Emitting smoke is against the law, and you should be punished. Do something about it very quickly: if you come up against a magistrate whose child is asthmatic you will get stuffed.
I know three people that own these things - and none of them are able to use them. They are fine if you live in the wilds of Dartmoor - but a waste of time in civilisation.
I'm with John. I believe you should be punished. I think you should be tied to a cart and whipped all the way out of town.
if it's a decent wood burner, properly installed and you're burning properly seasoned wood there should be very little smoke.
If there is enough smoke to annoy your neighbour you're probably burning green wood, which will also do all sorts of damage to your chimney etc. over time.
As a rule of wood, all wood should be stored for at least a year before burning, with big logs split to hep the drying process.
We have been looking at log boilers recently, and the chimney for that should be a minimum of 6m high to get enough draw, and should emit away from windows and above the ridge line if poss so the wind has a chance to disperse the emissions. We were advised that it is possible to fit a fan to the top of the chimney to help if the necessary height can't be achieved. But you'll also see lots of single storey extensions these days with long double-wall flues sticking some height above the roof.
I'd go back and talk to your wood burner supplier.
Originally posted by metalmicky: Emitting smoke is not against the law. Mike
In a lot of areas emitting smoke from a fireplace or stove is a civil offence punishable by a fine. I'm sure that this is rarely enforced, unless a complaint by a neighbour is received.
Originally posted by lee33: I was under the impression that most areas of the UK are now 'smokeless zones'. Something to do with the clean air act in the late 50s IIRC.
lee
All of them are actually. However there is a snag. Some local authorities are very poor at carrying out their duty under the acts. Such LAs, even if so many people complain that they can't ignore it, do things like turn up two days later and pronounce in a letter to the complainants that they have inspected the area and found that the nuisance, if there ever was one, is now abated.
Emitting smoke from the exhaust of a vehicle is illegal as well, but few LAs enforce it which is why it is so horrible getting caught behind a bus belching out fumes.
I was pleased to read above that good wood butrning stoves emit little smoke if the right logs are used. Pleased because in fact burning wood as fuel is the greenest way of heating, it is exactly carbon neutral because new trees have to be grown to replace the ones burned.
I should have quallified my reply to the effect that emmitting smoke is only an offence within smokeless zones, these zones are a very small minority of britains land mass and mainly confined to the cities which is fair enough as I could think of nothing worse than chimney smoke mixed with all the other fumes and stinks that town dwellers have to put up with.
Regarding seasoned timber, yes dried timber is best. certainly hardwood as opposed to soft wood, both burn but the S wood is gone in a jiff. Damp or green wood will burn and do very little damage to your flue, what you will find is that you have a nice hot stove and you stick some green on it and then a great deal of the stoves latent heat will be used in drying the wood and the moisture released will further cool the stove and flue etc etc. Mike
I take it you don't have a B.B.Q. thats not gas ? I live in a wood and we burn wood all the time. We are building a log stock so we can sell wood thats been drying for a year or more as it does give off almost no smoke. Plus the new trees growing convert more co2 in to oxygen.
If life is a road we take, is confusion just aroundabout ??
You can have smell without smoke. Wood is a complex concoction of hydrocarbons - many of them aromatic. If you live in a wood - fine. If you live amongst neighbours - forget it.
Our sweep swears that green wood will wreck a metal flue. And I have heard from a number of sources that the best logs are aged at least 1 year in the wet ie not covered up and at least 1 year in the dry -preferably very well ventillated. This of course takes quite a bit of storage space but will increase the wildlife visiting your garden. Hedgehogs that munch through tons of slugs and snails do love a good woodpile to hide in, but you might also get more creepy crawlies too yuk!
