How to Ensure the Efficiency of Your Wood Stove
The efficiency of a wood burning stove is something that varies from stove to stove, but if you want to get the best from yours, then read on.
Efficiency is how much heat you receive in your home compared to how much heat is generated. For example, you can expect to gain around 10% of the heat that an open fireplace produces. A lot of the heat will generally go up the chimney or even be absorbed by the bricks in the surround.
Efficiency of between 30% and 50% can be achieved by the most basic of wood stoves, whereas those in the high performance category can produce as much as 90% efficiency. What you need to know from this is the amount of wood that you’ll be burning in the gap between 30% and 90% efficiency. It’s likely to mean that you’re burning 3 times as much wood. This can make for an expensive difference in terms of time, energy, storage and waste.
If you want to benefit from using the most efficient of wood, then you can find out how much energy it has by checking the BTU rating. Although there is some difference between tree species, most wood is similar in output of energy.
One thing you should know is that the hotter the stove gets, the more efficient it will burn the wood. If the stove is not hot enough to break down the wood into smaller molecules, then the wood will not burn properly and much of the potential will be taken up the chimney in the form of smoke. In addition to the higher heat, there needs to be a good supply of oxygen to feed the fire.
Some people like to install a convecting stove fan outside of their stove. This can increase the flow of air over the surface of the stove so that heat is transferred into the room. However, with a newer high performance wood stove, this becomes unnecessary.
Call our expert team to find out about our latest offers of high performance wood stoves on 0113 257 1512.
