible, so have spent the last week decorating all through the house. Surely this cant be what the Bulgarians do every single spring, decorate the house from top to bottom.

So, question is, what other kinds of fuel can I use that will heat the house as good as a petchka, but not make it as dirty as the wood burning stove does. I love my house here in BG, but long to have the 'clean warmth of good old gas central heating'. Cant afford to fit a whole new system of 'whatever', but would welcome other peoples views on getting winter warmth without the dirt of the wood burner.

If anyone has gone down the route of using Electric storage heaters over here this last winter, I would like to hear from you about how they worked, if they were efficient enough, and what your bill was like for the winter quater. Reason Im asking is that many years ago in UK I had 2 big storage heaters to heat the whole house and I loved them, so warm and to be honest, not too bad on electric to considering.

[skaviva]

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Surely this cant be what the Bulgarians do every single spring, decorate the house from top to bottom.

It is indeed.

[oldtimer]

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I would not want the electric bill at the end of winter for storage heating, would coal be any cleaner not sure, you could have a gas tank fitted in the garden and run gas, besides that its back to wood, and painting, sorry I have to do this every year for the past 13 years. You could leave it one summer which we did but it looked so grubby. So once the fire goes out, out comes the paint brush.

[chappers]

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Air con, see air con thread. Probably, once fitted, cheaper than wood heating. keep the stove for any periods without electric

All the best!

[SimonTrace]

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As I have had a MF stove in the UK for donkeys years and never had a problem, can we not assume that it is the appliance and not the fuel causing the issue?

I burn logs and I don't have any issues other than a very slightly higher amount of dust on furniture. Would the solution be to replace the existing unit with an MF stove with back boiler if required? I would imagine that a modern stove would be more economical as well.

[Cameo]

Sell Overseas Property

Thank you Simon Trace. But I have a question, what is an MF stove, not heard of that. As for my stove, well I bought it this year, and 'think' its quite a modern one, at least that is what everyone who sees it says, not quite like the normal BG petchka thingy. What I did find though, is that every day there was a fine covering of dust everywhere and yes I can deal with that. But what it did do was to make all the white walls very grubby with dark lines around all the right-angled corners and wall/ceiling angles.

Dont get me wrong, I cant fault it for warmth, it was great. But ohhhhh the state of the walls now that its spring. Been painting solid for the last 3 days and am sick sick sick of painting. And this BG paint, its so thin it drips everywhere, aaahhhhhhh. Save me please. lol.

[SimonTrace]

Sell Overseas Property

Sorry Cameo, MF - Multi Fuel .

The stove you have, do you have the doors open on it when it's lit?

[bgcarl]

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Two things to try.

The less efficient the chimney, the less it draws and the more smoke it likely to emanate into the room.

How often do you clean the chimney? - possibly do it more often.

Build a taller and wider chimney and get more "pull". Even when you open the door to stock it up, less smoke will emanate.

Cheers

BGCarl

[Tiarnan]

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Cameo
I know this won,t be much help to you but we are in the same boat.....tho don,t get a fine layer of dust over things.....its probably straight into our lungs......but we would,nt change the petchkas at all. I,ll paint again when we stop lighting all together.....for us its only 2 rooms affected.
With respect I would,nt countenance any form of electric heating as a main source....way too dear and you could be left with none at at all with the frequent power cuts.
I believe that a couple of days painting at this time of years is worth the benefits of our petchkas.
Hope you can sort the problem to your satisfaction.

[SimonTrace]

Sell Overseas Property

Without knowing more information it is hard to advise. Although a wider taller chimney does not guarantee a good draw up the chimney.

The doors on a stove should remain closed when lit and the flue from the stove should be airtight. Has your chimney/flue been smoke tested?

Just as importantly the steel flue from the stove should have an airtight seal to the chimney (usually via a register plate).

I will say it again. There is no reason why a stove installed and operated correctly should have such an adverse effect on your décor.