Fireplace
I grew up cutting and splitting wood for the winter, so, the fireplace was a bonus. However, the draftiness of the house would smoke you out. And, opening all the windows in the house when it’s 20 degrees outside kind of defeats the purpose of “having a fire.”
So, I bought a wood-burning insert from Quadrafire that will heat the entire house. This was installed by a few great friends of mine, taking the half-wall down behind the old boiler and bricking up the left side. Then, dropping a liner down the chimney, making the connection at the insert, and sealing the top.
Yeah, spitting/cutting/storing wood can be a pain, but, this fireplace cuts my heating bill substantially. We have a heat pump for heat/AC, however, when the temperature outdoors drops under 30 degrees, the auxiliary heat kicks on and that gets expensive.
top of the chimney, can you guess which is the oil flue?
perfect example of why you need a cap on your chimney
top terracotta flue tile broken for fireplace
RonJon Chimney Sweep to the rescue!
RonJon also installed a cap
measuring the firebox for a new insert
Fireplace insert is here!
out with the old
this half wall was where the original boiler was, I needed these bricks for the left side
bricks cut out
ready to brick up the left side of the fire box
we have a wall
mortar curing, liner installed, ready for fire
I built this wood holder for the garage, it holds roughly a quarter cord of firewood
and this is the wood holder next to the fireplace, it's attached to the wall w/ french cleats
Bellah loves the fire
as do the cats
and sometimes we snuggle